The Considerate Method

Thoughtful planning begins with understanding your life.

We believe retirement planning should feel personal, coordinated, and calm.

Five stages, from a first conversation to a relationship that lasts. At the end of each, you hold something you did not have before.

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In brief

01
Fit
The first conversation
02
Direction
Understand your life
03
The map
Clarify the financial picture
04
The plan
Design and decide
05
Ongoing
Guide ongoing decisions

The Considerate Method

Five stages, one long conversation.

Most advisory work is organized around transactions. The Considerate Method is organized around a relationship: five stages designed to make decisions clearer, slower, and more durable over a long retirement.

Fit

The first conversation

Everything starts with one conversation. You tell us what brought you here, the decisions ahead, and what you are trying to build, and we tell you plainly what working together looks like. It is informational, with no obligation, and if the fit is not there we say so and leave it at that.

What you walk away with

A plain answer, both ways, on whether this is a fit.

The thinking behind it:How the first call works

Direction

Understand your life

Before building a financial plan, we want to understand the life the plan is meant to support. We talk about your goals and what they cost each other, your concerns, your relationships, the work transition, and what you want retirement to feel like.

What you walk away with

Your goals named and ranked, and what each one costs the others.

The thinking behind it:A retirement needs somewhere to go You were never your job title

The map

Clarify the financial picture

We gather the moving parts of your financial life into one view: investments, taxes, retirement income, concentrated positions, estate documents, insurance, and the decisions already in motion. Then we look at where your current course leads and where the gaps are, before anything is recommended.

What you walk away with

Your whole financial life in one view, with the gaps marked.

The thinking behind it:Your retirement timeline Two million is not a yes or no

The plan

Design and decide

We build a coordinated retirement plan and present it to you in full, with the reasoning shown. Then comes a refinement window: time to ask questions, weigh the tradeoffs, and change what should change. Nothing moves until you have decided on purpose rather than by default.

Income
a retirement paycheck strategy that balances flexibility, tax awareness, and long-term durability
Investments
portfolios aligned with the job they need to do, not with headlines or forecasts
Tax planning
which accounts to draw from, and when, over decades, coordinated with your CPA
Healthcare
the Medicare decision, insurance, and the cost of care later in life
Legacy
estate documents, gifts, and charitable goals, coordinated with your attorney and your family

What you walk away with

A plan with the reasoning shown, and the time to sit with it before anything moves.

The thinking behind it:The order you draw from your accounts Avoiding the Illinois estate tax The calculators

Ongoing

Guide ongoing decisions

Retirement planning is not static. Markets change, tax laws evolve, families grow, priorities shift, and life happens. We put the plan into motion with you, meet as decisions come up, watch the dates that matter as you reach them, and remain a thought partner through every transition.

What you walk away with

Someone who already knows your whole picture when the next decision arrives.

The thinking behind it:The widow's penalty What your bonds are actually for

What the shape is for

The goal is not simply to optimize a portfolio.

Why one plan, not five

Income, investments, taxes, healthcare, and legacy are one decision wearing five names. A withdrawal changes a tax bracket, which changes a Medicare premium, which changes what is left to give. Designed together, the pieces are meant to stop working against each other.

Why the pause

Many plans are presented and acted on in the same meeting. Ours is presented, then given time. You ask the questions that come to you a week later, and nothing moves until you have decided on purpose rather than by default.

Why ongoing

The plan is never finished, because your life is not. When the next decision arrives, a sale, a diagnosis, a hard year in the markets, someone already understands your whole picture, and you do not start over.

What it costs

One fee for all five stages. The first conversation costs nothing.

Our fee is based on assets under management, blended across tiers and disclosed in writing before any engagement begins.

Each rate applies only to the assets within that band. Your effective fee is the weighted average. Larger or more complex engagements may use a customised arrangement.

Assets managed

Annual fee

First $1M

1.00%

$1M – $3M

0.80%

$3M – $5M

0.65%

$5M – $10M

0.50%

$10M – $25M

0.40%

$25M+

Custom

Common questions

The questions people ask before they decide.

Plain answers to the things worth knowing before a first conversation.

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We primarily work with thoughtful pre-retirees and retirees with $2M+ in investable assets who want an ongoing advisory relationship. We are generally not the right fit for DIY investors or one-time planning engagements.

Then we say so, plainly, and there is no follow-up. The first conversation exists to answer that question for both of us, and a clear no is a good outcome.How the first call works →

Our fee is based on assets under management, on a tiered, blended schedule — as assets grow, the incremental tiers bill at lower rates. It is our only compensation: no commissions, no product revenue, no hidden charges. You will see the schedule in writing, and we will walk through it together, before any engagement begins. The full tier-by-tier schedule is published on our Process page. And we hold ourselves to a simple test: we should only work together if we genuinely believe we can create more value than we charge.See the full fee schedule on the Process page →

No. The Considerate Method is an ongoing relationship, because the value is in the decisions that come after the plan, not in the document itself. If a one-time plan is what you need, we will say so on the first call.

Less than you might expect. A few conversations, the documents we ask for, and honest answers about what you want. We carry the organizing and the analysis. You make the decisions, with the reasoning shown.

A first conversation

The best plans begin with a real conversation.

We work with a small number of families. The first conversation is informational only, no obligation, no pressure.

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