Individual Solutions

Every investor is unique, and investment advisory services provide you with professional investment advice and a personalized investment strategy. Whether you're seeking a tailored, professionally managed portfolio, or the convenience and simplicity of a diversified mutual fund wrap program, your investment choice should focus on meeting your financial goals. During this process, you should consider current and future growth objectives, income needs, time horizon and risk tolerance. These considerations form the blueprint for developing a portfolio management strategy. The process involves, but is not limited to, the following important stages.

• Ease of pre-designed mutual fund portfolios

• Set investment objectives

• Develop an asset allocation strategy

• Evaluate/Select investment vehicle

Some benefits of managed portfolios include:

• Ensure college expenses are properly planned -- include tuition, room and board and living expenses. Factor in an inflation rate for the rising cost of tuition. Should you consider planning for post-graduate studies? Do you expect your child/children to receive scholarships or financial aid?

• Providing access to top-tier investment management professionals.

• Tailored portfolios to meet specific investment needs.

• Ownership of individual securities - allowing for significant flexibility in controlling tax exposure.

Education planning for your children can be a major financial consideration. Planning early allows you to take advantage of the time value of money and help minimize the savings requirement.

Consideration should be given to one or more of the following strategies when trying to maximize your college planning:

• Prioritize your education objective with your insurance needs, retirement needs, major purchases and current income needs.

• Develop an effective savings strategy that considers asset allocation and takes advantage of education plans.

• Consider the various education funding options:

  • Qualified State Tuition Plans (also known as 529 Plans)

  • Uniform Transfer to Minor Accounts (UTMA)

  • Uniform Gifts to Minor Accounts (UGMA)

  • Coverdell Educational savings accounts

  • Prepaid tuition plans

The amount you will need in retirement depends on the age you plan to retire, your desired retirement lifestyle, how long you expect to live and the rate of return that you expect to earn on your investments. Social Security and employer-sponsored pension plans will probably provide less of what you will need than they did for your parents.

Consideration should be given to one or more of the following strategies when trying to maximize your retirement income:

• Clearly prioritized retirement goals and objectives

• Retirement at a later age

• Saving more

• Spending less during retirement

• Invest to earn a potentially higher rate of return on investments while still feeling comfortable with the level of risk involved

• Liquidation of non-cash assets

• Social Security

• Maximize contributions to qualified retirement plans

• 401(k) and IRA rollovers*

What you value may be more important than what you own. To follow through on your commitments -- to yourself, your family, and your ideals -- you need to think ahead. A personalized estate plan is important in helping to protect your family and your legacy. A well-constructed strategy can help address your specific estate planning needs including:

• Minimizing income and estate taxes

• Transferring wealth from one generation to the next

• Developing charitable gifting strategies

• Aligning existing portfolios and retirement accounts with your estate plan

Gifting strategies may be used as a means of distributing your estate and effectively reducing estate taxes upon death. Most taxpayers can accomplish significant estate planning objectives simply by taking advantage of lifetime giving which includes making maximum use of the annual exclusion, lifetime use of the applicable exclusion amount and lifetime taxable gifts.