Financial planning for business owners
Financial planning for business owners: one plan for the business and your life.
Where the company ends and your personal finances begin isn't a line anyone can actually draw. So we don't draw it. One plan - built on how the business pays you, what it's worth, and what you want it to make possible.
What the plan covers
Everything the business touches, in one place.
Each part connects to the others. A decision about one often changes the rest.
How you pay yourself
The mix of salary and distributions affects your taxes, what can go into a retirement plan, and how a buyer may value the business.
Your number
How much is enough to step back, and what it would take from the business to get there.
How much to retireWealth beyond the business
Building savings that don't depend on the company, so one asset isn't carrying everything.
Investment managementTaxes, year-round
Compensation, retirement plans, and timing, coordinated with your CPA before the year closes.
Tax strategyProtecting your family
An estate plan, insurance, and a buy-sell that agree with each other and with what you own today.
Protecting your familyYour exit
A sale, succession, or family transfer, planned with enough time to keep your options open.
Exit and successionBusiness and household
There's only one balance sheet.
For an owner here in Kitsap County, personal and business finances are already connected. A plan works best when it treats them that way.
- Revenue and profit
- What it's worth to a buyer
- Payroll and your team
- The company retirement plan
- The guarantee on the lease
- A credit line secured by the house
- How you pay yourself
- The business as the retirement plan
- Income for your family
- Savings and investments
- Your home
- College, giving, and retirement
An example
Why the business and the plan can't be separated.
For many owners, the business is the largest thing they own by far.
When one asset carries most of the plan
The assumptions
- The owner's share of the business$5,000,000
- Home equity$700,000
- Retirement accounts$600,000
- Other investments$200,000
- Total net worth$6,500,000
Where this owner's net worth sits
About 77% of this owner's net worth is in one asset that usually can't be sold quickly. A plan would look at how much to build outside the business, and how fast, what the family would rely on in a hard year, and what price would let the owner step back.
A hypothetical illustration based only on the assumptions shown. It is not a projection or guarantee of results for any client, and it is not tax or legal advice.
Your team, connected
Everyone working from the same numbers.
Your CPA has the taxes, your attorney the documents, your banker the debt - each excellent at their piece. A plan is the part that connects them, and with your permission, we keep everyone working from the same picture.
Your CPA
Tax returns and tax advice
Your estate attorney
Wills, trusts, and business documents
Your banker
Lending, credit, and cash management
Walters Wealth Management
Investments, retirement, and the plan that ties it together
Who you'll work with
Nate and Tyler, start to finish.
You'll work with both of us on the whole plan: the business, your family, and what comes after. Nate has advised business owners for more than thirty-five years. Tyler brings an analytical, modern approach to every plan.
No account reps or hand-offs. When you call, you reach one of us.
Meet Nate and TylerHow it works
How we build your plan.
One plan for the business and your life, built with you.
A first conversation
What's on your mind, and what you'd like the business to make possible.
One balance sheet
The business and your household together: how you pay yourself, what the business may be worth, and what you own and owe.
Decisions in the order they matter
Your number, income, taxes, protecting your family and the future of the business, written down so the plan doesn't live only in your head.
Your team on the same page
With your permission, shared with your CPA, attorney and banker, and revisited as the business and your life change.
Questions owners ask
Common questions about financial planning.
What does financial planning include for a business owner?
One plan that covers both sides: how you pay yourself, retirement and income, investments outside the business, taxes, protecting your family, and the future of the business.
How are you paid?
Advisory clients pay a fee based on the assets we manage; there are no separate planning fees, consultation charges, or hourly bills.
Who will I work with?
Nate and Tyler Walters, directly, start to finish. There are no account reps and no rotating team.
Do you only work with owners who are planning to sell?
No. We work with business owners at every stage, including companies that are still growing. The earlier we start, the more options there tend to be.
Related guides
Browse all resourcesThis page is general educational information, not tax, legal, or investment advice. Walters Wealth Management does not provide tax preparation or legal services. Please talk with your CPA or attorney about how any strategy applies to you.
You don't need to have everything figured out to start a conversation.
Many of our best client relationships began with a single, specific question.