Call us at 818-769-4600. Ask for an Actuary. No fee for initial consultation.

Financial freedom forever. Start with your hopes and dreams. Add us on as co-pilots, and we will help you chart and fly the route to your pension fortune, aka financial freedom. Small steps lead to mighty structures. We know...we've been co-pilots many times before, and seen a $15,000 per year contribution lead to $1 million-plus in a pension plan many times. It won't happen unless you take that first step by calling us....but if you do, yippee!

What We Do...Overview

We have been in the Actuarial and pension administration business since 1978. We have been co-pilots with many business owners before, quite a few of whose pension plans are over 20 years old now (and over $1 million or $2 million in many cases), and we like the trip.

We handle pension plans for corporations, partnerships, sole proprietorships, LLCs, LLPs, not-for-profit entities, etc. We handle only qualified plans (Defined Benefit, Profit Sharing, Money Purchase, 401k, Target Benefit). We do not handle IRAs, SEPs or the like. Using our Non-Standardized plan documents for qualified plans is much better than using SEPs, and not only because the assets are protected from creditors under qualified plans.

We are pension plan experts and actuaries, not affiliated with any investment managers. We charge a flat annual fee that depends on the type of plan you select "Fees". We give much better value than we charge. Your pension fortune can be a lot larger if you have us as your co-pilots on the journey, because we can show you options and planning you will not get outside of pension experts. We monitor your plan to make sure you know what to do to comply with the many government rules applying to pension plans, which makes paying us somewhat like paying for insurance to buy peace of mind.

Asking us for pension advice is a whole step up from asking your banker, or your broker, or your mutual fund representative. This is our full time business, we have extensive training in all aspects of pensions, and we support our recommendations in writing.

We work closely with your CPA or Business Manager to make sure that the pension plan contribution is closely tied into the pension deduction shown on the business tax return, and of course we discuss different contribution scenarios with you and your CPA on a timely basis each year....we give you a contribution range. Services

Call us at 818-769-4600. Ask to speak to an Actuary. No fees for initial consultation. We will get some details from you, and help you identify your goals, and discuss possible pension plan designs and future strategies with you.

Your Future Pension History, Not Yet Written

For many owners of businesses like yourself, who suddenly find themselves making a large income, the reality of having to pay huge income taxes hits home hard and fast. Now that you have a successful business, you need to build financial freedom.

You can do this with what we call a pension plan, but make no mistake you are really building future freedom for yourself, and doing it in a gorgeous tax-protected vehicle to which the IRS contributes mightily by way of greatly reducing your income taxes. The IRS is paying for you to build a pension fortune! You put money into the pension plan and deduct the full amount each year (saving up to 50% or more on taxes), and you don't have to pay Social Security taxes on the amount the company puts into the pension plan! You can vary the contribution from year to year to suit your business needs. You can contribute in bits during the year (and we strongly recommend this as a good savings discipline that works), as well as after the year end, right up to the time your business tax return is due (with extensions).

You invest the money and don't pay taxes on the growth until you start taking money out. You can take money out at any time, subject to some rules. You can stop contributing at any time, and restart later, or not restart as you choose.

Our job is to be your co-pilots throughout in the years you are initally growing, and later withdrawing (or your heirs are withdrawing), your pension fortune. Our service is to make your journey to financial freedom smooth and comfortable, with no unwelcome surprises and with minimal paperwork chores. We know the route, we've travelled it many times, and we like it.

You may choose to switch careers, or go live in Europe or Japan or South America, or just kick back. You will be able to do this because you will have built up a fortune in your pension plan. This fortune is a tax-protected window to financial freedom. Or you can carry on working and watch your pension fortune grow as you enjoy life.

What We Do ...In Detail

We do not manage or give advice on investments. You invest, we do the rest.The owner is responsible for all investments. We help you initially design and later modify your pension plan to help you grow your pension fortune, and we do pretty much all of the other paperwork associated with the pension plan, including preparing the required plan documents and the annual IRS/PWBA returns for the pension plan , and preparing the other annual reporting required for you, your accountant, the government, and plan participants. We help you keep the plan up to date with legal requirements, and keep a lookout to make sure that you don't do anything with the plan which would make it run afoul of the many government requirements. . We also answer any and all questions you may have, and our advice is expert advice.

Our Non-Standardized plan documents allow you the freedom and the opportunity to invest your pension plan assets at several places and use several different investment managers, not just one, to buy real estate or trust deeds or pre-IPOs if that is your desire, or to set contribution goals that meet your changing needs. So, you get the best of both worlds...we free you up to invest at a number of places, as you choose, and you get to deal with us as experts on pension plans. It's all about widening of choices.

We recommend and use all kinds of pension plans, including Defined Benefit Pension Plans (which require an Actuary licensed by the IRS), as well as Profit Sharing Plans, 401k Plans, and Money Purchase Pension Plans (including the Age-Weighted and New Comparability varieties of these plans), to provide you with the widest possible range of choices and flexibility year by year in annual contributions and control over your pension plan and investment managers. Again, widening of choices.

We are committed to (a) advising owners of businesses of ALL of the options available to them for pension plans, and (b) working with business owners and their CPAs, Business Managers, and other advisors and the IRS/PWBA to ensure that the pension plan runs smoothly and serves the needs of the business owner. Your financial freedom is our main goal too.

The great majority of our clients have either no employees other than the owner and spouse, or have 1-25 employees other than owners. We work hard with you the owner to build up your pension fortune. Very often, business owners and their advisors are not aware of the tremendous flexibility of pension plans available; often we set up Defined Benefit Pension Plans using our Non-Standardized plan documents with flexible annual contributions which can allow for contributions well above the limitations on Profit Sharing Plans and Money Purchase Pension Plans in good years (with maximums from $50,000 to $150,000 per year depending on your age), but can also allow you to cut back dramatically on contributions if you hit a bad year or years. Want a $50,000 contribution per year? Call us. Why pay huge taxes, if you don't need to spend the money ? Illustrations of Actual Situations

Our Profit Sharing Plans, 401k Plans, and Money Purchase Pension Plans can be customized to fit your needs, because we use our own Non-Standardized plan documents. Our documents allow you to invest your pension plan assets with several investment managers, and in real estate and other types of investments such as pre-IPOs. Our Non-Standardized plan documents also allow you to prepare in advance for the possibility of you having employees in the future. Planning is everything.

If You Have Employees

If you have employees, the Defined Benefit Pension Plan, and the Age-Weighted and New Comparability versions of Profit Sharing Plans and Money Purchase Pension Plans will be of great interest to you. If you have employees who will be covered by the pension plan, very often we can show you how to maximize the plan to your benefit, while still providing contributions for employees; in many cases, you the owner will end up way ahead of the game (i.e., have a much larger financial fortune) as opposed to not having a pension plan at all, even though you are paying benefits for employees! So it's a win-win situation for you and for your employees, with the IRS paying the bill in reduced income taxes! The government is REALLY trying hard to have you set up pension plans which will at least provide some retirement benefits for your employees, as opposed to doing nothing. The government is handing out really amazing tax benefits to you to set up pension plans! So you can have a pension plan which gives benefits to employees, hence helping you to attract and retain great employees, and yet have you end up with a much larger personal fortune than if you never adopted a pension plan!

If you adopt a pension plan calling for a contribution to employees, then you can consider holding back somewhat on future raises...each job position is worth a certain total amount, and if you increase the pension portion, then you can consider cutting back on the direct compensation amount by restricting future raises; you are actually helping employees to save for their futures!

In this tight labor market, a Defined Benefit Plan, Profit Sharing Plan or 401K Plan can be an excellent tool to attract and retain key employees. You can even design your pension plan to reward specific employees or groups of employees.

Also, if you don't start a pension plan, then you are giving away the really large tax benefits the government is handing out to pension plan sponsors...your tax dollars are indirectly going to finance some other business owner's personal pension fortune!

Call us at 818-769-4600. Ask for an Actuary. If You Have Employees

If You Don't Have Employees

If you as owner are the only employee, we can provide you with (a) Non-Standardized Plan Documents which allow you to invest at multiple places, or in real estate or trust deeds, or IPOs etc, as you choose, as well as the opportunity to contribute more in good years, and cut back in bad, than is generally available under the Standardized plans offered by mutual fund houses, stock brokerage firms, and banks, and (b) because we do the annual reporting and review of your plan, we can keep your plan out of harm's way with respect to the many government regulations on pension plans.

We have many clients who have no employees who are doing some amazing things with large contributions, and with obtaining specific investments such as real estate and pre-IPOs, and also with selecting several investment managers for their growing portfolios...just like the companies with thousands of employees do in their pension plans. We help you find that freedom. We are pension experts and Actuaries.

It Can Be A Mighty Bumpy Ride Without Us As Co-Pilots

What you as a business owner don't know about pension plan laws CAN hurt you. We often take over administration on one-person plans where serious mistakes have been made because the business owner or well-meaning advisors did not know many of the specialized pension rules under Section 401, 404, 412 and 415 of the Internal Revenue Code, let alone rules from the Department of Labor and the PWBA branch...typical errors include: contributing after September 15 to a Money Purchase Plan on a sole proprietorship (penalty is disallowance of the deduction); excluding leased employees or otherwise eligible employees (penalty at worst can be disqualification of the plan and at best will involve a lengthy negotiation with the IRS and payment of a hefty penalty); failure to update plan documents as needed (penalty at worst is disqualification of the plan and at best will involve the same lengthy negotiation with the IRS and payment of a hefty dollar penalty); failure to file Series 5500 reports for an owner-only plan when assets exceed $ 100,000 (penalty is $ 25 per day the return is late to a maximum of $15,000 per year for which a return is not filed; if any employees other than the owner are on the plan then the 5500 Series reports must be sent in each year regardless of how small the assets are); improperly completed or missing Adoption Agreements; improper registration of plan assets; and a host of others (with corresponding nasty penalties we hope you never find out about by way of an IRS pension audit).

If you don't know all the rules and if there is no pension plan expert to tell you about the rules, then the errors may be discovered by the IRS in a pension plan audit, which is not a good place to be when the errors are discovered....if you come to us at that point it will be a lot harder to get you to a good place than if you call us now.

The IRS and the DOL are much more forgiving if you correct errors before an audit is opened.

Our Fees

We charge a flat annual fee which is deductible to your business, and you can think of this as: (a) opening up more possibilities for you for higher maximum contributions in good years, (b) allowing you the possibility to diversify your investments among several different pension fund managers, or real estate or pre-IPOs, and (c) an insurance against you or some well-meaning advisor in another field unwittingly making serious mistakes with the pension plan simply because you or they didn't know the rules you had to follow.

Your success is our success. We charge a reasonable fee for services rendered on a flat annual basis. We do not, and will not, pay fees to any referral sources; we do not accept fees or commissions from anyone other than you regarding your pension plan. We give much better value than we charge, not only in peace of mind that your plan is legal, but also in making you aware of options and choices you have for contributions and accessing alternative investment managers of your choice. We hope to keep your business for 20-30 years, and we will not lose your trust by over-charging you. Fees

All About Choices and Income Taxes, and Saving On Income Taxes

Please note that you will have to pay federal income taxes on ALL amounts you eventually take out of the pension plan. However, you will not have to pay Social Security taxes on these amounts. In addition, you can schedule how much you take out to keep your taxes at a controlled amount. Also, if you establish residence in a low-tax state, or overseas, then you can pay ZERO state income tax ( and yes, lots of folks just like you do it, including a former President of the United States). If you have enough assets for personal use in your lifetime, you can leave the residual pension plan to your kids and grandkids, and they can pay the income taxes at THEIR marginal rates on installments each year spread out over their expected lifetimes, while the fund continues to grow. You have CHOICES, and how you use them will save you taxes.

The fact that you don't have to pay taxes on the investment earnings each year in a pension plan is what really gives the plan enormous value. This non-taxability of annual investment earnings is where the IRS is really giving you an incredible gift towards your personal pension wealth. Of course, it is also important that you get the business tax deduction in the year you contribute, but over time the current deduction is much less important than the non-taxability of investment earnings each year. Illustration of Actual Situations

Entertainment Guilds

We work closely with Guild plans (SAG, Aftra, DGA, Producer-Writers, Musicians, etc) for our clients who are in the Entertainment Industry. There is almost always a way to get significant contributions into your private pension plan without disturbing your Guild benefits. Even if you have full Guild benefits, if your spouse works in the business you can get significant contributions for him/her at a relatively low salary level with a Defined Benefit Pension Plan. The relatively low salary level means low Social Security taxes.

We also perform actuarial and 401k plan consulting services for some very large companies (i.e. plans with thousands of employees). If you are a business owner with a large company, we will be happy to talk to you about consulting services. This is a very different type of work, requiring a high level of consulting and interfacing, and we can and do work in this area. Call us at 818-769-4600 and ask for an Actuary.

After You Stop Contributing To Your Pension Plan

A growing number of our clients are retired, or have long since ceased making pension contributions to their pension plan, but still maintain the corporation or business entity in a semi-dormant state, available to sponsor the pension plan as well as for any future business restart. However, because their pension plan assets are substantial, there are good reasons for keeping the plan alive as a qualified plan, as opposed to rolling over to an IRA. These reasons include: (a) investment control over the assets of the plan, (b) professional actuarial advice on how to take distributions from the plan, including age 70 1/2 requirements, (c) asset protection from creditors (an IRA is not protected from creditors in a lawsuit, etc.), and (d) having professional advice available for leaving the pension plan assets to your heirs (yes, you can do this, and if done right the assets can be left in the qualified plan and paid out over the expected lifetimes of your children and grandchildren). If you are in an IRA, who is going to tell you this information? In our experience, clients often get this advice from sources who are well-meaning but not aware of the full range of choices possible. In fact, we often get new clients who roll their benefits out of a rollover IRA back to a frozen qualified plan we set up for them; this plan acts purely as a vehicle for investments, asset protection, and leaving pension fortunes to children, grandchildren, or charities, with little or no future contributions expected. Already Have A Standardized Pension Plan - Why Use Us?

Finally.....

We are pension plan experts and Actuaries. We are devoted to showing you, the business owner, ALL of your pension options, and helping you find clear skies and calm air enroute to your pension fortune. We are in the plane with you. Come fly with us.

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