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Dear Fellow Planner-for-the-Future :
Wills and living trusts are wonderful.
Tax-advantaged transfers of assets, too, are of great value.
But . . .
What are your real desires
for your heirs?
Wealth is nice, but if your children and grandchildren can't get along together . . . or if even "only" one of them becomes a drug addict, an alcoholic, a wife-abuser, or worse: wouldn't you trade the money, if you could, to salvage the person?
John Holzmann, President
StrategicInheritance.com
Peer-Aided Strategic Legacy & Estate Planning
Counsel
Hi. My name is John Holzmann. My wife and I have run a successful business for the last 18 years and, during that period, have made what to us is a significant fortune. In fact, we've enjoyed quite an astonishing ride. It wasn't so many years ago, we were living well below the poverty line. Now, I'm told, our income places us somewhere in the very top echelons of income earners in the United States.
I mention that not to brag, but in order to explain why I have created StrategicInheritance.com.
The responsibilities of a legacy.
Our family's success has granted us certain benefits, of course. But, far more than benefits, I have felt the weight of responsibility that wealth brings. I have recognized the opportunities our family has to do good with our wealth. I have also been reminded--more often than I would like to remember--of how devastating wealth can be to a generation of recipients who receive it before they have been properly trained for its reception.
To help us direct our family, my wife and I have sought the best professional counsel we can find. Among other things, that has meant we have invested thousands of dollars on estate planning attorneys, CPAs, and other advisors. And we have invested multiple tens of thousands of dollars on specialists who are known as wealth counselors and legacy planners.
I have also invested hundreds of hours of my own time studying the literature, working on the details of our plans . . . and then trying to figure out what are the root issues every other family, wealthy or not, could benefit from.
Among other things, I have learned how legacy planning differs from estate planning, how appropriate plans and structures--including a formal family government!--can help a family not only weather the normal stresses, storms and strains of life, but flourish . . . for centuries.
I became so excited about what I learned, that I resigned from Sonlight Curriculum, Ltd., in order to share my legacy and estate planning knowledge with you . . . here, in a friendly, peer-to-peer environment.
Estate and legacy planning professionals have
their place,
but peer-counsel can go way beyond. At least at
first.
Don't get me wrong. Traditional estate planning professionals--attorneys, CPAs, insurance agents, financial advisors, and so forth--are absolutely vital once you know what you want to accomplish. They will help you put feet to your desires.
But very few such advisors are in any position to help you with the most important matters. They can't help you
- direct your future generations in the ways they should go. (I'm talking about helping them see their unique skills, talents and gifts and then commit themselves to develop them for lifetime service.)
- decide how best to help your heirs pursue their best future.
- strategize how to shape them into productive, joy-filled members of society.
- instill in them the kind of vision that inspired you to get to the place where you are today.
- help you inspire them to go beyond your achievements . . . to live lives not merely of success but significance .
Indeed,
Even
if estate
planning professionals could help you in these
areas,
they wouldnt.
Why? Because they are trained in other areas. These are not their areas of expertise. And they know you are willing to pay them the big bucks for these "other" things.
You pay them to help you with . . .
- property, not people.
- the construction of effective documents, not effective family government.
- the tax-efficient transfer of assets, not the effective transfer of vision, mission and values.
Estate
planning professionals are ill-equipped to help you
with these matters. Legacy planners are. However . .
.
There are two features of the legacy planning profession I have found that hold me back from recommending you use them right from the start of your family-focused strategic planning.
1. Their fee structure.
And,
2. Their fee structure.
First, even if you have a multi-million-dollar estate ($5 million, minimum, but, more likely $10 million or more), the value you retrieve from their services will easily cover their charges.2 But even multi-millionaires tend to balk at $50,000 annual fees for services with squishy delivery dates and no solid end in sight.
Better, it seems to me, if you're going to chafe under the deadlines: do a lot of the hard thinking on your own before you call in the professionals, so you can provide your legacy planner with a relatively well-defined goal you want to work toward.
Why did I mention fee structure twice? Because I am going to assume the majority of my readers are not multi-millionaires. I want to serve the multi-millionaires. I have set aside a unique and private area of the site for them. But what about for all the others who could benefit from the thought process and the family preparation--the envisioning and strategy and creation of government--but who, simply, cannot possibly afford even a tiny fraction of the annual fees a professional legacy planner would charge?
For you, it's not a choice. Using something other than a professional is absulutely necesarry.
And so . . .
I recommend you
at least begin your process with help
from your
peers.
That's why I created
StrategicInheritance.com.
A
place to compare notes with
friends
If you own a business, I expect you enjoy hearing stories from peers--successful business people--about how they ran their companies or how they transferred ownership when the time came to do so. You enjoy hearing the technical details. But, far more, if you had the chance, you'd find yourself even more drawn to know how successful families have dealt with ne'er-do-well sons-in-law. Or twice-divorced daughters who seem always "in need." Or grandchildren who, at 15, have already been arrested twice for drug use. Or other family members who . . .
It's not that you're a busybody or a gossip. Far from it. No. You want to hear these stories because you have family members just like them.
And you'd "give anything" to know how to handle the situations.
The problem is,
These aren't the kinds of things
you can talk about
with your neighbors.
No. Nor are you likely to ask for prayer about these things in church. They're simply too private. Too painful. Too embarrassing. . . .
You know what I'm talking about.
And yet you know it could be very useful to discuss these things with other people you could trust who have "been there and done that" . . . or are being there and doing that right now!
And
That's why I created StrategicInheritance.com.
I wanted to share with you what I have learned through life. And, I hoped, in return, you would allow me (and others) to gain from you whatever insights you have learned about these matters.
StrategicInheritance.com is not only about estate planning. It is not only about passing on to our children, grandchildren, and future generations, whatever material wealth we may possess. It is about training them for receipt of these gifts. And it is about effective philanthropy. It is about sharing with future generations every form of wealth we own: social, spiritual, intellectual, relational. . . .
What questions do you have? What insights? What information? What sources of information would you recommend?
Reproducing what I've done before.
Back in 1996, I created the Sonlight Curriculum online presence, something which, right from the start, centered on mutual communication through an online forums community. And over the last dozen years, I have come to appreciate how valuable a hundred heads are compared to my "just one." And a thousand heads compared to a hundred.
I have seen the Sonlighters Club forums develop from barely a dozen people to over 5,000 active participants today--more than a million messages every year.
It is my desire to see a
similar community develop
here at
StrategicInheritance.com.
And so I've put together several Strategic Inheritance Legacy Planning/Estate Planning "Forums" where you can communicate with fellow pilgrims on the road you're traveling.
Many of the participants in the Sonlighters Club forums consider themselves closer to one another than they do to most of the people they know in real life. I wouldn't be surprised if we find a similar community develop here at StrategicInheritance.com.
Besides the forums, and, actually, before I created the forums, I have been blogging about our family's legacy planning experiences. I wanted to fill you in on some of the exercises we have done and some of the issues we've faced. (One problem we have faced: We are now working with our third professional legacy planner! You might find it interesting how and why the previous relationships soured.)
Over time, I intend to fill in the navigation bar to the right with links to resources and articles I think may be of help to you. As you--or I--come up with additional ideas about how Strategic Inheritance might be of service, I intend to add those as well.
Meanwhile, come on in!
I expect you'll find the water's fine.
Sincerely,
John Holzmann
1 Roy
Williams and Vic Preisser, co-authors of
Philanthropy: Heirs and
Values
. A family
is said to be intact if they still own at least a
substantial portion of the original
financial inheritance and, more importantly,
participants enjoy healthy relationships one with
another.
A family is no longer intact if the financial assets are gone and/or relationships have been severed . . . or both.
Ninety percent of wealthy families will have lost their wealth before the third generation shuffles off this mortal coil. "Shirtsleeves to shirtsleeves in three generations." Even with the finest estate planning counselors money can buy--attorneys, CPAs, tax consultants and more. [Return to text.]
2 If your estate is in the $10 million to $20 million range, you're likely looking at fees somewhere in the neighborhood of $50,000 to $100,000 per year . . . plus expenses . . . plus attorney's fees for the attorneys who actually write the documents. (Legacy planners don't actually draft the documents. They "merely" oversee the process of helping you focus and state your intentions and desires . . . so that the attorney will produce a document uniquely suited to your family's needs.) You will pay this fee for the initial planning process and then, ongoing, for as long as you want them to watch over your estate. Notice, by the way, that this fee is "only" maybe one-half of one percent of your net worth. So not outrageous. Especially if their work will--as it should--eliminate virtually all inheritance taxes and help you establish your family on a solid financial (not to mention legal, relational, social, and, potentially, even, spiritual) footing. [Return to text .]