Our Approach

Our firm's investment approach is based on our belief that an effective investment strategy can only be designed as a component part of the financial planning process. This enables an investment strategy to be personalized and integrated with a client's specific goals and objectives, while also considering income tax considerations and financial and emotional ability to handle risk.

Our investment approach combines more than eight decades of market data, Nobel Prize-winning academic research and the latest discoveries in behavioral finance. The main objective is reducing risk through diversification, which we call asset allocation. We consider risk to be another word for volatility, the likelihood of a given investment fluctuating in value from year to year. Diversification is intended to reduce volatility.

To achieve diversification that reduces risk, we recommend allocating assets among the major classes of stocks, bonds, and real estate (and to a limited degree, cash, commodities and other alternative investments). Stocks are further divided between U.S. and foreign, large and small companies, and growth and value styles. We do not "time the market". Rather, we follow the discipline of "staying the course" through both the ups and downs of the financial markets (studies show, even in a declining market, it is risky to engage in "timing", as an investor who has stepped out of the market is likely to miss the opportunity to reenter in time to participate in the rebound). In addition, we exercise care to minimize income taxes and investments' expenses so that more of what is earned is retained in the account.

For clients who engage us to construct and manage their portfolios, we utilize the institutional caliber of mutual funds offered by Dimensional Fund Advisors (DFA). We prefer DFA funds for their low internal expenses, low turnover (resulting in tax efficiency and further reducing cost) and other advantages over retail mutual funds and ETF's. However, in situations when our preferred mutual funds are not available such as in employer-sponsored retirement plans, we will make recommendations from the specific choices that are available. Furthermore, we are able to fully customize clients' portfolios as merited by other considerations, such as when clients are holding low cost basis securities that should be sold gradually so as to minimize capital gains tax.