Minerva's financial planning methodology

Financial planning is not a product we sell — it's the lens through which every recommendation we make is filtered. An investment recommendation without a plan is guessing. A plan without ongoing monitoring is a binder on a shelf.

Phase 1: Discovery

Discovery is a structured conversation (usually 60–90 minutes) where we learn everything we need to build a meaningful plan.

What we gather:

Financial data:

• All accounts (retirement, taxable, bank, HSA, 529s)
• Income sources (salary, bonus, rental, Social Security estimate, pension)
• Liabilities (mortgage, student loans, car payments, credit cards)
• Insurance policies (life, disability, long-term care, umbrella)
• Estate documents (wills, trusts, beneficiary designations, powers of attorney)
• Tax returns (prior 2 years)

Goals and priorities:

• Retirement target age and desired lifestyle
• Major planned expenses (home purchase, college funding, wedding, second home)
• Legacy goals (inheritance, charitable giving)
• Risk concerns (what keeps them up at night?)
• Non-financial goals that have financial implications (career change, relocation, caring for aging parents)

The unspoken goal. Clients often lead with "I want to retire at 62" but the real goal is "I want to know I'll be okay." Discovery isn't just data collection — it's listening for the underlying anxiety and addressing it with a plan.

Phase 2: Analysis

With discovery complete, we build the quantitative foundation.

Kwanti modeling:

• Input all accounts, income streams, expenses, and goals
• Run Monte Carlo simulation (10,000 scenarios) to generate probability-of-success metrics
• Baseline scenario: "If nothing changes, what are the odds you meet all your goals?"
• The output isn't a single number — it's a probability distribution. "You have a 78% chance of maintaining your desired lifestyle through age 95."

Gap analysis:

• Where does the plan fall short? (underfunded retirement, inadequate insurance, no estate plan)
• What are the biggest risks? (sequence-of-returns risk, long-term care costs, premature death of a breadwinner)
• What are the opportunities? (Roth conversion windows, tax-loss harvesting, employer benefit optimization)

Phase 3: Strategy

This is where we develop specific recommendations.

Strategy categories:

| Category | Example recommendations | |---|---| | Savings rate | Increase 401(k) contribution from 6% to 12%; max out Roth IRA | | Asset allocation | Shift from 70/30 to 60/40 as retirement approaches | | Tax planning | Roth conversions in the 3 years before Social Security begins | | Insurance | Add long-term care policy; increase umbrella to $2M | | Estate | Update beneficiary designations; establish revocable trust | | Social Security | Delay claiming to age 70 for higher earner | | Debt | Accelerate mortgage payoff vs. invest the difference |

Each recommendation includes:

• The expected impact on the plan's success probability
• The trade-offs involved (e.g., higher savings rate means less current spending)
• Priority ranking (high/medium/low) based on impact and urgency

Phase 4: Implementation

Recommendations don't help anyone sitting in a document. Implementation is where we make it real.

• Open or restructure accounts as needed
• Adjust asset allocation and execute rebalancing trades
• Initiate Roth conversions or tax-loss harvesting
• Coordinate with client's attorney (estate documents) and CPA (tax strategies)
• Set up automatic contributions or systematic withdrawals
• Update insurance policies

Each action item gets an owner (advisor, paraplanner, client, or external professional), a deadline, and tracking in the CRM.

Phase 5: Monitoring

A financial plan is not a one-time event. We review and update plans:

• Quarterly: Light check during the quarterly review — is the plan still on track? Any changes?
• Annually: Full plan review with updated Kwanti projections. Account for changes in market returns, income, expenses, and goals.
• Event-driven: Major life events trigger an immediate plan update — job change, inheritance, marriage, divorce, health diagnosis, birth of a child, death of a spouse.

The monitoring phase never ends. As long as the client is with Minerva, their plan is alive and adapting.

Key takeaways

1. Financial planning follows five phases: Discovery, Analysis, Strategy, Implementation, and Monitoring.
2. Discovery is the most important phase — understanding the client's full picture and true goals determines plan quality.
3. Plans are probability-weighted ranges, not predictions. Kwanti's Monte Carlo simulation shows the likelihood of meeting goals across thousands of scenarios.
4. Every recommendation includes expected impact, trade-offs, and priority ranking.
5. Plans are living documents, reviewed quarterly, updated annually, and revised immediately after major life events.

Glossary

• Monte Carlo simulation — A modeling technique that runs thousands of randomized scenarios to produce a probability distribution of outcomes, used in Kwanti for financial planning.
• Probability of success — The percentage of simulated scenarios in which the client meets all stated financial goals. Not a guarantee — a decision-making tool.
• Gap analysis — The process of identifying where the current financial picture falls short of the client's goals and where risks or opportunities exist.
• Discovery — The initial data-gathering and goal-identification phase of financial planning.
• Event-driven update — An unscheduled plan revision triggered by a major life change (job change, inheritance, marriage, health event, etc.).
• Implementation — The phase where plan recommendations become real actions: account changes, contribution adjustments, insurance purchases, and legal document updates.