A better financial planning experience shouldn’t mean more meetings, more paperwork or months of waiting to get started. In 2026, Mason & Associates has changed its new client process to make it faster, more flexible and more focused on what prospective clients actually need. In this episode, John, Tommy and Ben explain how the updated process works, why the firm has removed its upfront $3,000 financial planning fee and how it aims to move new clients from an initial conversation to an ongoing relationship in around 60 days.
Listen in to learn what information to have ready, what to expect from each meeting and why the process is designed to answer immediate financial questions rather than make prospective clients wait for a comprehensive plan. You will also hear how to choose and interview a financial planning firm, when to start the process before retirement, who Mason works with and how its fee-only approach works.
Listen to the full episode here:
What you will learn:
- How the 30-minute introductory call helps determine whether there’s a good fit. (5:50)
- Why the introductory call is not the same as an in-depth financial planning interview. (8:45)
- Which financial documents and information to prepare before the next meeting. (12:20)
- Why the firm removed its $3,000 upfront financial planning fee. (17:15)
- Who can work with Mason & Associates. (26:50)
- How the firm’s fee-only model operates. (29:40)
- Why it is important to understand your taxes in retirement. (35:00)
Ideas Worth Sharing:
- “This should be one of your most vetted and researched things that you do, hiring a financial planning firm.” – Mason & Associates
- “We want to work for you. We want to put on our hard hats. We want to analyze your financial plan.” – Mason & Associates
- “Accelerated doesn’t mean less sophisticated.” – Mason & Associates
Resources from this episode:
- FEFP: How Do I Choose a Financial Planner? (EP128)
- FEFP: An Inside Look at Strategic Planning Season (EP94)
- Mason & Associates: LinkedIn
- John Mason: LinkedIn
- Tommy Blackburn: LinkedIn
- Ben Raikes: LinkedIn
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Read the Transcript Below:
John Mason: Welcome to the Federal Employee Financial Planning Podcast. In this episode, I’m joined by Tommy Blackburn and Ben Raikes as we discuss the new client process at Mason. You may be thinking, “I’ve heard this before,” and you’re probably right, but we have new updates for 2026 to better accommodate new clients who are seeking the services that we provide.
In addition to expanding on our new client process, we’re going to answer frequently asked questions as well. Tommy, Ben, welcome to the podcast.
Ben Raikes: John, I’m back, man. I’m back. It feels like it’s been a little bit of time since the last time I was on the podcast, but I’ve been tuning in and listening to you guys doing an awesome job, and the guests that you bring on.
And personally, I’m doing great. Elsie turned 20 months old yesterday, and, man, it’s just crazy to see how much they change over a year, and even over a month or a week. She’s singing and dancing and climbing on everything and everyone, and she’s just having a ball, man. It’s just a really special time in our household watching her every day and getting to see how she grows.
Tommy Blackburn: Hey, man, it’s good to have you back, Ben. And for our audience, yes, we have the man, the myth, the legend, Ben Raikes back with us. It’s good to have him make these appearances here with us. For me, we are doing good. Life is very busy. The firm is doing great, as everybody on the podcast can attest.
We’re hitting our goals, strategizing for the future, and growing. A lot of great things are happening here. Family-wise, Nathan just turned three, which is a lot of fun. He’s a crazy little three-year-old with a very infectious smile, but yeah, just a little crazy. And Zoe’s in first grade, which is a ton of fun.
I actually was at soccer practice with her last night, and that’s honestly been really fun to watch—watching her play soccer and develop, rooting her on, trying to help give her some tips, and just watching the team aspect of a sport beginning to happen at that phase of life. So we are very busy, but it’s all good stuff.
Well, guys, it’s always a pleasure to be here recording with both of you.
John Mason: Glad to hear families are well. My family’s doing well too. Sarah and I just got back from an anniversary trip, which was great. Soccer’s so much more fun to watch than T-ball and Coach Pitch, so I agree, Tommy, it’s significantly better.
Ben’s in the danger zone. I remember two, three, and four like it was yesterday, and they’re just dangerous little kids at that age. So welcome to the party, Ben.
Ben Raikes: Literally everything they try to do is just accidentally hurt themselves. You look away for five seconds and they’re falling off the couch or the furniture, or grabbing a fork or whatever it is, man. It’s crazy.
Tommy Blackburn: I will say, every child is different, but boys seem to, as a generality, be a whole different level of crazy. So I’m not sure about Elsie and if y’all ever get to see the difference in that, but there is, from my perspective having both, quite a different level of self-harm with boys versus girls.
John Mason: Yeah, and I don’t think it gets any better. That’s my observation—it stays about the same.
Tommy Blackburn: It continues.
John Mason: Yeah, it stays about the same. Then they start doing even more risky things. Anyhow, audience, thanks for being with us today. We’re going to have a couple different asks of you throughout the episode, but we’re not going to ask for anything yet because we haven’t given you any value yet.
So let’s talk about the new client process and experience. What I’d like to start with, guys, is that the audience may be thinking, “Wow, I feel like John, Tommy, and Ben talk about this all the time.” We do continually iterate the financial planning process, both for our benefit as well as clients’ benefit. So I think it hopefully really resonates with clients today—or potential clients too—that, yes, we’re a successful firm, but we’re not resting. We’re not just saying because we’ve done it this way for 15 or 20 years, it’s the best way.
So some of the changes we’re going to talk about today, maybe they’re not revolutionary, but they’re kind of revolutionary at our firm. It’s a big departure from the way we’ve done things in the past, and I really feel passionate that we’re better able to serve clients. We’ve eliminated some barriers to entry, which I think is important. And as important as all of it—kind of teeing this up for whoever wants to take it, maybe Ben first—is not only are we eliminating some barriers to entry, I think we’re doing a better job answering the client’s immediate questions and solving their immediate problems.
So with all that being said, audience, we’re going to talk you through today what it’s like to become a client. We’re going to educate you, whether you’re interviewing us or some other firm, how to interview that firm and how to be better positioned if you’re making this hire. This should be one of your most vetted and researched things that you do: hiring a financial planning firm.
So we hope as we share our process that you’ll be better adept at doing your interview process as well. So Ben, expand on any part of that that you’d like to. Because you’ve been doing most of our introductory calls, fit calls, or “does a relationship make sense” calls—whatever you want to call that meeting—if you would just kind of expand on this for a bit.
Ben Raikes: Absolutely. I want to talk a little bit generally about the process, and I think that first intro call is really important. The number one question that the clients or potential clients listening to this podcast might be wondering is: well, why did they change their process to begin with?
And I think the biggest reason that we changed this process is we wanted to accelerate it, because we had people calling in that wanted to work with us, and we were taking them through step 1, 2, 2.1, 2.1A, 3, 4, and 5. And by the time a client said, “Ben, I like you guys, I want to work together,” we’re looking at the calendar, and three months had passed.
We want to work for you. We want to put on our hard hats. We want to analyze your financial plan. We want to start doing the work that’s meaningful and impactful to you. So the big reason that we took a revamp of this process is really to accelerate that and to move clients through the process faster so that we can get to work for them.
Now, the first step in that process, if you’re wondering, “Well, how do I even get to know if I like these Mason & Associates guys? Yeah, I’ve listened to a lot of their podcasts. I’ve seen their YouTube channels.” Maybe you’ve even read our blog. How do I really determine if I want to become a client or if working together with Mason & Associates makes sense?
Well, the first thing that you’ll do is go to our website and schedule what’s called an introductory call. That call is 30 minutes long. It’ll be one of our team members here on that call, and really that’s what I like to call our quick fit test. Do you like Mason & Associates? Do you like Ben Raikes? Do we like you? Do you have enough assets so that we can have a meaningful relationship, where we feel like we’re getting paid and adding value to your life and vice versa?
We’re going to ask you a few fact-finding questions, and really our objective of that meeting is to move you to that next step if you’re a fit, or move you along somewhere else if you’re not a fit. This shouldn’t be a very time-intensive process of looking at your 2025 tax return line 17B and asking you why you did a QCD when you could have done something better. No, we can do that at another meeting. This is high level: Do we like each other? Do we want to continue to find out more? Schedule the call, and you’ll speak with one of us to determine that in a very short amount of time.
John Mason: You can also schedule that call, audience, by calling 757-223-9898, and we have live humans that answer the phone Monday through Thursday. We don’t have a phone tree. We don’t have a chatbot that answers. It’s actually physical people in the office. So if you want to schedule at midnight, masonllc.net is your best bet. If you want to schedule during normal business hours on East Coast time, you have the live human option as well.
The podcast and the YouTube channel are also our ability to show you who we are as people. But like Ben said, the intro call is 30 minutes. We would prefer to do that by Zoom; that way we can actually see you. We would encourage that both spouses attend that call if you’re married, and it’s 30 minutes tops to decide: Is there a world in which we could ever work together? That’s really the point of the call.
Is there any potential way that we can all work together? The services that you’re looking for—do we provide those? How are we compensated? Do you meet our asset minimum, which is typically federal employees who are near retirement with a million or more in assets? So we want to go through 15 to 30 minutes describing the fit and describing what an ongoing relationship looks like.
And at the end of that call, what we like to say, Tommy, is, “Now please know this was not our interview,” because there’s no way we could actually demonstrate financial planning value during this quick fit call. Maybe both spouses weren’t there, we didn’t have your tax returns, or we didn’t have your estate docs. We’re just now determining, yes, we should really do that in-depth discovery meeting.
So what we’ve learned, audience, is that sometimes people would leave an introductory call thinking that they’ve seen the best that Mason has to offer, and that’s just not the case. Because we approach this call asking: Is there a world possible, Tommy, that a relationship makes sense? If so, let’s move toward the more labor-intensive part of the process, which is prospective clients sending us all their stuff, gathering all the documents, and being prepared for an hour-long discovery meeting where we learn about you as humans. That’s a lot to ask on the first quick fit call, which is why we don’t do that.
Tommy Blackburn: Absolutely, and there’s a lot of work and analysis that’s going to go into that second step—on the prospective client’s side of getting all of this information to us and being ready to have the interview-type discussion, and on our side as the planning team/firm being able to put together a plan for you and begin delivering the value that we hope to deliver.
So before anybody commits to that level of effort, first it’s just: Are we a good fit for each other? There may be some very high-level ideas, just based on this conversation—not only are we a fit, but there are a few ideas I have in my head that we think could be of value. We do see value in continuing this conversation, and we’re going to talk about this further at that next meeting.
However, this isn’t the interview because we don’t have all of the information. Now, that next meeting, that’s where we’re going to make sure, through all of these meetings, we put our best foot forward. But that’s where we can really say, “Hey, we’ve looked at the entire situation. We’re going to do some more fine-tuning through this discussion. We have the data to now start giving you some really valuable thoughts and ideas if we want to continue going.”
And hopefully, we think pretty highly of ourselves. We know there are some other great firms out there too, but particularly when it comes to federal retirees, as tax planning specialists, we think we’re second to none. If we don’t want to say the best, we’re second to none. So we think if we get to that meeting, we’re going to have a great conversation. We’ve already determined it looks good working together, so hopefully we’ll continue on to that next step then.
Ben Raikes: Absolutely. So practically, what this looks like at the end of that 30-minute call, if you’re like, “Okay, I want to schedule that 30-minute call, what are you going to do for me next?”
Typically, what you’ll get is an email reply that says, “Hey, Mr. and Mrs. Client, we had a great call. We think we’d be a great fit together. In order to move on to the next step, here’s what we need,” and we’re going to send you a data sheet that says, “Send me the last two years of your tax returns, your last two years of pay stubs, your TSP statement, your bank and debt balances, life insurance…” I mean, it is a very robust list.
On top of that, there’s also going to be a link in that email to send you to a fact finder that’s going to ask some more pointed questions, like: How much do you think you’ll spend in retirement? Do you have children? What aspects of your financial plan are important to you? Because what’s important to you is important to us.
Now, it’s really important that we get those documents well in advance of that next meeting, because as soon as we get those, we’re going to start working for you as soon as possible: analyzing the tax return and looking for long-term tax planning opportunities, looking at your TSP and making sure that the allocation you’re in fits your long-term needs, and reviewing your pay stubs and trying to determine cash flow and spending in retirement.
We want to get to work for you as soon as possible, and having those documents as soon as possible really helps, because that next meeting is where we’re really going to determine how we can add value for you and whether you think there’s value in us working together. Without those, we’re not going to be able to provide that advice or, as Mike Mason and sometimes John will say, “deliver the boom” in that meeting.
John Mason: Well, it’s well said by both of you. So summarizing: There’s no fee for the introductory call, which is the 30-minute fit call. We hope you leave that call better off than you were before. Is there any possible way that a relationship could work? If yes, we move to the next step: an in-depth interview—you’re interviewing us, we’re interviewing you—one hour.
You send us your documents at least a week in advance, if not more, which allows us and our team to do an initial financial plan buildout as well as an initial tax projection, so that we’re coming prepared to that next meeting ready to deliver some boom. It’s like, “Here’s what we heard. Here’s what we’re seeing. Let’s fine-tune this. Let’s massage it. Let me figure out where we go from here.”
There’s no fee for that second meeting either. That’s where you’re going to see the value. And when we talk about fees, this is the meeting where you’re really going to be able to see, “Wow, this is what an ongoing relationship looks like. This is why I would pay a fee.” You’re hopefully getting multiples of value over the fee over time for having this relationship with somebody like Mason.
So no fee for appointment one, no fee for appointment two. At the end of that meeting, we’re going to ask you, “Do you want to become an ongoing client?” And that’s where we really go to work and fine-tune the plan. We begin transitioning assets. We begin initiating things like TSP rollovers, start doing things like Roth conversions, and making asset allocation changes, whether it’s going from too much G Fund to more of a 60/40 split or what have you.
Here’s the big change that the audience may be hearing: One, we’ve shortened the process from three, four, or five months in some circumstances down to now wanting to get clients fully onboarded within about 60 days. The reason for that, you may think it’s self-serving, and let me just say yes, in a bit it is a little self-serving because then the assets transfer faster and we get fees sooner. That’s part of the deal.
But why is it good for the client? Most people only have so much time to dedicate to working with a team of financial planners, and at the end of three or six months, they’re probably pretty tired, and they don’t want to hear from Ben again. So when we were dragging this thing out for three or six months, people were exhausted. What might have felt like a very thoughtful, methodical process could in turn just be exhausting for the end client or end user.
A couple takeaways I think that we’ve learned as we’ve revamped this process in 2026 is that the people who are hiring us today were strongly referred, have watched hours of YouTube, and have listened to hours of podcasts. And we don’t need to—and I don’t mean this to be mean, audience—I don’t think we need to prove how smart we are anymore.
I think, hopefully, through the education that we’re providing through this platform, as well as YouTube and the webinars we’re doing, we’ve kind of earned: “Yes, these guys know what they’re talking about.” Now we just need to make sure that there’s the right personal connection. So rather than spending all this time proving that we know our stuff, we’re saying, “I think you know that already. How can we just start answering the questions that you have?”
And what we’ve done is eliminated the upfront financial planning fee. We used to charge $3,000 for an initial financial plan. Was that valuable, Tommy? Absolutely. Clients walked away with tremendous value. But it was two decision points, which we know humans don’t like: One, do I want to pay a fee for an initial plan? And then decision point two: Do I want to hire these guys ongoing?
We’ve eliminated that friction. We’ve eliminated the $3,000 planning fee, and we simplified it to one decision: Is this the team for me or not? If so, let’s just get to work. By eliminating that step, we save people $3,000 in planning fees. We’ve saved them two, three, or four hours of appointment time by doing that.
And most importantly, Tommy, because we’re not taking them through this 30-year financial plan, we’re answering the questions that they actually have right now, which is like, “Hey dude, I’m retiring right now. All this Medicare IRMAA stuff is great. RMDs are great. I just know that I don’t have to eat beanie weenies in 2027. Can we just focus on that, please?”
So for that audience, where the big changes are: eliminating that $3,000 planning fee and consolidating the onboarding from three-plus months down to hopefully about 60 days. We’re going to move at your pace, right Tommy? We don’t want to make people feel uncomfortable, but we want to keep the momentum going, whereas before we were losing it.
Tommy Blackburn: There are plenty of opportunities for prospective clients to get to know us and develop comfort with how we approach things as a firm, so we certainly don’t need to drag that out.
Number one question is: “Can I retire?” And then deliver the boom: show me where you’re going to add additional value. So you said we’re not doing 30 years. We’re not necessarily going to give 30 years of recommendations to you in that meeting, but we are sketching out a 30-year plan, making sure you can be retired for 30 years, and looking for opportunities that are going to change throughout it.
So that’s also happening. I want to make sure people do get that. But what we see is it’s a more efficient, pleasant experience for clients. Typically, you’re interviewing to determine: Is this the right person? You’ve already done a bit of research. In the world we live in, there are plenty of ways for you to get to know us, so you’ve kind of already determined that. You have a couple gut checks: the fit check and then the intro meeting. Does it look like they’re delivering the boom, and are they answering the questions I have and the ones I didn’t know to ask?
And now I’d like to get to work. And honestly, I’d like you guys to get to work, right? I’m hiring you to do these things for me to the extent you can. So if we could stop dragging it out, I would prefer to just get going. I have a pain point, and I’d like you to alleviate that pain.
John Mason: I’m going to toss it over to you, Ben, in a second, but we had a new client onboard this year who essentially said, “Yeah, I want all that financial planning stuff, but what I want you to do right now is just get the assets under management, get it managed accordingly, and then we can come back and do the financial plan when life slows down a bit.”
And it’s like, wow—six months ago, we would’ve just completely derailed that family and taken them through our process rather than just helping them onboard. Now, Tommy’s still building the initial plan, Tommy still did the tax projection, and Tommy and our associates are still working on all that stuff, but we didn’t have to deliver all of that to begin the relationship.
We still want to do an initial delivery, initial thoughts, initial looks, and show you why we’re recommending the things we’re making. But I thought it was a good example, Tommy, that some people just want to move a little faster.
Tommy Blackburn: There have been many instances—I know I’ve had at least two or three clients onboard this year that fit what you’re talking about, where it’s: “Let’s get to work. Here’s the pain. I want to turn the assets over. I know you’re building stuff in the background.”
And audience, as professionals, as fiduciaries, we have some due diligence we have to do, right? We want to manage these assets and get to work for you as fast as possible, but we have to have something to base decisions on, right?
So part of that is a conversation; part of that is putting a plan together, even if it’s behind the scenes and you don’t see it. But, John, I guess what I just wanted to say is it’s not unique. That’s been a number of clients that we’re seeing. That’s how they want to approach it: Let me circle back to the plan. I know you’re already doing diligence in the background, but I’m ready to check this box off of transitioning the assets and letting you begin doing that as these other pieces fall into place, and we’ll address things as I’m ready to address them.
I think ultimately, John, if I sum all this up, we’re meeting clients where they want to be met. It’s a really good point.
John Mason: Ben, I’d love you to share any—you’ve done most of the intro calls this year. You, Mike, and Ken have done most of those intro calls. Tommy and I are going to start doing a little more to give you guys a little break going forward and take some of that back. But any insights that you can share from the new client process and experience intro calls? And then I want to transition to some FAQs on maybe some questions that people may have for us or other firms out there.
What have you seen this year, and have you noticed that people are kind of fans of the new process? I think we know the answer, but—
Ben Raikes: It’s so cool, guys. I know we’ve talked a little bit about this internally among the three of us, but it’s just amazing to see a prospect schedule a call with us, and in the referral notes, they say they watched YouTube or the podcast. We’re kind of going through our getting-to-know-you phase, and I’ll say something about, I don’t know, a 75% reduction on your FEGLI, and the client will say, “Yeah, you know what? I remember Tommy talking about that in a podcast. That’s just so cool.” Or I’ll mention some fact about TSP and he’ll say, “Yeah, I remember when John mentioned that in the YouTube video a couple months back.”
We’re getting people in these days who feel like they already know us, who feel like they already know the firm, and that’s really part of the reason that it’s easier to accelerate this. There’s a lot less friction than, “I’m calling a completely new advisory firm that I’ve never heard from in my life.” They’re getting a sense of who we are before they even call in.
And so John, Tommy, to your point, I think the new people coming in have really appreciated being able to go faster because even though we’re starting at step one, they’re mentally already at step two and ready to take that step forward. So I just think that’s been a really cool change.
John Mason: Really good point, man. And accelerated doesn’t mean less sophisticated. Exactly. It just means a more predictable, reasonable onboarding experience for clients. For us, it feels accelerated because it was taking so long before, but I think the audience will feel that it is still very thoughtful: the right amount of time, not rushed, and time to think things through.
I don’t think the audience would ever feel rushed by our, in air quotes, “accelerated” process. So I think that makes sense to call out.
This is an evergreen episode, so whenever it goes live, it’ll go live. We typically onboard clients about nine months out of the year. So intro calls—that’s a 30-minute fit call—happen throughout the year, all 12 months. We do not onboard clients during April and May because that’s when we’re doing our strategic planning meetings.
So our audience has heard about that dedicated six- to eight-week period where all we do is meet with existing families. Throughout the other parts of the year, we will onboard new families strategically—typically not over the Christmas holidays, typically not at times where we know there’s just not a good fit in our schedule or when the process is going to break because of holidays. But about nine or 10 months out of the year, we will onboard new families.
If you’re thinking that you’re going to retire in six months, now’s the time to get on the calendar. If you’re thinking in the next one or two years, now is probably the time to get on the calendar. If you’re retiring in 10 days and you need help, you’ve waited too long.
So there is certainly a balance between when is the appropriate time to get on our calendar and start thinking through this process. Here’s my ask to the audience: If you like what you hear and you’re thinking that you’re a good fit and that we’re the right team for you, let’s schedule the intro call.
It’s 30 minutes. That’s where we determine the fit. And if it’s not the perfect time to begin working together, we’ll put a date in our contact management system that says, “Let’s reach out to Joe in two years when the appropriate time is here.” So there’s absolutely no negative in reaching out maybe a little bit early or at least confirming the appropriate time. Don’t you think, guys?
Ben Raikes: Absolutely. We’ve done that several times this year where someone’s gotten in and we say, “Hey, I think we’re a good fit to work together, but maybe we’re just two or three years out. Let me talk to each other. Let’s get face-to-face, and then we’re going to put a reminder in our calendar that says, ‘John Smith is going to retire this year. Let’s reach out to him in March, six months in advance, and restart that process.’”
John Mason: We’re going to link to at least one or two episodes in the show notes, and maybe we’ll get really fancy and throw a card on the screen. I don’t know. But it’s the strategic planning meeting process—what that looks like. And audience, the reason we’re doing that for you is we’ve talked about how to onboard and become a new client, but we want to show you in this video what it means to be an ongoing client, so you can start to see what that picture looks like, too.
What do you think? FAQs, guys, for the next five or ten minutes, and then we wrap it?
Ben Raikes: Let me do it.
John Mason: Cool. So I think I’ll ask the questions, and then you guys can just go back and forth. Tommy, how about this FAQ: I’m not a federal employee. Can I work with Mason?
Tommy Blackburn: Of course, yes. We have many non-federal clients. In fact, many federal retirees are married to the private sector, so that is a sizable portion of our clientele. The main thing is: Do we like each other? Do you fit the profile of in or near retirement with a million or more to manage? And if we feel like we’re out over our skis, we will certainly let you know that we think there’s someone more specialized for your situation. But yes, we can certainly work with many non-federal retirees.
John Mason: Ben, Tommy just mentioned we typically work with federal employees in or near retirement with a million or more. What if I’m 40 years old and just inherited $2 million? Can I work with Mason?
Ben Raikes: See yourself out the door. No chance that we want to work with you. Get out of here.
No, absolutely. I think Tommy said the best piece of that: If we feel like we get out over our skis and there’s something ultra-specific and special to you that we don’t feel equipped to handle, then we’ll gladly refer you to another resource. But Tommy, John, and myself—we all have many years of experience not working only with federal employees, but with people from all different walks of life. And certainly someone who has just inherited money or come into money, whatever it may be, we’d love to have that initial 30-minute intro meeting with you to see what we can do to help.
John Mason: Tommy, I am 55 to 57 years old. I’m thinking about retiring at MRA or maybe around 60. I know you guys say you have a million-dollar minimum. I have about $500,000 to $700,000 in a brokerage account right now that I could transition to you guys. I’d love to kick off the relationship, but TSP transfers and other big asset transfers can’t happen for 12 to 18 months. Can we work together?
Tommy Blackburn: Yes. Are these questions on our FAQs? They’re great questions.
Yes, we can work together. Where I would start that conversation is: Let me have a conversation. Let’s do that intro call to make sure it continues to make sense. Just because you’re under the million immediately, the conversation would be to acknowledge that we think we can add value. This is a perfect time to start before it gives us plenty of leeway up to that life transition, and to make sure that you, as a prospective client, are committed to transitioning your TSP to us at retirement. If we can check all those boxes and everybody feels great, yes, we can work together.
John Mason: Ben, I’ve heard all these different stories about how financial planners are compensated. Some people get big commissions; some have revenue-sharing agreements. What’s it like working with Mason?
Ben Raikes: Mason & Associates, as you’ve probably heard many times on this podcast before, is a fee-only registered investment advisor, which means the only fees that we ever collect come directly from our clients. We don’t get paid a commission from selling an annuity. We don’t get paid a commission from selling life insurance. The only money that we get paid comes directly from our clients.
Why is that important? Well, there’s probably no perfect fee structure. There’s always going to be somewhat of a conflict of interest anytime you’re paying someone a fee. But the assets-under-management model essentially says that we get paid more as your accounts grow more, and that aligns our incentives the best as they possibly can. We are also a fiduciary, which means under this fee-only structure, we are required to act in your best interest at all times.
A typical example: We get paid by assets under management, which is the assets that we have control over on your behalf. If we’ve got $1 million and you say, “Ben, I really want to pay off my $500,000 mortgage at 2%,” I’ll tell you till I’m blue in the face why I think that’s a really bad deal. But at the end of the day, your money is your money. If you want to take $500,000 out of your accounts to pay off your mortgage, we’ll help you do that—even though that means our fee has technically been cut in half. We do that because we’re fiduciaries.
John Mason: Wonderful. How about this one, Tommy: Mason is based in Newport News, Virginia, in Hampton Roads. I don’t live in Virginia. Can I engage with your firm?
Tommy Blackburn: I only do business in Virginia… Yes, of course you can! We’re registered with the SEC, so we can work throughout the United States, and we have clients spread throughout the country. Certainly, we have a heavier population closer to home here in the Virginia, Maryland, and North Carolina area, but we have clients all across the country and are happy to work everywhere. We meet with our clients predominantly—99% of the time—remotely via Zoom, so that’s a very natural way for us to work with people who are not local.
Ben Raikes: Just a cool anecdote to add to that: Five years ago, I think maybe 80 to 90% of our new clients coming in were from Virginia. I think now that we have the podcast and YouTube, we’re seeing maybe a 60/40 split between existing Virginia residents versus anywhere else in the United States. So we’re very proficient at using Zoom. It’s the way 99% of our meetings are conducted, and living in a different state doesn’t mean anything to us other than maybe our 4:00 PM Eastern Time needs to be adjusted a little bit for wherever you are in the Midwest or on the West Coast.
Tommy Blackburn: I will say, Ben, we also have a commitment when you live somewhere else that we’re going to learn about where you live. Every state tends to have some special tax treatment, so we are going to dig, look under the hood, and make sure we understand the ramifications there.
Ben Raikes: If you’re living in the state of Illinois and your financial advisor has not told you that your Social Security isn’t taxable, that your IRA distributions aren’t taxable, that your TSP distributions aren’t taxable, and that your FERS pension isn’t taxable in the state of Illinois, you need to find another advisor.
John Mason: Well, thank goodness, because I’m pretty sure they have the highest real estate taxes in the country, so they have to give it back somewhere! Goodness.
So Zoom is the best, you know—pick your video conference solution. We typically use Zoom, but it’s great. It’s more educational. It allows us, we believe, to deliver a better client experience. In-person meetings happen from time to time. We’re not scared of human contact—we actually like humans quite a bit—but we do believe the educational experience is better via Zoom.
Tommy and Ben both just hit this… So Ben, you’re an IRS enrolled agent. Tommy, you’re a CPA. So here’s a FAQ: Every time I call a financial planner, or every time I call TSP or a 401(k), all they ever tell me is, “I don’t know. I can’t help you. Go consult your tax advisor.” Is that how it’s going to be at Mason?
Tommy Blackburn: Well, I always have to laugh. I think when you say he’s an IRS enrolled agent, people probably think Ben’s coming to collect tax money from them!
Ben Raikes: Knocking on your door to get that tax revenue, baby!
Tommy Blackburn: Yeah, which is not the case. He’s an advocate for you. It’s a credential issued by the IRS saying that he can represent clients before the IRS, but it doesn’t sound that way.
Yeah, we have a podcast episode titled Consult Your Tax Advisor that specifically talks about this, in that it’s quite frustrating when everybody’s pointing at each other and you don’t have a tax advisor. So we are very tax-planning-heavy and focused, and we get granular into the details. We’re going to walk side-by-side with you. We’re not going to help you with uncertain transactions, which most people have no idea what that is—that’s where the IRS has a lot of scrutiny. No, we’re not doing that. But we are doing plenty of tax planning. We’ll review tax returns and give guidance. All of that hopefully answers your question, John: We are that. We are your tax planning advisor, and second to none, if I have to go there. Second to none. We’ll get in the weeds with you.
Ben Raikes: You all have said this many times: Your tax bill is likely to be one of, if not the, largest bills throughout your retirement. Thinking about how much a million-dollar TSP at age 62 could grow by the time you’re 75 and need to start taking RMDs—in our humble opinion, it borders on malpractice if you can’t give tax advice and let somebody know what tax plan you have in place to not just eliminate taxes today, but to reduce the tax bill over your lifetime and potentially your heirs’ lifetime as well.
John Mason: You do not have a financial plan unless you have a tax plan. Period, end of statement.
So the National Association of Personal Financial Advisors, also known as NAPFA, has a list of questions to ask a financial advisor. I have these over here on the screen. We’ve answered most of them. The one here is: “Will you help me implement the financial plan?” The answer is yes.
“How frequently will we meet or communicate?” That’s at least one time a year minimum during strategic planning meeting season, but that’s also typically a tax return review before your return is filed. It’s also typically either a meeting or email communication toward the end of the year with any end-of-year tax planning advice.
And then one of the questions on our website, guys, is: “When should I call my financial planner?” The answer to that is anytime life happens that impacts your finances—that’s when you should call us. When you get good news, when you get bad news. The worst thing an existing client can do is not call us when life happens, because that’s what we’re here for.
I think sometimes the audience may think, or maybe even a client sometimes could wrongfully think, “These are my money guys. They manage my portfolio. They help me with my tax plan.” They forget about estate planning. They forget we have mortgage contacts. They forget our in-depth insurance knowledge. They receive a long-term care rate increase and forget to forward it to us. All of these things are in the wheelhouse of what we do at Mason and what real financial planning actually is.
So by default, we’d much rather you over-communicate and give us the ability to say we can or can’t do it, rather than you make the decision on whether or not we can or can’t do it. Let us tell you whether or not we feel qualified and ready, rather than you make that decision for us.
I think those were good. Let’s see here… I believe we’ve answered most of these. “Can I see your regulatory disclosures or your ADV?” was one. Who wants to take that?
Tommy Blackburn: Yeah. It’s on our website in our disclosures, and you can go to the SEC’s website and look it up and have all that information as well.
John Mason: What happens to my relationship if my advisor leaves the firm? That hasn’t really happened here, Ben, but take your first stab at it.
Ben Raikes: That’s a great question, John, and I think that’s the reason, one, everyone on this call is a partner of Mason & Associates. Mike and Ken are partners of Mason & Associates. We’re not going anywhere anytime soon.
The second piece is part of this onboarding process: You meet with two people as you go through your intro call, into that introductory meeting, and then as your financial plan is being presented. This is thought of more not as “if my advisor leaves,” but “if my advisor is on vacation” or “if my advisor has a baby and they’re on maternity or paternity leave.” You have someone else within this firm who knows your plan really well based on being in those first handful of meetings and presenting that financial plan. So to me, that’s just a natural fit—if an advisor is unavailable or leaves the firm, there’s somebody who knows the situation really well already.
John Mason: We have worked really hard to build a succession plan at Mason. Mike and Ken are the founders of the firm. They still actively serve clients, but we now have the three of us as owners of the firm. We’ve hired two new financial planners with Colby and Kyle. We’re actively interviewing another financial planner as we speak, and that is not going to stop.
Will someone leave our firm one day because they get a better offer or higher compensation? Maybe. But realistically, we believe that the culture we’re building at Mason is that most people are going to leave because they’re retiring. Like, Mike and Ken are going to retire at some point, and the clients they work with are going to know who that successor is. They’re going to feel comfortable and confident in that person, and it’s not going to be a surprise.
Now, we can’t control death, incapacity, or freak accidents, but what we can control is making sure that we’re actively getting in front of all that stuff. Things will change over time. We can’t promise that if John Mason is your lead advisor now, he’ll always be your lead advisor for the next 35 years. But what we can say is that if John ever has to stop being a lead advisor for a certain number of families, you’re going to feel confident with the person taking my place.
What’s our commitment? Our commitment is that we’re not going anywhere. We feel very confident in that transition if and when it has to happen, but we also have the backstop that says, “We’re not going to let you down.”
So hopefully that answers the question a couple of ways, Tommy.
Tommy Blackburn: Yeah. I kind of want to dovetail or add to it. I think you said it very well. One, the firm is built to last, we believe, and we’re building it to last more. You are a client of the firm, not a client of an individual advisor. So you may work with one person quite a bit, but it’s the firm that’s committed to you.
To all the points that y’all are making, you’re going to have service. We’re going to make sure that we have people here to serve our clients, and you should like them. They will be competent professionals, and we’ll aim to take care of them as well.
The last thing you said that I thought was great is: As senior partners of the firm, as the firm is growing and we’re continuing trying to build this to last, we’re still leading it. We may not be in client one-on-one meetings all the time in the future, and that may change as the firm continues to change and need things. But you mentioned culture, and now we’re talking about leadership. That’s not changing—at least not anytime soon—and that’s where we ensure that the experience and standards are upheld.
John Mason: Well, we’re going to transition to closing down the episode. I think we’ve answered these questions really well.
I wrote down surrender charges. There are no surrender charges when you work with Mason. You will sign an ongoing investment management and financial planning agreement, but essentially what that says is either one of us can end the relationship at any time for any reason. What we say there is, if a relationship ever has to end—which is pretty rare—we will help you transition assets wherever they need to go with the same smile that we had when we brought the assets in. We hate to see a relationship end. It is rare, but you’re not locked into us for one year, seven years, 10 years, or some products that are even longer. We don’t have those surrender charges. It’s a fully liquid relationship.
As someone else in our industry says, every quarter you’re going to see our fee on your statement, and then our face is going to be right next to that. You’re going to have to decide every 90 days: Do Ben, Tommy, John, or all the advisors here provide value that meets or exceeds that fee? If so, we continue for another 90 days.
I’ll step off my soapbox: Some years are more intense than others, and that is where we really have the ability to shine. Some years we may have an easy year, and then next year there could be a health event, the death of a spouse, a retirement, or an inheritance. Our fee is our fee. Understand that the relationship ebbs and flows, and we’re here for you when life happens.
Closing thoughts for y’all, and then we’ll have a few audience asks as we close down the podcast.
Tommy Blackburn: Go ahead, Ben.
Ben Raikes: While you were talking, John, about the firm and the succession plan that’s in place, I would challenge any prospective client or existing client to find another firm that has done such a tremendous job transitioning the company from the initial founders to the team that’s running the company now and meeting with clients. Mason & Associates, Ken, Mike, and you all have done such a tremendous job with this that I think it deserves a lot of praise.
The second piece of that is for prospective clients and current clients: Do you want your advisor to be 65 years old with gray hair, or do you want them to have a long runway working with you? Those 65-year-olds at some point are going to retire, and you are going to be retired for the rest of your life. Do you want someone to exit that relationship right when something happens? I don’t think so. I think you want to work with someone who’s going to be in this industry for a really long time.
Tommy Blackburn: Wonderful, Ben. Yeah, great points.
I did want to put a spotlight, John, on recent Episode 128, “How Do I Choose a Financial Planner?” I feel like it dovetails fairly well with some of the conversation today. It goes a little more in-depth into questions to ask and how to think through things—very complementary to this episode, so check that one out as you’re listening to this if you want more detail or have more questions around it.
I think it’s been a wonderful episode. Hopefully our listeners like the idea of this new process. We’ve been leading up to this for a while. We’ve mentioned it in many episodes, and I hope that gives our audience confidence that, as you mentioned, it’s a monumental change, but it wasn’t one that we just did without thought. It was very intentional. A lot of thought and iteration has gone into this, and it seems like it’s been well-received.
John Mason: Well, thank you both. Audience, we promise that we will provide a lot of value before we ask anything of you, so here are the asks for today:
One, go to masonllc.net and download our e-book on survivor benefits. In exchange for your email address, we will provide that e-book, and we promise you that we will not take advantage of the fact that you’ve trusted us with your email. We’ll send you monthly updates, invite you to webinars as we’re doing them, and keep you apprised of everything going on at Mason. We absolutely will not take advantage of you.
New clients—yes, we’re taking them! If you’d like to start that process, it’s masonllc.net.
We know this makes a big difference for us: Please like, subscribe, and share this episode with friends, family, and coworkers across the country. It really makes a big difference for our channel. We believe our content is wonderful, and the next thing we want to do is increase eyeballs on that content—we can’t do that without you, the listener, helping us spread the message. As we like to say, you can be somebody’s hero by sharing what we do at Mason.
Audience, thank you for being with us on another episode of the Federal Employee Financial Planning Podcast. Remember, we’re financial planners first, and we do this second. We hope you leave this episode, and every episode, feeling educated and empowered to make positive changes in your financial plan.
Check out one of these two episodes: either Episode 128 that Tommy mentioned, or the other episode on our strategic planning meeting process and what it looks like to become an ongoing client of Mason & Associates.
The topics discussed on this podcast represent our best understanding of federal benefits and are for informational and educational purposes only, and should not be construed as investment, financial planning, or other professional advice.
We encourage you to consult with the office of personnel management and one or more professional advisors before taking any action based on the information presented.
