Medical & Legal Professionals

Our disciplined wealth planning is based on your own meaningful goals rather than market benchmarks. Your Wealth Plan is the blueprint upon which your asset allocation and investment portfolio will be built and measured. Our complete, tailored wealth services will be delivered through a personalized relationship with you and a deep understanding of your unique financial challenges.

We will help you minimize taxes to offset high earnings and manage your portfolio proactively; good returns are especially important for physicians with large expenses. Physicians often have too little portfolio diversification, which creates risk. We will allocate your assets to help protect you from market volatility.

Expertise at reducing debt and boosting cash flow – Attending medical school, starting and growing your practice comes at a significant cost. We can help you to pay down substantial debt, begin to accumulate capital, adopt strategies to improve your cash flow and develop disciplined spending habits without feeling like you’re on a budget.

Strategies for a great retirement – We are well-qualified to help you plan for all your financial needs. In addition, we work closely with Wealth Planners in complex situations. Together, we can help you to understand and plan to achieve an ideal retirement as you define it. The key is to diversify intelligently so that all your assets are not held within your practice.

Discretionary investment management – Our team offers discretionary investment management, which alleviates decision-making pressures on busy doctors. Delegate your portfolio decisions and free yourself from daily decisions, which can enable us to respond fast when opportunities or risks arise.

Practice Succession – Unlike traditional business owners, physicians cannot easily or objectively measure the value of their practice to transfer it to another clinician. You are your practice. So, together with experienced BMO business advisory and practice succession experts, we will help you decide how and when to retire and transition your wealth tax-effectively to loved ones and charitable organizations.

Law school tuition has increased significantly, so your wealth plan should include a student loan repayment strategy to shorten the time spent making payments so you can begin contributing to your portfolio sooner and benefit from long-term compound growth. On top of your student loans, you may also have a mortgage, car loan, or other debts to repay. We will develop a consolidated plan to pay down your debt which includes a repayment schedule for all that you owe.

Lawyers can earn significantly higher incomes than most people, yet they often spend more, too. Their busy lifestyles and high-pressure profession can prompt them to spend on expensive conveniences, lifestyle enhancements and entertainment.

We will help you budget to balance your short-term lifestyle needs with your long-term life and legacy goals; manage cash flow between your professional, personal and trust accounts; and advise you on the best way to use the extra cash flow when your practice starts generating growing revenues.

Your wealth plan should include insurance coverage to protect you, your loved ones, and your practice should unforeseen crises occur, such as illness, injury or a malpractice suit. Insurance can also be a very effective and tax-wise estate planning tool. When an added measure of sophistication is required, we will introduce you to a trusted BMO Private Investment Counsel Estate and Insurance Advisory specialist.

Beyond contributing to a Registered Retirement Savings Plan (RRSP), Tax-Free Savings Account (TFSA) or Individual Pension Plan (IPP), we can offer a wealth of tax planning strategies you can use to further mitigate tax.

When you are incorporated, you can pay yourself through your corporation, and own stocks directly rather than through a mutual fund or pooled fund. This brings you much greater tax flexibility and efficiency. You can opt to receive your income through dividends rather than through income or capital gains, which are taxed at much higher rates.

We will work with the expert tax planners at BMO Private Investment Counsel to ensure your corporation and portfolio are structured to maximize every allowable tax advantage.

We will help you determine what you need to accumulate to enjoy the lifestyle you envision for your retirement and then build a prudent, income-generating portfolio to fund the steady stream of needed liquidity. Lawyers often have above-average expenses and start investing later in life than other investors, so diligent retirement planning is extra important. We will work with High-Net-Worth Wealth Planners to ensure you meet your goals without running the risk of outliving your savings.

Crafting a thoughtful and tax-conscious estate plan that ensures your wealth will be distributed according to your precise wishes is a high priority. We will consult regarding your Will, beneficiaries, and powers of attorney and ensure all the details are correct and up to date. We can also introduce you to professionals from BMO Trust Company to help administer your estate and provide trusts in complex situations.