After more than four decades spent building a family and technology business together, husband-and-wife entrepreneurs Sam and Natalie are ready to think about retiring. They have a clear idea of what they’d like to do in retirement – golf, travel, and volunteer with their favourite charities – but are unsure if they’ll have enough money to support all their goals.

Neither of their two grown children is interested in taking over the business, so Sam and Natalie plan to sell the company – an idea that’s been causing a lot of stress. The business has been their main and steady source of income for decades, and they were reluctant to let it go. They knew they would have no problem finding a buyer for the business but wondered about its selling price and whether that would be enough to fund their future goals.

Here’s what the Rubach Wealth team did for Sam and Natalie:

• Retirement costs projection: Sam and Natalie knew what they wanted to do in retirement but hadn’t quite figured out how much their post-work lifestyle would cost. The Rubach Wealth team did a month-by-month projection of what they’re likely to do in their initial years of retirement and extrapolated this information over a longer time horizon, taking into account potential factors such as declining health in their later years. This exercise allowed us to estimate their retirement expenses.

• Identify current and future priorities. Sam and Natalie emphasized from the start their desire to engage in philanthropic work during retirement. But after an in-depth conversation with them, we learned that they were also keen to build a legacy based on strengthening the presence of women in science and technology. At the same time, Sam and Natalie wanted to make sure there would be money to pass on to their children, who were also starting their own families.

• Strategize for the sale of the business. We brought in a trusted business valuations expert to assess the value of Sam and Natalie’s technology company. The result of this assessment showed us that if the business was sold in the next two years, Sam and Natalie would fall short of what they needed to achieve all of their goals in retirement and beyond. With this in mind, we worked with Sam and Natalie on a plan to keep the business for the next five years and continue to build its sale value.

• Create financial, tax, philanthropic, and estate plans. Sam and Natalie’s vision for the future involved a lot of moving parts. There was a retirement lifestyle that needed funding, a business to sell, causes to support, and future wealth transfers to the next generations. With all of these in mind, we created four distinct plans for Sam and Natalie to address their financial needs today and in retirement, ensure tax efficiencies – particularly from the sale of their business – build a legacy to support their philanthropic causes and ensure fair and tax-optimized inheritances for their kids and grandkids.

The road ahead for Sam and Natalie

The work we did with Sam and Natalie helped them establish a timeline for selling their business which, in turn, would trigger their retirement. They’ve crystalized their short-term goal – to build greater value into their business and get it ready for a successful sale – while starting to plan for life in retirement. Sam has started looking at golf club memberships with a global reach and Natalie is researching organizations that do meaningful work in encouraging girls and young women to pursue education and careers in science, technology, engineering, and math. They’ve got five years to line up what they need to achieve their retirement, legacy, and intergenerational wealth transfer goals and now have comprehensive plans to guide them forward.