Investment Strategies with Jason Totedo

*The following is the output of transcribing from an audio recording. Although the transcription is largely accurate, in some cases it is incomplete or inaccurate due to inaudible passages or transcription errors.

Good afternoon everyone. It’s answers for elders radio, and happy Saturday. I am so fortunate today that we are joined by a gentleman by the name of Jason Toteito, and Jason is a financial advisor for a GP wealth advisors. Jason, welcome to the program good afternoon. Thanks for having us. You know, I am so interested in the topic that we’re going to talk about today because, as a adult daughter, I took care of my mom for the last six years of her life. My my world kind of totally drastically changed and I think a lot of it does happen with caregivers, people that are, you know, called into to care for a senior parent. I was one of those people that lost my job. I had a K that I was able to draw from for a while, but obviously I was kind of in a loss of you know, I had a home, I had, you know, a mortgage to pay and there’s all these different scenarios that happen for me and of course I know that many families are going through this and so, you know, question for you, Jason, how often do you see this kind of scenario? It’s getting a lot more common as people take a more holistic approach to what they’re trying to accomplish, and that’s part of what we do at a GP is really is bring out questions around what’s happening in the generation above you and what’s your goal for your children? Sure so, by looking at a multigenerational approach, you really able to uncover scenarios where we can really add value M and that’s part of the planning process that we that we do with our clients is really understanding what resources will you have available to you from the prior generation and how do you want to utilize them moving forward for your children and your your interests, philanthropy. You know, it’s so interesting that you say that because in the early days of my mom’s elder care, right we sold our house right she had a lot of cash to finance her later life. We didn’t know what to do, and that’s a whole other subject that will I’d love to talk to you about in another interview. But the thing is is that you know, you don’t anticipate your own concerns. How is this costing you? And I happen to know I think national statistic say that the average family caregiver spends out of pocket almost six thousand dollars a year just in their own caregiving expenses, meaning doctor’s appointments, where and tear and a vehicle purchases, a loss of pay, leaving, you know, leaving work, different things like that. So it is a costing an average caregiver a con send considerable amount of money and yet they have assets to those assets can get sometimes, you know, compromised. So it sounds to me like what you’re saying is is coming in soon and early. About how is this going to affect the family? This is the ideal scenario. Is that correct? Absolutely. The way this normally will work with a client engagement is that we’ll talk with normally the elder children, the elders children, adult children, and talk a little bit about what they have going on and in verily that discussion will will shift to well, my parents live here, my mom’s health is x, and then we can get a little bit more holistic around what type of planning they’ve already done. In a lot of cases it’s there’s a little bit to be to be worked on. And the Nice thing about your firm agp you guys aren’t beholding to one provider or one product. Does that correct? I mean I want to verify a little bit. So you guys have many options to show families absolutely a fully open architecture when it comes to investments, insurance. You know, we talked about long term care, the options available there. That’s a part of the solution. But yes, we’re are completely open architecture. We’re not behold into any one organization or company for a solution. We’re able to assess that clients needs, what resources they have available to them and then customize that solution to meet that unique set of needs. See, that’s amazing and it’s good because obviously there’s varying factors that come into that and and as that senior parent their needs increased. Obviously that’s going to affect that the later generation. It really comes to fruition in terms of the tax, the wealth and estate planning. As I said, each each situation is a little bit different depending on the net worth of the parents. Solution slightly different. So well, resources they have available to them? Are they going to have an estate tax problem either at the state or the federal level? What type of care do they want? So the last thing someone wants to do is have their husband and wife their parents separated later. Right. So, if those resources are there to keep them together, wouldn’t you rather? Wouldn’t you rather have had a situation where you could have gone and visited your mother and spend time with her rather than truly being in the trenches of taking care of her? Right? But spend that quality time with her, a few, three four hours a day, relaxing and enjoying your time, versus, as you say, spending valuable resources where they be economic, emotional. It’s taxing. It is so important, and especially this time of their lives. What you’re saying is so true. I see so many families torn apart because they think that the adult child has to do it all. In many cases that there’s multiple children. You know adult children in the family. You know that the tour of taking care of a senior parent is going to fall on one person’s shoulders and that brings up a whole other dynamic as well and and obviously the whole scenario within a family. Different types of situations can certainly affect. You know, the financial piece, absolutely, I can see that. Yeah, you have two or three siblings, couple of them live out of state, ones here locally. They’re bearing the brunt of that, that care. That creates a lot of friction. HMM. So we are techn to Jason Totito from a GP wealth advisors. Jason is talking to us today about just the whole fact of, you know, what happens to money. As you know, the family dynamic, you know, evolves through senior care and I think that’s really important that there is a solution. Jason, I that, you know, it’s really a group scenario and and it’s looking at what’s going to happen in the future. So obviously there’s a lot of things that we as adult children don’t know. I didn’t know during that six year period of time taking care of my mom that I could deduct her, you know, as a dependent, use claim her as a dependent on my taxes. I had no idea. So I filed taxes for like five years not realizing that a lot of my caregiving expenses could have been deducted. What kind of things do you know of that can be deducted in that way in that area? Well, well, that’s you know, that’s really the area of a train tax professional. Sure we’re not allowed to give tax advice, got it, but part of our comprehensive approach is the marrying of wealth, tax and estate planning all together. So, as an example, a GP wealth advisors is based in on the east side. I sit in a tax practice in Bellevue. So we’re separate and distinct from the tax practice, but we have resources available to us to really understand what those the answers to those questions. Sure. So let’s say, for instance, you are to come on as a client, we would engage you in a comprehensive discussion around all those different pieces. Do you have a state planning concerns? Have you updated your state documents, sir, as your parents updated their estate documents? Sir, are you taking care of you taking advantage of all the tax savings that are available to you in terms of deductions for this type of care? The wealth management piece that we do, and we do it very well, is but a small component of the overall solution that we provide to our clients and I really think that’s what differentiates AGP wealth advisors. I mean, you haven’t mentioned it, but we were recognized by barons for the last five years as one of the top one hundred fancial advisors in the country, one of only two in the state of Washington. That’s amazing and it’s certainly important for somebody like like myself, who took care of my mom. I didn’t know where to go. You know, it’s not like something that you know you’re trying to help your parents and all of a sudden you get on Google and say, I have I’m taking care of my mom. What do I do with their money? Are you know? How does that fact my money? There isn’t any literally clear answers that you can get up, you know, on Google. But to have a company that we have in our own backyard. So, Jason, tell me a little bit about all your locations and how you work. Sure. So. We’re locally owned and founded by a gentleman from the puget sound area, University of Washington graduate. We’ve been in business with a Mara price financial for the Beta part of twenty five years. Our headquarters is in Renton. HMM or founders from Maple Valley, so he likes that location. As I say, I sit in a tax practice in Bellevue. Part of our value proposition again is the combination of wealth tax and estate planning. So by having those professionals very close it’s one thing to provide someone a referral and say hey, go talk to this guy, he’s in saddle. That may or may not work out, but when you’re able to walk down the hall and introduce a client to a tax professional or to an estate planning reach and one stop shop, very, very powerful. We have an office in Southeast Alaska and Juno. We have an office in a present since pocane boy see Idaho, as well as a Burlington facility, and we’re constantly looking for opportunities to continue to work with our clients and their partners in terms of broadening out what we can do for them. That’s awesome. That’s awesome. So, as far as where your parents are located or, you know, making it easy for you, the Nice thing about it, I guess for me is is when you’re trying to find answers and you’re trying to go to all of a sudden you’re saying, we’ll go this guy and he’s in Bellevue, and go to this woman, to elder law attorney that’s in Mercer Island or whatever. You know, you’re running around all over the area and you’re really not getting the answers that you could get, which which you could just basically sit down and in pretty much, you know, one place, you can get all the answers very quickly, and the beauty of this, Jason, is the synergy that you create between each other. You there’s no surprises on what’s going on at any end, which is really important. I know absolutely it’s overused, but time is the most valuable commodity that we have, particularly for for working professionals today. They have to balance between their family, making a living and caring for other family members. The ability to holistically look at that have a trusted partner that can give guidance across multiple dimensions is really what we do. Awesome. So how do we reach you, Jason? You can touch our website at AGP wealth advisorscom telephone, four to five, two to eight, onzero. Awesome. Thanks for being on the program today. You’re welcome. Thanks for having US