Divorce at Altitude: A Podcast on Colorado Family Law

Wealth Management During a Divorce with David Kopp | Episode 62

October 21, 2021 Ryan Kalamaya & Amy Goscha Season 1 Episode 62
Divorce at Altitude: A Podcast on Colorado Family Law
Wealth Management During a Divorce with David Kopp | Episode 62
Show Notes Transcript

Financial advisors will assess the complete financial situation a the couple going through a divorce, from income and expenses and assets, to insurance policies. Although immediate financial needs are important in a divorce, long-term plans should also be taken into consideration.

Amy Goscha and David Kopp discuss how a wealth management advisor can help plan for the future during a divorce.

What is Divorce at Altitude? 

Ryan Kalamaya and Amy Goscha provide tips and recommendations on issues related to divorce, separation, and co-parenting in Colorado. Ryan and Amy are the founding partners of an innovative and ambitious law firm, Kalamaya | Goscha, that pushes the boundaries to discover new frontiers in family law, personal injuries, and criminal defense in Colorado. 

To subscribe to Divorce at Altitude, click here and select your favorite podcast player. To subscribe to Kalamaya | Goscha's YouTube channel where many of the episodes will be posted as videos, click here. If you have additional questions or would like to speak to one of our attorneys, give us a call at 970-429-5784 or email us at info@kalamaya.law.

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DISCLAIMER: THE COMMENTARY AND OPINIONS ON THIS PODCAST IS FOR ENTERTAINMENT AND INFORMATIONAL PURPOSES AND NOT FOR THE PURPOSE OF PROVIDING LEGAL ADVICE. CONTACT AN ATTORNEY IN YOUR STATE OR AREA TO OBTAIN LEGAL ADVICE ON ANY OF THESE ISSUES. 

What is Divorce at Altitude?

Ryan Kalamaya and Amy Goscha provide tips and recommendations on issues related to divorce, separation, and co-parenting in Colorado. Ryan and Amy are the founding partners of an innovative and ambitious law firm, Kalamaya | Goscha, that pushes the boundaries to discover new frontiers in family law, personal injuries, and criminal defense in Colorado.

To subscribe to Divorce at Altitude, click here and select your favorite podcast player. To subscribe to Kalamaya | Goscha's YouTube channel where many of the episodes will be posted as videos, click here. If you have additional questions or would like to speak to one of our attorneys, give us a call at 970-429-5784 or email us at info@kalamaya.law.

************************************************************************

DISCLAIMER: THE COMMENTARY AND OPINIONS ON THIS PODCAST IS FOR ENTERTAINMENT AND INFORMATIONAL PURPOSES AND NOT FOR THE PURPOSE OF PROVIDING LEGAL ADVICE. CONTACT AN ATTORNEY IN YOUR STATE OR AREA TO OBTAIN LEGAL ADVICE ON ANY OF THESE ISSUES.

Ryan Kalamaya (4s):
I'm Ryan Kalamaya

Amy Goscha (6s):
And I'm Amy Goscha

Ryan Kalamaya (8s):
Welcome to Divorce at Altitude. A podcast on Colorado family law.

Amy Goscha (13s):
Divorce is not easy. It really sucks. Trust me. I know, besides being an experienced divorce attorney, I'm also a divorce client.

Ryan Kalamaya (21s):
You are someone considering divorce or a fellow family law attorney listening for weekly tips and insight into topics related to divorce co parenting and separation in Colorado.

Amy Goscha (37s):
Welcome back to another Divorce at Altitude podcast episode. I'm Amy Gosha and I have with me today, David Kopp from LPL financial. How are you doing David?

David Kopp (48s):
Thanks so much for having me on today.

Amy Goscha (50s):
Yeah, I really liked doing these podcasts episodes and they're really fun. You know, really excited to talk about what you do. So kind of just to jump in, can you tell me what your background is?

David Kopp (1m 1s):
So I'm getting ready to start. My 25th year in the business as a wealth manager, I started out helping people. I've always enjoyed that. And I started helping people by preserving their wealth and to grow their wealth. And over time I realized that that was fun and all, however, I found a lot more value in becoming a financial planner and helping people protect all of their assets and not just their investments, but also looking at their whole financial picture Instead.

Amy Goscha (1m 32s):
That's great. And so you and I met through a mutual or a colleague of mine, you know, I was introduced to you because you can really be an asset to kind of my team and helping a client. Can you explain to me, you know, how you got into the realm of working with divorce clients?

David Kopp (1m 47s):
Oh yes, absolutely. It was actually more of something I stumbled upon than something that I had planned and sometimes the best things in life work out that way, the person who had initially introduced you and I together, I haven't met him again by accident. And I had asked him when we sat down, we were talking and getting to know each other and I just asked him, what did he find was his greatest challenge? And his answer was nothing that I had even expected him to say. He said that he's puts in so much time to prepare for these meetings that he has and the cases that he goes to court with. And he feels he's ready to answer any question or be ready for any scenario. However, he typically gets the one scenario that he doesn't feel so great with.

David Kopp (2m 31s):
So even after he has a great ending to the case, they win, they get exactly what they were going after. Then the client will ask them one final follow-up question, which is, is this enough? Will this last long enough?

Amy Goscha (2m 46s):
Yeah, that's a very difficult question. You know? So how do you start even unpacking that question

David Kopp (2m 53s):
Question? And this is the biggest one. Is, is it enough? How long, what Last is really the important one, because there are no second chances. This is the one shot or the one chance to make sure that you've got enough assets to last for the duration of your life. So a lot of times an attorney is so well-equipped to do an amazing job of representing their client and making sure that they get their fair share and what's fair and do to them. However, they may not have the same strengths that I would bring to the table, which is to find out through a financial comprehensive plan of, will this be enough? So the assets may seem so much on paper of however much that the client may get for their half, but there's so many other landmines of things that may come into play.

David Kopp (3m 40s):
Things like inflation that I know we'll talk about here in the next couple of minutes, but may not be factored in. So while that number may seem great right up front, we all know that life is so much more expensive than we realize. Day-to-day right.

Amy Goscha (3m 57s):
So let's talk about the team approach. So what is a wealth managers?

David Kopp (4m 3s):
Great question. So like, so many things it's changed in life even 20, 30 years ago, it was mainly just handling investments. So the old thinking was you would do your job, Amy, which is to represent your client the best you can get. What's fair to client. You would then make a reference, a referral to meet. I would then just manage the money, the best I could to preserve the wealth and to try to grow it as best as possible. But that has come a long way since then. Now we're finding, there's so much more benefit to integrating both of our strengths, yours and mine and our services before this case even starts to find out what's important ahead of time, by finding out what's most important to the client and where the most beneficial assets will be for the client.

David Kopp (4m 56s):
It helps you, Amy do a better job at representing the client to know what assets to go for and what will be best suited for your client as well as during and after. So instead of just having the situation where it works better after this will also, there's so much value in bringing a financial planner or a wealth manager in ahead of

Amy Goscha (5m 20s):
Right. And, you know, with my role, when a client comes to me, I mean, and we'll talk more about, you know, the state of where people are when they're going through divorce, you know, but they're really looking to me for advice to handhold them on, you know, what is equitable? You know, what should we go after? And I, don't always, you know, it's great to have someone who specializes in that area to guide me because I frankly might not always know.

David Kopp (5m 47s):
Yeah, that's really a great point also to kind of bring this around, bringing me in or someone like myself in ahead of time and doing the financial plan. It really helps things out for so many different reasons. A couple of them that come to mind are for most people, this is the largest financial transaction they will ever have in their life. Also, I know you can relate to this as so many people can putting something down on paper, just calms the moment down if you've ever gotten up in the middle of the night, and you've got so many things running through your head, how will this happen? How do I work through this? And just any normal day situation of things that come up in your head, once you put them down on paper, everything just feels calmer and a little more organized and a little more in control of financial plan.

David Kopp (6m 36s):
So a financial plan lets you put things down on paper, let you prioritize, lets you categorize things so that you can stay focused and clear your mind of things that are just running overwhelming. That's the financial part. There's also the emotional part, a divorce. It's not just about the money. There's so much emotion involved. The less you have inside your head, the more you can maintain a clearer head of what's important to you picking up the pieces, moving on with your life. Does that make sense?

Amy Goscha (7m 12s):
And I also see that with clients because they are so overwhelmed, you know, one day they might, you know, they might write something down, but the next day they might write something else down just because there's so much going on that, you know, they're just kind of in a tailspin. So I think having the team approach of your divorce attorney and a wealth manager come in is super critical at the onset.

David Kopp (7m 34s):
Absolutely. Again, having more than one set of eyes is beneficial, especially in what could be potentially your most vulnerable period of time. Things that could be the most routine or mundane things in your life are so instantly overwhelming because you've got so many things going on. So again, the more things you can compartmentalize and put down on paper, the more calm everything seems to be. And also the add to what you had said. You can sit down with someone I know this has happened to you on both ends, meaning you as an attorney and you as just a consumer at life, you'll sit down with someone on something and they'll explain it.

David Kopp (8m 16s):
And when you're sitting in the meetings, it makes complete sense. And then as soon as you get up and walk away, you think, what was that about? What did they say here? This will to put something down on paper, you'll be able to remember it the next day and the day after. And then when things do change, you'll at least have a starting point in which your financial plan will be able to remain fluid with your ever-changing needs in your life. Because what happens today is probably not going to be as important to you or regimented as it would be in a year or two.

Amy Goscha (8m 50s):
Right? And this is a super critical point I think. And we kind of touched on it, but when is the right time to bring you in as the wealth manager or someone going through divorce,

David Kopp (8m 60s):
I would say right after the first consultation, it's important to establish some sort of rapport between you and your potential client. So you wouldn't need me or someone again, in my line of work into that meeting, there may just be too many moving parts for the first meeting. But after the first meeting, if there's some sort of synergy that's formed between you and your potential client, then the next steps would immediately be to bring myself or someone in our field, into the meeting to start looking at analyzing the balance sheet, the assets. And I don't want it to sound completely financial because when you're going through a divorce, the last thing you're thinking about is financials.

David Kopp (9m 41s):
You're more just trying to figure out what will I do with my children who will get what schedule and you're thinking what the different part of your brain, not the analytical side, you're thinking more with the emotional side as you should be. That's why you would bring in someone with the financial analytical side, but someone who can bridge the two emotions of the emotional side and the financial together, but do it in a way that doesn't seem like you're being grilled on things that you normally would be very routine, but now seems so overwhelming.

Amy Goscha (10m 15s):
Yeah, it does. And I think, and correct me if I'm wrong, but it sounds like what you're saying also is that a client can take control of their finances by bringing a wealth manager in with their divorce attorney at the beginning.

David Kopp (10m 28s):
Yes, absolutely. One thing that I've seen and noticed again, I've been working for about 23 years with family law practices like yourself. And I've noticed that the biggest concern that the client has is the unknown. What is the outcome going to look like? We all want to know. It's like, unfortunately an analogy would be like watching a scary movie for the first time. As soon as you watch it, you're biting your nails. Wondering how is this going to end boy, I wish I kind of knew how this would end by bringing in ahead of time and having a team of professionals looking at everything ahead of time, they can provide insight to tell you here's what the end of the movie's going to look like.

David Kopp (11m 10s):
And again, going back to the analogy, once you seen the scary movies, so to speak or the horror movie, go back and watch it a second time, it's a completely different experience because you already have an idea of the ending and it's not nearly as daunting or overwhelming. So the same thing would apply here. We sit down together with you, myself and with the client and we already discern what's the most appropriate assets. And we give you an idea of what the end of this story is going to look like. And again, in the time of such uncertainty, any form of an idea of what the end is going to look like is a very welcome emotion,

Amy Goscha (11m 52s):
Right? So we've with cover that it's really important to bring you in at the beginning of the process. Let's talk a little bit about what that process would look like. So if I had a client and brought you in, in the beginning, you had a meeting with them. What, what is kind of your general I guess process?

David Kopp (12m 10s):
Yeah. So the last thing I would do, knowing that the client, again, can barely sometimes even hold it together because of the stresses of focusing on my life has been structured this way for so many periods of time and now it's all about to change. So the last thing that I would come in is start asking questions that are so analytical that they either don't care don't know or don't have an interest in. So what my job is is to discern information, but do it in a way that they can relate to, without creating a sense of feeling overwhelmed or a deer in the headlights. So in English I'm basically gathering financial data, which helps me do a better job and provides this information for you.

David Kopp (12m 54s):
So I would do fact gathering of the complete financial picture of both parties, what they have assets wise, liabilities, income, flow assets, tax bracket, stuff like that, but not in a mathematical way. And then I would then present this information to you, Amy, so that you would know what is the right approach to go after with these division of assets, come up. I say this because someone may need a lot more income than another type of client. Some assets may need more low cost basis because of their tax bracket. And others just may need more assets that produce dividends.

David Kopp (13m 39s):
Every one is going to be different and unique, but the more you Amy know about them and not just what they tell you, but what they have, the better job you could do in going after what assets are most appropriate.

Amy Goscha (13m 53s):
Yeah. And also from my role, you know, that's what I'm doing as well as kind of information gathering financial gathering because we have to complete the 16.2 disclosures. So that's a great time to have you come in as well, you know, because the client is doing that anyway, you know, to have your expertise. And I think another important thing is that you also help with

Ryan Kalamaya (14m 16s):
This episode is brought to you by our law firm. Kalamaya Goscha Amy. And I describe our law firm as an innovative and ambitious trial team that pushes the boundaries to discover new frontiers in family law, personal injuries, and criminal defense in Colorado. We currently have offices in Aspen, Glenwood Springs, Edwards, Denver, and Boulder. If you want to find out more, visit our website, Kalamaya dot law. Now back to the show,

Amy Goscha (14m 45s):
You talked about income. Why is it important to figure out how much income someone has or need? Yes,

David Kopp (14m 52s):
Absolutely. Because every scenario is going to be different, but you may find that someone in, or one of the cases that you're working on, you may come from a family where only one of the partners is working and the other one is not used to working or doesn't have the ability to replicate that high level of income. So in that case, you would be forced to find assets that would create that income stream or reproduce it. Whereas they may not typically have the skillset to do that. For example, if one of the spouses was a surgeon and the other one didn't have that type of specialized training, then immediately you would be less inclined to go after the big house up in Aspen, which would be basically a new surround your neck because of the liability and the depth that the outflow of cash.

David Kopp (15m 45s):
And you'd be looking for more things that would create income to keep up with just the daily cost of living. Also something that I've found when I sit down with family law attorneys like yourself, is that you have such a tight window of time from when this first starts until the assets are divided. So bringing in someone like me, you can hand off some of the asset gathering to me so you can focus on other aspects of the case and therefore you'll be more prepared to do a better job and serve the client even better. If that makes sense.

Amy Goscha (16m 18s):
That does. And one thing that I think also is important is that we also, you know, I have to figure out a budget for the client moving forward. And that's something that you can also help with is you can run different scenarios to show the client, you know, here's what you need in order to, you know, live now, but also into the future, is that correct?

David Kopp (16m 38s):
A hundred percent. And you just said the key word, which is the future. What I mean by that is the one thing that is typically overlooked. I see time and time again is over time, the person that you represent, no reflection of you, just the either side is going to typically become poor and poor because the assets that they may get initially, or the income level that they may get is typically going to decline over time. That's simply not the wealth manager doing a bad job. It's because the cost of living continues to escalate. If you look right now, we are really in a high inflationary cycle that we have not seen in years where just go to the grocery store and you'll see my goodness.

David Kopp (17m 22s):
The cost of food is out of control. The cost of education for schooling is out of control, assisted living facility. So the cost keeps going up even though your income may or may not. So it's important when you do a budget to factor in tomorrow's dollars, not just today. So the amount of money you have today make work perfect with even extra laying around, to take a vacation or do something, but you'll find that over time it'll become worth less and less, unless you factor in inflation into your scenario.

Amy Goscha (17m 56s):
Yeah. I know we've talked about this before, where, when someone's going through a divorce, they might not be able to see what they need into the future, just because there's so much going on emotionally. So having, you know, a team approach with you, you know, someone like you, someone like me really looking at the future and helping plan a super important.

David Kopp (18m 17s):
Absolutely. And we don't ask the client things like, what do you think you'll need in the future? Again, they probably got up and wondered how they were even going to get into your office today and get the kids off to school. Those become such overwhelming tasks to do. Whereas normally those used to be so routine, but now they're so out of their comfort zone, knowing am I doing the right thing? Should I be getting a divorce? Should I not? How will I be able to survive? So that's my job to factor in inflation. And again, we talked about what assets would be most appropriate because at the end of the day, I think a lot of times people get stuck on, well, I got half, half, isn't always equitable.

David Kopp (18m 60s):
Half could be detrimental depending on which assets you're going after. So doing the financial plan ahead of time will help you. Amy decide, which is the most equitable 50% assets for your clients.

Amy Goscha (19m 15s):
And he said something very key. Half is not always equal. Like that's very, you know, important to, for clients to understand. So let's talk about that. You know, in Colorado, the law is that division of marital property is equitable. Most times that is, you know, a 50, 50 division, but can you talk to me David about, you know, how are not, how are all assets not

David Kopp (19m 37s):
Great question? Absolutely. So cash, for example, using the most simplest form of an asset is cash. There's no ramifications tax wise to it. It's cash. It doesn't have much growth. It's just sitting there at represents safety and liquidity. Whereas going to the other extreme, there may be something like a piece of property. Let's say that you run into a potential client and that client receives the house, the primary residence. Well, you didn't realize that it's again, not your fault. This isn't your area that you're supposed to focus on and neither did the client, but you realize the client now the divorce is over the client's living in the house and says, I don't want this house anymore.

David Kopp (20m 23s):
It brings back too many negative memories. I want to move. Now, the client puts the house on the market and didn't realize that there's such a low cost basis on the house. So all of a sudden, even though they did fine and sold the house for a nice sum of money, unfortunately they have to pay the government of very big sum of money all now, we're not looking at the amount of money that we thought was 50%. We're now chiseling down from the 50. And now we're looking more into the 40 something or even less percent range because taxes were never factored in. We were looking at over the top, whereas cash again is cash.

David Kopp (21m 6s):
And another example could be something as simple as corporate stock or stock options, depending on if one of the spouses or both have a bunch of low cost stock. The same thing applies. So taxes are very crucial to knowing our, my getting 50%. So that's an example of what we're talking about. Work half is not always equity.

Amy Goscha (21m 28s):
Yeah. Or there's a scenario where, you know, if people have a lot of money in retirement, but you need someone who needs access to money, you know, you're not going to want them to have all of their assets tied up in retirement. You know, that's another good example. Or when you were talking about the house and someone wants to stay in the house, you know, from a legal perspective, if you're keeping the house, we're going to value it based off of fair market value. And then like you said, if they then decide to sell it, then they have the sales cost and the tax issue.

David Kopp (22m 1s):
Amy, that is such an amazing point that you've brought up to piggyback onto what you're saying. That's another issue, not just the house, but now all of a sudden, it's all too common to get half of a tax deferred plan, like an IRA or a 401k, neither of those have experienced taxes. So if you have your client and they inherit a bulk of their 50% comes in the form of a tax deferred, like we're talking about an IRA or a 401k, and now the client needs access to the assets for liquidity. Now, all of a sudden we've got not just taxes, but if the client is under the age of eligibility, now we've got a penalty.

David Kopp (22m 41s):
That's up to 10% on top of this. So every dollar that you take out could be as high as 40 or 50% of every dollar you take, you give to uncle Sam and taxes. So again, reiterating you're not getting 50%, whereas on paper, it looked very clean and simple. Yay. I got 50%. Here's half of his IRA or her IRA, but in reality, that's just not how it really is. So it's a little more complicated than it seems of splitting the assets on paper.

Amy Goscha (23m 14s):
Yeah. And also splitting the assets is highly tied to, you know, spousal maintenance, if someone needs that. And if I'm representing someone who is the earner, how much can my client pay versus, you know, if I'm representing the person that needs the spousal maintenance, how much do they need? You know, and it's very tied to assets as well, because we can look at, you know, can we give someone an income producing asset to lower the, you know, the spousal maintenance obligation. So those really are tied together when I'm trying figure out what's best for my

David Kopp (23m 46s):
Client. Absolutely. And to again, to piggyback to what you said, if in your scenario, you're representing the earner, is it better to provide assets to the receiving spouse, not your client, but the other party, or is it better to pay in income? Is it better to pay child support or alimony there's tax advantages to each of the scenarios that there's disadvantaged? So we run income analysis to find out what's most tax favorable. Again, you're not trying to cheat anyone, but you're trying to do what's equitable, but at the same time, what's most efficient tax-wise for the client, but still doing the correct and honorable thing to the other party.

Amy Goscha (24m 31s):
Right. So let's talk about, we talked about bringing you in at the beginning and that financial or information gathering stage, the next kind of piece in my case is going to be probably setting the case for mediation. How can we work as a team when I'm preparing to go to mediation and how can you help the client and me be a better attorney in meeting?

David Kopp (24m 51s):
Oh, great question. Okay. So bringing me in ahead of time IS FOR, does create a few advantages. One, as I've already mentioned, just getting something on paper, gets it out of your head, where everything is just running around and you can't keep all your thoughts control. This, puts it down on paper. Secondly, a financial plan typically costs anywhere up to five or even $7,000. My plan is complimentary. It's not that I'm a non-for-profit by nature. It's just that the financial plan is just as much for me and for you, Amy, as it is for the client, I use they're likened this to going to your doctor, your doctor has to ask questions. They don't just say, oh, your stomach hurts.

David Kopp (25m 32s):
Get the scalpel nurse, let's cut them open and start surgery. They'd have to work up a profile to find out what the most appropriate course of action is. So do I, so I don't charge anything for the financial plan to gather the data and provide it to you. Also, the financial plan is, as I mentioned, a very fluid process. So if in the middle of it, you get a curve ball thrown at you. Something that wasn't disclosed during the first phase or the discovery phase, we can update the plan on the fly so we can make changes that stay fluid with the situation, as we know that life requires that to happen regularly.

Amy Goscha (26m 10s):
And then one thing I'd like to mention is that when you're going through divorce, you mentioned that things are expensive. You know, we have inflation, it's really expensive to live on your own, but when you're doing your budget, you know, you need to think about certain things. Like what if you have to replace a hot water heater in a home? You know, there's just certain things that I'm guessing that you have specific questions that you can ask people that they're not thinking of that need to be added in.

David Kopp (26m 34s):
Absolutely. So we ask all the questions that we can think of. And then I factor in the miscellaneous column just for things that you just so eloquently said that you can't think of because that's how life is. It's always something that you weren't expecting. So that could be anywhere between 17 and 23 additional percent factor it into the budget as well.

Amy Goscha (26m 59s):
Yeah, that does. And also when I'm looking at spousal maintenance, a lot of times, the first question people have is how much am I going to get? And in Colorado we have an advisory guideline, but then we have the factors that really look at, you know, what is your need? And so if I extrapolate the formula and I say, oh, you know, you could get 18,000 per month. They might say, oh, I can live off of that. But maybe they can't when they actually look at, you know, what is their lifestyle on how much it costs?

David Kopp (27m 27s):
Absolutely. How much am I going to get is such an arbitrary question. And I don't think it's as relevant as people think it may sound like a great number, but I think the bigger question that you just said yourself is how much do you need? That is way more important than how much am I going to get? And you would just be throwing out a ballpark and with something as important as your one shot in life, you've got to be more specific than a ballpark. Also, I find that so many times people haven't even done a financial plan when they were together or if they have, they've never done one individually on their own.

David Kopp (28m 9s):
It was always when the assets were together, what are we going to do for the children together? Now it's time to start looking for you and taking care of you and putting together a financial plan for you for the next phase of your life.

Amy Goscha (28m 24s):
Right? And that's very important looking into the future. So say that in our scenario, you know, we went to mediation, the assets are divided. How can you help a client moving forward?

David Kopp (28m 35s):
Great question. So based on the results of the financial plan, we sit down, we put down everything that's important to the client. And a couple of rules of thumbs that I typically follow is I encourage clients not to make big decisions in the first year. And the reason is this is they're just trying to sort out, picking up the pieces of what the next steps are. A lot of times I work with people that they've been together for so many years, that their identities are so intertwined that the first year or two, they're just trying to unwind and try to recreate their new identity. So we again do a financial plan because you've got to have some sort of basis, but the biggest mistakes are typically made when people make big decisions, purchases in the beginning, a there's such an emotional element.

David Kopp (29m 26s):
They're either out of spite or out of, I can show them and move on and make a decision that in the next year or two, you may find what was I thinking? That's just not that important to me. So we try to encourage minimal decisions in the very beginning, but to tie it back to what you're asking is we take the pre divorced planning, financial plan, and we updated a little bit further and say, okay, this is what we were shooting for. This is how things ended up settling. Now we take these assets, this income, these tax brackets. And then we say, this is what's going to go on the rest of your life based on what you said was most important to you so that we make sure that we cover the things like I mentioned the inflation, and to make sure that the kids are taken care of to make sure that things are important to you,

Amy Goscha (30m 18s):
Right? And with anything in life, you know, life happens, things change. And so, you know, that financial plan needs to be updated. And sometimes people come back to me and, you know, someone has lost a job or there needs to be a child support modification, you know, and I can work with them along with you to look at, you know, how should that be modified and how should their trajectory moving forward, be updated.

David Kopp (30m 43s):
Absolutely. And again, tying into what you're saying, but also looking forward, some people just come, I've had experiences where someone will say, I don't want to do this anymore. Can I? Or what if and the, what if is the biggest two words I find with anyone that I work with? What if, what if I decide to go to part-time? What if instead of working the hectic nine to five, I want to do something where I put more into working as a nonprofit. Can I do this? And that's what the plan gives you the freedom to know the answers ahead of time. So you can make the bold decisions and play more offense instead of defense and say, I'm going to do this with my wife, because I know the math will work for me.

Amy Goscha (31m 26s):
Yeah. And that's one point that we didn't really talk about is it is important to bring you in. And also, you know, someone like me at the beginning of a divorce, because you don't want to be on the defense. You know, I think that's super important for a client to feel like they're not just on the defense that, you know, they know what they have. They know what they need and they know what they need to go after.

David Kopp (31m 49s):
Absolutely. Yes. So we've already talked for a fair amount about the pre-divorce planning and during the process, but then afterwards, so the case is over the client gets this much in income, this much of assets, but then what, so transitioning the relationship. It's not just a transaction of, thank you. I enjoyed working with you. Good luck. Hope it all works out, but now it transitions you to the next phase. It's not just the division of assets, but now it's, what do we do with them? How will they work? Because picking up the pieces is every bit as important as working on things ahead of time and getting everything in the pre-planning process.

Amy Goscha (32m 36s):
Right. That's a great point. So as we kind of wrap this up, so David, we've talked about a lot of really important key points today. Can you just summarize what we've talked about that are the key points for clients to take away?

David Kopp (32m 49s):
Absolutely. So in the old traditional thinking, it was basically more of a transaction approach. And now there's so many benefits we're finding to the new ideas of taking more of a holistic approach. When working with clients, having more eyes, look at it, starting a financial plan ahead of it. So that you're playing more offense instead of more defense, having an idea of what the outcome is going to be a lot more clarity than wondering how is this whole thing going to work out, taking more control of your own life, instead of hoping for the best.

David Kopp (33m 31s):
And just seeing what happens. People are looking to take more control and have more responsibility and know the ending before the movie even starts. So to speak, bringing in a financial planner and someone, a wealth manager to do a plan beforehand During, and then transitioning the relationship to the longest part, which is after the divorce, when all the dust settles is the new type of thinking. Instead of just we've won a great case. We were awesome. But now what, and everyone's sitting around the table with a ton of questions.

Amy Goscha (34m 9s):
Yes. Great. Wrap-up I appreciate that. And I, I appreciate you being on the podcast today, David, if clients want to get ahold of you, what is the best way that they can get in touch with you?

David Kopp (34m 20s):
Absolutely. So everyone has a different preferred method of communication. So if you would like to reach out to me, my phone number is (303) 809-1976. That's my mobile. And it's with me at all times. My email address is David dot Kopp, which is spelled K O P p@lpl.com. And of course a text is fine as well to the mobile number. I've just given.

Amy Goscha (34m 56s):
Great. Thank you, David. And thank you to everyone. Another great episode of Divorce at Altitude. We'll talk to you next time.

Ryan Kalamaya (35m 3s):
Hi everyone. This is Ryan again. Thank you for joining us on Divorce at Altitude. If you found our tips, insight or discussion, helpful, please tell a friend about this podcast for show notes, additional resources or links mentioned on today's episode. Visit divorceataltitude.com. Follow us on apple podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen in. Many of our episodes are also posted on YouTube. You can also find Amy and me at Kalamaya.law or 970-315-2365 that's kalamaya.law.