Dan Wilkinson

I help people build wealth, reduce taxes, and make smarter financial decisions
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Securities offered through LPL Financial, Member SIPC

[Dan Wilkinson @DanWilkinson_FP]

My recommended order of financial operations:
1. Doing

2. Learning

(big gap)

3. Thinking

What most people start with:
1. Thinking

(big gap)

2. Learning

(big gap)

3. Doing

[Dan Wilkinson @DanWilkinson_FP]

4 weeks and 5 days
But who’s counting 😅

[Dan Wilkinson @DanWilkinson_FP]

WEEK 25/52

🐋 The Whale

This place is a must-go

[Dan Wilkinson @DanWilkinson_FP]

https://t.co/63jXueiR9I

[Dan Wilkinson @DanWilkinson_FP]

White Sox fan … but apparently I can be persuaded

[Dan Wilkinson @DanWilkinson_FP]

Garbage in = Garbage out

I hear some version of this pretty often:

“I’ll have $X million by age ___"

Usually, that number is coming from a compound interest calculator

The calculator can show you what happens if everything goes according to the assumptions you entered

It cannot predict your future

Here are the assumptions hiding inside that number:

You’ll earn the return you plugged in
You’ll invest the same amount every year without interruption
The market will cooperate with your timeline
Your income will continue to support your savings plan
Your goals and lifestyle won’t change over the years
Taxes and other life changes won’t affect the outcome

Everybody has a plan
... but few are stress tested

[Dan Wilkinson @DanWilkinson_FP]

Simple advice sits on a lot of to-do lists

How often does it actually get crossed off?

In a lot of cases, if there's nothing making you do it, it doesn't get done

That's the irony of personal finance. The advice isn't the hard part

It's doing it on a random Tuesday when:

Nobody is watching
There’s no immediate reward
Something else feels more urgent

[Dan Wilkinson @DanWilkinson_FP]

WEEK 26/52

Labriola

Portion sizes are excellent 🔥

[Dan Wilkinson @DanWilkinson_FP]

https://t.co/Amaj7HcWoV

[Dan Wilkinson @DanWilkinson_FP]

When people hear “financial advisor,” the first thing they are thinking is investments.

But your financial life is much bigger than your portfolio

Think about everything that goes into your financial picture:

Your income
Your spending
Your family
Your goals
Your taxes
Your insurance
Your investments
Your estate plan

There are experts who help with each piece and each person plays an important role

But these decisions don't happen one at a time

No need to overcomplicate this -
Financial planning is just making sure all of those decisions are working together

Whether you do that yourself or work with an advisor, the idea is the same:

Make better decisions with your money

[Dan Wilkinson @DanWilkinson_FP]

Most financial advice for pilots sounds something like this:

• Max out your 401(k)
• Buy term life insurance
• Don't increase your spending every time you get a raise

Don't get me wrong this is good advice
But I think there's a much bigger opportunity that gets overlooked

Pilots have two advantages that almost no other profession has

First: You know what you're going to make

Most professionals don't know what their income will look like five years from now

Pilots do

Your pay is negotiated, published, and based on years of service. Assuming normal career progression, you can project your income decades into the future with a level of certainty that's very rare

Second: Your base doesn't necessarily determine your state income taxes

Under 49 U.S.C. § 40116(f), airline crew members generally pay state income tax based on where they're legally domiciled

If you're based in a high-tax state but legally reside in a state with no income tax, that difference can have a meaningful impact over the course of your career

Here's why these two facts matter together

Because your future income is relatively predictable, you can model the long-term impact of your state tax decisions with much more precision

A 5% difference in state income tax doesn't just affect this year's paycheck

Applied to a predictable career earnings curve, it can add up to hundreds of thousands of dollars over a career

That's why I think a transition to a mainline carrier is one of the best times to review your overall financial plan

Because it's not just reviewing your retirement contributions

Sometimes the biggest financial wins don't come from earning higher returns

They come from making better decisions with the income you're already going to earn

[Dan Wilkinson @DanWilkinson_FP]

A couple wants to max retirement accounts, save for a house, and build a pre-retirement work-optional income bucket

They can't fully do all three this year

The money runs out before the goals do

Max retirement = money locked up for decades, but compounds the longest
House fund = cash sitting on the sidelines right when investing it might pay off most
Work-optional bucket = needs to be liquid and accessible well before 59½, which usually means lower growth than the other two

This year's paycheck can fully fund maybe one and a half of them

Most people don't choose. They do a little of everything and wonder why nothing moves

The real tradeoff isn't A vs B vs C like it appears

It's this year's dollar vs. next year's dollar

If you skip that decision it gets made for you by whatever has the nearest deadline

Not the best payoff

[Dan Wilkinson @DanWilkinson_FP]

"I want to combine everything into one account to increase the compounding"

This one sounds intuitive, but it's not how compounding works

Compounding = your money earns returns, then earns returns on that bigger amount next year

That happens to each dollar based on its own return - not which account it's in

$10k at 7% grows to $10,700

Doesn't matter if it's alone or split between 10 accounts

Consolidating accounts has real upsides like simpler tracking, easier RMDs, less paperwork

"More compounding" just isn't one of them

[Dan Wilkinson @DanWilkinson_FP]

https://t.co/yUJCTuGnJI

[Dan Wilkinson @DanWilkinson_FP]

Played the loop today… Incredible!

@forestdunesgolf

[Dan Wilkinson @DanWilkinson_FP]

Financial planning does not start with numbers

It starts with a goal

And every goal has a lifecycle

1. The Idea
"I want to retire by 60"
"I want a lake house"
"I want financial independence"

2. The Formation
What does that life look like? What are you planning for?

3. The Execution
The steps today to get there

This is why I'm a goals-based planner

When you are clear on exactly what you want, today's decisions become a lot more obvious

[Dan Wilkinson @DanWilkinson_FP]

Financial planning isn’t graded on a curve

You’re either on track, or you’re not

I often meet people who’ve built their own projections

Example

They’ll tell me they only need to save $500 a month
Then we run a full analysis
The number turns out to be closer to $2,500 a month

Wouldn’t you want to know which number is right?