Entrepreneurs
Entrepreneurial wealth rarely follows a straight line, and the financial complexity can increase quickly.
Cleros coordinates financial decisions around the opportunities and complexities of entrepreneurial wealth.
Exit-strategy planning
An exit can take many forms: a full sale, partial sale, recapitalization, succession, or transaction that allows an entrepreneur to retain meaningful ownership.
We help evaluate those paths through the lens of the entrepreneur’s broader financial life. That means considering expected proceeds, retained ownership, taxes, future cash flow, liquidity needs, estate objectives, and what the entrepreneur wants the capital to accomplish after a transaction.
Liquidity and cash-flow planning
A liquidity event can fundamentally change the structure of an entrepreneur’s wealth. Before a transaction, we model potential proceeds alongside taxes, spending, liabilities, future investments, and other anticipated uses of capital.
That planning continues after the transaction, when the focus shifts toward determining how much should remain liquid, how much can be invested for the long term, and how the proceeds should support the entrepreneur’s next chapter.
Investment management
Selling all or part of a business can turn a concentrated operating asset into substantial financial assets, often in a relatively short period of time.
We build the investment strategy around what that capital now needs to accomplish, including near-term liquidity, long-term spending, future ventures, estate objectives, charitable plans, and the risks and exposures that remain elsewhere on the balance sheet.
Tax-aware planning
Tax planning can be particularly important around a liquidity event, and many decisions are best considered before a transaction is finalized.
We work alongside a client’s tax and legal professionals to evaluate how the timing and structure of a transaction interact with estate planning, charitable giving, investment decisions, and the amount of capital ultimately available after the sale.
Estate and wealth-transfer planning
A liquidity event can materially change the size, composition, and liquidity of an entrepreneur’s estate.
We work with estate counsel to help evaluate whether existing structures still reflect the client’s objectives and how transaction proceeds, retained business interests, investments, charitable intentions, and future wealth transfers fit together.
New-venture and private-investment evaluation
An exit often creates both the capital and the opportunity to pursue what comes next.
We help entrepreneurs evaluate new businesses, private investments, real estate, and other opportunities within the context of the post-transaction balance sheet. This includes liquidity needs, existing private-market exposure, potential capital calls, downside risk, and long-term financial objectives.
FAQs we hear from entrepreneurs
Ideally, well before a transaction is underway. More time can create more opportunity to evaluate tax, estate, charitable, ownership, and investment decisions before the terms of a transaction limit the available options. Planning can still be valuable later in the process, but earlier provides more flexibility.
We work backward from the financial life the proceeds need to support. That includes spending, taxes, liabilities, major purchases, future investments, charitable goals, family objectives, and the amount of liquidity the client wants available. We can then model different transaction outcomes against those requirements.
Each creates a different combination of liquidity, retained ownership, future income, concentration, and risk. We model those tradeoffs within the entrepreneur’s broader financial plan so the economics of each path can be considered alongside personal and family objectives.
That depends on the transaction and the client’s circumstances, but the period before a sale can be important for evaluating ownership structures, estate-planning strategies, charitable giving, and other decisions with potential tax implications. We help identify those planning questions early and coordinate with the client’s tax and legal professionals.
We begin with what the capital needs to accomplish rather than immediately determining how it should be invested. Taxes, near-term spending, future ventures, liquidity reserves, estate objectives, and charitable plans can all influence how proceeds are ultimately allocated.
There is no standard timetable. The appropriate approach depends on liquidity needs, taxes, market exposure, future commitments, and the client’s comfort with moving from an operating business into a financial portfolio. We can establish a deliberate investment plan rather than requiring every decision to be made immediately after closing.
We model the post-transaction financial life before the transaction occurs whenever possible. That can include ongoing spending, investment income, new ventures, real estate, philanthropy, family wealth, and other priorities so the entrepreneur understands what the proceeds can support before making decisions about what comes next.
Cleros Wealth Partners works with a limited number of clients.
We are thoughtful about the clients we serve, seeking relationships where our approach can support their needs today and well into the future.
Clients looking for a highly personal advisory relationship are invited to write to us directly.
