What’s the after-tax number?
Structure, timing and charitable moves can still change what you keep. Every one of those levers closes permanently at signing.
Business Owners
Most of your wealth is in the business. Most planning ignores that.
MCF works with owners years before a transition: building value, structuring the taxes around a sale, and planning the life that comes after. One team, under one roof, in confidence.
No committees, no handoffs. You’ll talk to an advisor who works with owners.
What owners actually worry about
It’s rarely about the money
Owners rarely lose sleep over the headline price. The real worries are quieter, and a spreadsheet won’t answer them. The plan has to.
“Who am I, the day after?”
The company is your calendar, your title and most of your net worth. Exit plans that ignore that are why owners say “I want to stay forever.” We plan the next chapter first, so leaving has something to leave for.
“Will this be fair to the kids?”
One child runs the company, two don’t. The estate plan has to make the math and the family work, and it has to be settled before the deal settles it for you.
How we answer them
Four questions, one team: your advisor, our CPAs and estate planners working them together, years before a deal.
“Am I going to get killed on taxes?”
A sale is a once-in-a-lifetime tax event. The structure, timing and charitable moves that change the number close permanently at signing.
“Could it even run without me?”
Buyers pay for a company that doesn’t need its founder. Key-person risk quietly discounts the price years before anyone makes an offer.
The owner’s arc
The biggest decisions happen before the LOI is signed
How much of the sale’s outcome you can still change
Illustrative
MostLeast
LOILOI signed
CloseClosing
Where the biggest decisions live
A different job
Illustrative of the planning window, not a projection of any transaction. Structure, entity and gifting decisions are hardest to change once terms are signed, which is why the work starts years out.
Before: years out
Build value. Get exit-ready.
Entity structure, clean books, key-person risk, gifting windows that close at signing. The tax architecture of a sale is set long before the sale.
During: the transaction year
A once-in-a-lifetime tax event, modeled in advance.
Our CPAs run the sale-year return before you sign (structure, timing, charitable moves), while there's still room to change the answer.
After: the next chapter
The day after closing, you're the family office.
You're past worrying about having enough. Now it's staying tax-smart, protecting the kids and making the giving count. We built the plan before the wire hit; one team runs it with you.
Exit planning strategies and coaching may be provided through MCF’s referral network, including VALO. Referral partners are separate from MCF Advisors, LLC.
One team, under one roof
Your deal attorney negotiates the sale. Who’s coordinating everything around it?
A transition touches your taxes, your estate, your family and your company’s books all at once, while you keep running the company. At MCF the people handling each piece sit on the same team, so nothing waits on a handoff.
CPAs who model the transaction year before you sign, and file the returns after
Estate planners on the same team, so documents keep pace with the deal
Business accounting and personal-CFO services under the same roof
One advisor accountable for the whole picture: before, during and after
Every relationship starts with the same conversation. We’ll map which services fit your situation.
MCF Legal for business owners
For owners, management teams, and families, our advisors consult with in-house and outside legal resources to coordinate the financial and legal considerations that accompany business ownership.
- Mergers & Acquisitions Analysis, Valuation and Strategies
- Business Ownership & Management Transition Planning
- Corporate Law
- Incorporations/LLCs
Legal services are provided by licensed attorneys through separate legal engagements where applicable. MCF Advisors, LLC is not a law firm and does not provide legal advice.
Under the same roof
Business accounting & Personal CFO services
For owners, the company’s books and the family’s finances are one picture.
Cash flow analysis
Balance sheets, income statements and cash flow statements delivered regularly
Bill payment services
General bookkeeping
Tax preparation and analysis
Consolidated reporting across your financial life
Services are tailored to each client’s circumstances and engagement. Not all services described are provided to every client.
Before you sign anything
Six questions to answer before the LOI
The best time to start was five years before the sale. The second-best time is now.
You’ll only sell this company once. These are the questions we walk through with every owner. Most matter more than the headline price.
Can’t answer all six? Walk through them with an advisor, confidentially.
Which windows close the day you sign?
Gifting and planning moves only exist before the transaction. Once the deal is done, so are they.
Could it sell without you in it?
Buyers pay for a company that doesn’t need its founder. Key-person risk quietly discounts the price years before anyone makes an offer.
What does your estate plan assume it’s worth?
Documents drafted years ago rarely keep pace with what the company has become. The deal will test every assumption in them.
Where does the money go the day after closing?
The day the wire hits, you’re the family office. Staying tax-smart, protecting the kids and making the giving count starts before the sale, not after.
Who's coordinating the professionals?
Your CPA, attorney and banker each own a piece while you keep running the company. Someone has to own the whole picture.
The podcast
The Legacy Behind the Logo
MCF’s podcast for business owners, hosted by Dave Harris, CEO. Conversations with owners about the business, the family and the transition, in their own words. The first episode arrives after Labor Day.
One conversation. Complete confidence.
Tell us where the business is: thinking, preparing or already in motion. We'll tell you plainly what we'd do and when.
Prefer to speak with someone directly? Call (859) 392-8600 and ask for the business-owner team.