The Obvious Solution

The Obvious Solution addresses the 5 main concerns of the affluent (those with more than $1 million of investable assets) and lays out a process that a wealth manager should use to help you achieve financial peace of mind.

If “Custom-Designed Financial Peace of Mind” is an obvious solution to a problem important enough to write a short book about, then you might rightly ask: • What exactly is the problem that is being solved? • Who benefits from the solution to the problem? • What exactly is the solution, and why does it work? • And finally, if the solution is so obvious, why isn’t it more widely applied? Before we dive in and answer these questions, please consider the following: Sometimes in life, the simplest things can make the biggest difference. Unfortunately, regardless of how unhappy or dissatisfied we might be, we are unlikely to notice or become aware of those simple things—even if they are right in front of us—if we are saddled with years of history and inertia. Like it or not, none of us can know what we don’t know, and if we don’t know that different and better options exist, then at a certain point, we are likely to just stop looking for them. The solution being presented in this book is not always easy to execute well. But it is in many respects a simple and obvious solution—one that really works—and can be stated as follows: We hope that by the time you have finished looking through this book, this simple and obvious solution will be so clear and will make so much sense that if it applies to your situation, you will take action and move forward in implementing it. (One way to move forward is to receive a free second opinion on your situation, which we’ll discuss in Chapter IV.) Our firm may or may not be the right match for you, but no doubt there is a perfect fit for you or you and your family out there. Ultimately, if this book motivates even one individual or family to move from dissatisfaction to satisfaction, from doubt to clarity, or from haphazard handling of the many elements of their financial and financial-related life to a comprehensively secure and content state of mind, then it will have accomplished its purpose.

The O'Donnell Group was recently named by Forbes as one of America's Leading Financial Professionals!

Growing up in Chico, California, in a divorced family of average means, we (Mike and Ryan O’Donnell) didn’t know what it was like to be or live wealthy, much less how to get there. But in our early teens we started playing golf, and at the golf course were soon exposed to many individuals and families of significant wealth. One day a gentlemen came up to us and asked a very odd question: “What are you doing for your ‘little old man’?” Puzzled, we asked him what he was talking about. He said that if you want to be successful in life, you always have to be doing something for your “little old man.” And, he said with a wise nod, that the “little old man” wasn't just us at 90, but also us at 30, 50, and 70. He further explained that you always have to be doing something to make progress toward your—and your “little old man’s”—long-term goals, financial and otherwise, to most successfully experience every stage of life. In 2005, while we were both working for a large investment firm, we formed The O’Donnell Group. In 2009, after an amicable split from the investment firm, we formed our own independent firm, as we knew that was truly the only way to offer the unbiased advice—the custom-designed financial peace of mind—that our clients needed and deserved. At The O’Donnell Group, then, our goal is to help all of our clients improve and provide for their “little old man.” We do this by serving as our clients’ personal CFOs and addressing their five biggest concerns: • Preserving their wealth; • Mitigating their taxes; • Taking care of their heirs; • Ensuring their assets aren’t unjustly taken; and • To the extent that our clients have charitable intentions, helping them make their gifts more impactful. As brothers, we have stuck together our entire lives. Upon leaving Chico, we both attended and graduated from the University of California, Davis, and each earned a B.S. degree in agricultural and managerial economics. At Davis we were both scholarship golfers, and golf has continued to be a major theme and a productive, enjoyable hobby for both of us. As this book is being written, our Registered Investment Advisory firm oversees nearly $100,000,000 in client assets, and we are proud to say that our highest allegiance is always to our clients’ needs, interests, and greatest welfare. That is, we always put our clients’ interests first, not only because as RIAs we are legally obliged to do so, but because it is the right thing to do and, in our experience, the only way to reliably deliver world-class wealth management services to those who have entrusted us with the entirety of their financial lives.