Frequently Asked Questions

The truth is that many financially savvy people CAN manage their investments themselves if they had the time necessary to devote to monitoring their investments and the discipline needed to adhere to a well thought out asset allocation plan. The fact is that most people just don’t have that kind of time available and even if they did, many often allow the emotions of riding the market ups and downs to dictate their investment strategy. Moreover, a person’s overall financial strategy involves much more than simply investing. We bring a holistic approach to the planning that we do for clients. We incorporate investment management with tax planning and we do it in a disciplined way. We understand market cycles and have experienced both significant market upturns and downturns. We help clients dispassionately adhere to their target asset allocation strategy, reminding clients of their overall goals and objectives along the way.

DBK operates under a “fiduciary” standard of care. This standard of care mandates that the advisor must always be pursuing the client’s best interests when advising clients. By contrast, many other financial advisory firms continue to operate under a “suitability” standard of care. Such a standard of care means that the advisor’s advice to the client must merely be “suitable.” Such a standard of care invites conflict of interest and the outcome is that the advisor often acts in his own best interest at the expense of the client. At DBK, the client’s best interest is always our standard when rendering advice.

In addition to the standard of care, DBK brings a unique multi-disciplinary approach to the financial advisory services that it offers. Our personnel have many years of tax experience in addition to investment management experience. Therefore, we offer tax planning and income tax return preparation services along with the investment management services to our clients, which is rare among financial advisory firms.

We are a fee only financial advisory firm. We do not receive commissions, nor any other form of compensation based upon product sales. This allows us to be completely objective when rendering advice to clients as we have zero financial incentive to sell Product A over Product B. We get paid solely for our advice.

DBK takes its ethical obligations very seriously. As such, we are bound by both professional and personal ethical standards. Professionally, we are regulated by the Ohio Division of Financial Institutions, the Florida Office of Financial Regulation, and the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). As a Registered Investment Advisor, we operate under a “fiduciary” standard of care. This standard of care mandates that the advisor must always be pursuing the client’s best interests when advising clients. We have a responsibility to disclose any potential conflict of interest. We further understand that ethical standards are only as strong as the people adhering to them. DBK highly values character with respect to its team members and each prospective team member is subject to a thorough vetting process, including character references and background checks.

DBK does not take custody of client assets. We instead utilize an investment custodian and have partnered with Charles Schwab and Company as our investment custodian of choice. Charles Schwab is a multi-billion dollar financial services firm with offices the world over. This arrangement provides our clients with critical piece of mind that their investment assets are in the custody of an independent third party. It also provides our clients and us with the vast investment research and other resources at Schwab’s disposal. For more details on how client assets are protected when utilizing Charles Schwab as investment custodian, click on the following link.

Generally, our clients have investable net worth of at least $1 million.

Meet Our Team

The client experience takes place in multiple steps. We first work with our clients to get to know them and their financial and non-financial goals and objectives. We then work with our clients to construct a risk profile and an asset allocation strategy that is specifically tailored to that client and the achievement of their goals and objectives over the long term. We then implement the plan using a well-diversified portfolio of index exchange traded funds and/or index mutual funds. The plan is then monitored and investment accounts are re-balanced as needed throughout the year. In addition, for those clients that desire it (which are most of our clients), we provide them with tax planning and income tax return preparation services as part of the overall relationship. Lastly, we meet and communicate with our clients regularly throughout the year to review investment performance, discuss their investment strategy, and provide planning advice.

Please submit your question here and our team will answer it for you.