Financial adviser for business owners and family businesses
You built a valuable business. Now build the wealth outside it.
Plenty of successful owners reach their 50s with a business worth a lot on paper and a personal balance sheet that’s thin, unstructured and exposed. We help you get wealth out of the business, hold it in the right structures and be ready for the day you sell or step back.
Our view
The business gets your best hours, your best ideas and every spare dollar. Your own balance sheet gets whatever is left. After twenty years, that adds up to a valuable business and an owner who is far less secure than anyone would guess.
Sound familiar?
The questions owners ask us at the first meeting.
Every day you make decisions about your business, your team and your family. Your own finances are the thing you’ll get to later. Then later turns into ten years, and these questions start keeping you up.
Is my family protected if the business hits trouble?
Personal assets often sit where a business debt, a guarantee or a dispute can reach them. Most owners don’t find out until it matters.
Am I paying more tax than I need to?
Profits get taken out the same way every year because that’s how it was set up. Nobody has looked at the whole picture across you, the business and super.
How much do I actually need to retire?
You know what the business turns over. You probably don’t know the number you need outside it to stop working, or whether you’re on track.
Is too much of my wealth tied up in one place?
If the business is your retirement plan, your retirement depends on one buyer, one industry and one point in the cycle.
Do I have a real plan to sell or hand over?
A sale or succession that’s planned in the last twelve months rarely gets the best result. The work that matters starts years earlier. How we plan an exit.
Who gives me an honest second opinion?
Your accountant, lawyer and banker each see a slice. You want someone who looks at all of it and tells you straight.
Where are you up to?
Every stage of the business asks a different question.
Start with the one that sounds most like you.
Still building
Every dollar goes back in. The question is how much of you is being built alongside the business.
Established and busy
Profitable, stretched, and paying more tax than you suspect. Time to make the profit work for the family.
Five to ten years from the exit
A buyer, a successor or a wind-down. The decisions you make now shape what you walk away with.
The business-owner wealth gap
How a great business ends up with an owner who’s behind.
We see the same pattern constantly. None of it is a mistake on its own. Together it leaves a profitable owner with most of their wealth locked in one asset they can’t easily get at.
Every spare dollar goes back in. Growth, staff, equipment. The business gets the investment and the owner gets what’s left.
Super gets the minimum, or less. Contributions are an afterthought, so years of tax-effective saving are skipped.
Personal assets sit in exposed names. The family home and investments are held wherever was convenient at the time, not where they’re best protected.
Profit is drawn the way it always has been. Wages, dividends and trust distributions follow last year’s pattern instead of a plan.
The exit is left until the end. Sale readiness, succession and tax concessions get looked at when a buyer turns up, if at all.
The result. A valuable business and an underdeveloped personal balance sheet. That gap is what we close.
What we work on
Turning business success into personal wealth.
We coordinate the decisions that usually get made in isolation, and work alongside the advisers you already have.
Getting wealth out of the business
How and when profit moves from the business to you and your family, coordinated with your accountant so it fits your tax position and your goals.
Structures and asset protection
Which entity should hold what, separating personal wealth from business risk, and making sure the structure still suits the stage you’re at.
Super and retirement
A contribution strategy that uses super properly, a clear number for retirement and a plan for the income you’ll draw from it.
Succession and sale readiness
What a buyer or successor will look at, when to start preparing, and how tax concessions on a sale fit in, confirmed with your accountant. More on succession and exit planning.
Investing outside the business
Building a diversified portfolio so your future doesn’t ride on one asset, with no investment commissions.
Family, insurance and estate
Cover that protects the family and the business, plus wills and powers of attorney through our preferred legal provider.
WE. get it
We’re a family business too.
We’ve spent years running our own business, so we know the time pressure, the way it eats your attention, and how easily the personal side gets pushed back another year.
For most owners it’s about more than money. It’s the legacy, the next generation and keeping the family name secure. Your family’s success matters as much as the business’s.
We’re not owned by a bank or product provider, we quote a fixed price upfront, and we work with your existing accountant, lawyer and broker rather than replacing them. We also keep our client list deliberately small so the advice stays tailored.
Andre Dirckze
How it works
From first conversation to a plan that keeps working.
Discovery and direction
We meet to understand the business, the family and what your ideal future looks like, and identify the key financial steps to get there.
Your long-term wealth strategy
We build a step-by-step strategy and put our recommendations in writing, with the fee agreed before any work starts.
Partnership and execution
We put the strategy in place and coordinate with your accountant, lawyer and lender so nothing falls between the cracks.
Ongoing review
We meet regularly, adjust as the business and the rules change, and keep you informed so you’re confident in every decision.
Your accountant stays your accountant
We work alongside your existing team. If you need extra help, we take the enquiry first and introduce you to people we trust: accounting and tax services are provided by Altiora Advisory (Byron Raal), legal work by our preferred legal provider, and lending through WE. Mortgage Solutions. Altiora Advisory and our preferred legal provider are separate businesses, and we may receive a referral fee, which we’ll always disclose.
Is this you?
No two families are alike, so we talk before we take anyone on.
WE. are the right fit if
- You run a business or family business and the personal side has been left behind
- You want strategic advice on your personal position, not a product
- You want to understand the decisions, not just sign off on them
- You want an adviser who works with your accountant, lawyer and business advisers
- You want your business to serve your family’s goals, not the other way round
WE. are not the right fit if
- You’re after one-off advice on a single product
- You’re not ready to think about the longer term
- You’d rather do it all yourself and don’t want someone keeping you accountable
- You have plenty of spare time to manage your own wealth strategy
Structure Review
Your business has grown. Has your structure kept up?
The rules for trusts, companies and capital gains changed in 2026, with more proposed for 2027 and 2028. In 45 minutes we map every entity you own and flag what needs attention before you sell, retire or hand over.
See how other business owners turned their business, property and structures into a retirement plan. Read our client stories →
Questions owners ask
Frequently asked questions.
Do you replace my accountant?
No. Your accountant handles compliance, tax returns and the business’s books. We look at your personal wealth, super, structures, insurance and exit, and work with your accountant so the advice lines up. If you don’t have an accountant, we can introduce you to Altiora Advisory.
When should I start planning a sale or succession?
Earlier than most people think. Many of the conditions that affect tax on a sale, and much of what makes a business attractive to a buyer, depend on how things have been set up over several years. Starting well ahead gives you more options. Eligibility for any tax concession is confirmed with your accountant. Our succession and exit planning page sets out how we approach it.
How do you charge?
We quote a fixed price upfront before any work starts, and ongoing fees are agreed in writing and reviewed with you each year. We don’t take commissions on investments. Our fees page and Financial Services Guide explain how we’re paid.
What happens in the 45 minute strategy session?
We talk through the business, your personal position and where you want to be. You’ll leave with a clearer view of the gaps and the options worth exploring. It isn’t a sales pitch and no products are presented.
Do I need to be on the Gold Coast or in Melbourne?
No. We have offices in Currumbin and Melbourne, and most meetings happen by phone or Teams, so we work with business owners right around Australia, including doctors, dentists and allied health practice owners and civil construction and earthmoving businesses.
Take the first step
Book a strategy session.
Pick a time for a 45 minute strategy session by phone or Teams. We’ll get a sense of your situation, you’ll get a sense of whether we can help, and we’ll be honest either way.
Prefer we call you? Send your details and we’ll be in touch within one business day.
WE. Insights
Thinking for business owners.
Your next step
You did the hard part. Now make it count.
Let’s make sure your personal wealth, protection and future are as strong as the business you’ve built.
General advice only. This page does not take into account your objectives, financial situation or needs, so consider whether it is appropriate for you and read our Financial Services Guide before acting. Wealth Effect Group (CAR 424768) and Andre Dirckze (AR 395157) are Authorised Representatives of Boston Reed Pty Ltd, ABN 89 091 004 885, AFSL 225738. Accounting and tax services are provided by Altiora Advisory, not by Wealth Effect Group. Legal services are provided by our preferred legal provider. Credit services are provided by WE. Mortgage Solutions, a trading name of Wealth Effect Pty Ltd ATF Wealth Effect Unit Trust, ABN 78 766 858 328, an Authorised Credit Representative (480612) of BLSSA Pty Ltd, Australian Credit Licence 391237, not under Boston Reed’s AFSL. See our important information.