Frequently Asked Questions

No. Pathways works with households at every stage, from someone putting away a thousand dollars a month to families holding several million. The reason is not generosity, it is that the planning itself does not change with the balance. Everybody has to start somewhere, and starting earlier is usually what makes the later numbers possible.

A family office aggregates. It manages the investments and refers everything else out to other firms. A Total Office keeps every discipline in house, so the tax professionals, estate attorneys, Medicare specialists and investment committee all work for the same firm. Your plan is built and maintained under one roof instead of being handed around.

A brokerage sells you ingredients. We bake the cake. Choosing sound investments is one ingredient in a retirement plan, not the finished product. Pathways handles the whole recipe, tax planning, income, risk and estate work together, and takes responsibility for how the plan turns out rather than for one component of it.

Yes, deliberately. High earners who are not wealthy yet are one of the groups we enjoy partnering with. A lot of this industry ignores them until the balance is large enough to be interesting. We would rather help build the plan in your thirties and forties than meet you after the decisions are already made.

You get an email confirming your message arrived, and a member of the team contacts you within 24 hours to arrange a time, as long as it is not a holiday or weekend. There is no scheduling loop to fight with and no phone tree. Someone from the Pathways team will connect with you directly.

Our office is at 3900 American Drive, Suite 204 in Plano, Texas, and we meet households across the Dallas–Fort Worth area and the state of Texas in person. We also work with clients nationwide by video and phone. If you are outside Texas, get in touch and we will confirm whether we are able to work with you in your state.

You do not have to choose. Each service page describes a discipline, tax planning, Medicare, federal benefits, income planning, and any one of them is a door into the same complete plan. Whichever one brings you here, you can receive the full Total Office plan rather than only the piece you arrived for.

Medicare Part B and Part D premiums rise once your income passes certain thresholds, through a surcharge called IRMAA. It runs on a two-year look-back at your tax returns, so your 2026 premiums are set by your 2024 income. IRMAA is a cliff: crossing a threshold by a single dollar triggers the whole monthly surcharge.

It depends on your employer. If your group coverage comes from an employer with 20 or more employees, you can usually delay Part B without a late penalty and enroll when that coverage ends. With a smaller employer Medicare generally pays first, so delaying can be expensive. Most people take premium-free Part A, but doing so stops HSA contributions.

Original Medicare leaves gaps: deductibles, a twenty percent share of most Part B services, and no annual limit on what you can spend. A Medicare Supplement policy covers much of that cost sharing. A Medicare Advantage plan bundles coverage instead and caps your out-of-pocket spending. Which fits depends on your health, your budget and your doctors.

The coverage gap people knew as the donut hole no longer works the way it did. Part D now caps what you pay out of pocket for covered drugs in a year, and past that cap your covered costs are met for the rest of the year. What still matters is picking a plan whose formulary actually covers your prescriptions.

We understand the details of both the FERS and CSRS retirement systems, as well as the concerns, questions, and goals that often come with planning for retirement in federal service. With specialized federal benefits software and dedicated resources designed specifically for federal advisors, we're equipped to analyze your situation with precision and clarity.

One of the biggest questions federal employees ask is whether they will need to change their lifestyle in retirement. We help you project your income from all available sources and create a strategy designed to support the lifestyle you want, while helping reduce the risk of outliving your money.

Long-term care refers to medical and support services for those who have difficulty in executing routine daily functions, or those individuals with prolonged or degenerative illnesses, cognitive disorders, old age and or other conditions. Nursing homes are probably what come to mind first when discussing long-term care, but long-term care can also include assisted-living facilities, continuing-care retirement communities and home healthcare, among others.

One reason long-term care planning warrants more consideration today than in decades past is because we're living longer lives. According to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, most people turning age 65 can expect to use some form of long-term care during their lives. Not having a plan can mean that costs fall on younger family members, causing a financial strain, or on a retired spouse, leading him or her to potentially deplete their own retirement savings.

You get an email confirming your message arrived, and a member of the team contacts you within 24 hours to arrange a time, as long as it is not a holiday or weekend. There is no scheduling loop to fight with and no phone tree. Someone from the Pathways team will connect with you directly.

Yes — $1,500 for our initial Retirement Check Up Session. This isn't a sales call; it's substantive, personalized work. The fee is waived for referrals from existing clients or industry contacts, and for attendees of our events. Ask us how to qualify.