Helping families in Cambridge, Massachusetts
Fee-only financial advisors for Cambridge families
About 25 minutes from Concord, and a short distance from our Boston office.
Monument Group provides fee-only fiduciary financial planning to Cambridge, MA households from our Concord and Boston offices. Common work includes coordinating university 403(b) and 457(b) plans across multiple vendors, planning around biotech and technology equity compensation, and Massachusetts estate tax exposure from appreciated Cambridge property.
Cambridge holds two quite different economies within a few square miles: the universities and hospitals, and the research and biotechnology companies clustered around Kendall Square.
Households drawn from each arrive with genuinely different problems, and the planning that follows looks different too.
Two economies, two sets of decisions
Academic and hospital households usually hold their retirement savings in 403(b) and 457(b) plans, frequently spread across more than one vendor and more than one employer, with investment menus and fee structures that differ inside the same institution. Consolidating that view is often the first useful thing anyone has done with it in years.
Research and biotechnology households face something else: compensation weighted toward equity, in companies whose value can change on a single clinical or regulatory result. The upside is real, and so is the concentration.
Both groups share the property question. Cambridge housing has appreciated to a degree that puts ordinary families past the capital gains exclusion on sale and past the Massachusetts estate tax threshold on death, neither of which announces itself.
What comes up most in Cambridge
- University retirement plans
- 403(b) and 457(b) accounts across multiple vendors and employers, reviewed together — for what they cost to hold, and for how they should be drawn down in what order.
- Biotech equity compensation
- Options, RSUs and ESPP shares in a company whose value can move on one result. Planning the sequence ahead of vest beats reacting to it.
- Single-company concentration
- When an employer’s stock is also the household’s largest asset, a setback arrives as a loss of income and a loss of savings at the same moment. That is a planning problem before it is an investment one.
- Massachusetts income surtax
- A surtax applies above an annually indexed income threshold, which is what makes staging a large vest or a property sale across tax years worth modeling.
- Massachusetts estate tax
- Massachusetts applies its own estate tax above $2 million — far below the federal exemption — and around Boston a long-held house plus retirement accounts clears that line more often than people expect.
Services Cambridge families use most
Financial Planning
Life planning that coordinates retirement income strategies, estate planning, tax planning, risk management, and charitable giving into one cohesive blueprint.
Learn moreTax-Efficient Wealth Transitions
Deep experience transitioning concentrated stock positions and highly appreciated assets into diversified portfolios while managing tax impact.
Learn moreRetirement Income Planning
Using sophisticated tools, we help you determine sustainable withdrawal strategies designed to support decades of spending, and to hold up through market volatility.
Learn moreCambridge, MA
Questions from Cambridge families
Can you advise on a university 403(b) or 457(b) plan?
Yes, and it is some of the most useful work we do for Cambridge households. These plans often sit with several vendors at once, with different menus and different costs inside the same institution. We review them together — what each holds, what each costs, and the order they should be drawn from in retirement.I hold most of my savings in my employer’s stock. What should I do?
Reduce the concentration deliberately, over more than one tax year, rather than all at once or not at all. The plan has to account for basis, vesting schedules, any trading restrictions you are subject to, and what your own financial plan needs the money to do. We would rather set a pace you agreed to in advance than have an event set one for you.How far is your office from Cambridge?
Our Boston office at 55 Union Street is a short trip from Cambridge, and our principal office is about twenty-five minutes away at 801 Main Street in Concord. We also work by secure video for anyone who prefers it.
Cambridge, Massachusetts
Fifteen minutes of conversation beats an hour of reading.
Schedule a time to discuss whether our approach is the right fit for you.