Business-owner clients seek your advice on a wide range of issues including buy-sell, key person protection, employee retention, and exit/succession planning. If these issues lie outside your core areas of expertise, this worksheet will help you spark meaningful conversations.

It's possible to avoid the taxation of employer-owned life insurance. The general rule is that death benefits paid from a life insurance policy subject to IRC Sec. 101(j) are taxable when received. In order to avoid taxation, clients must qualify for one of several exceptions.

There's no "one size fits all" answer for deciding who should own a life insurance policy that is being used for estate planning purposes. But, these considerations can help you compare beneficiary-owned and trust-owned policies to get the discussion started.

Although a deferred annuity is great for accumulating retirement funds, it's not an efficient vehicle to transfer wealth. Deferred income may be subject to income or estate taxes at death. Using annuity maximization, assets from the annuity can be repositioned to maximize value.

High-net-worth clients who want significant amounts of trust-owned life insurance create potential estate tax exposure. In this case study, the individuals loaned the trust money, with the trustee investing loan proceeds and making annual premium payments on a large policy.

Your high-net-worth clients earning attractive returns on their portfolio may be reluctant to liquidate assets to pay for life insurance. But this strategy can be used to substantially reduce out-of-pocket costs for life insurance and increase potential income.

You may have clients holding on to a surprisingly large concentration of stock in a single company. At older ages, diversifying may be in their best interest. Life insurance can act as a noncorrelated asset, providing a natural hedge against the market risks of concentrated stock.

A company that routinely bids for large contracts needs to maintain a large pool of working capital, usually held in conservative assets. The cash value of life insurance can be counted as liquid working capital for bond underwriting and while providing a better return.

Like all high-income earners, highly paid employees of non-profits reach a point where they'd prefer to defer some of their current taxable income. In the summer of 2016, football coach Jim Harbaugh struck a split-dollar plan with the University of Michigan that's become legendary.

Business partners often own term life insurance policies on each other to fund a buy-sell agreement. They figure the buy-sell need is temporary and will go away once either partner retires, but there are problems that can be avoided by each partner owning their own policy.

Principal is a leader in the business-owner planning arena, helping owners secure their financial future. It starts with knowing what their business is worth — and the validity of existing buy-sell agreements. This RFP will help clients work it out.