Managing money has never felt more complex. Rising costs, competing priorities, and the pressure to make smart financial decisions can leave anyone feeling uncertain. If you’ve ever questioned whether you’re budgeting correctly, saving enough, or choosing the right investments, you’re in good company. That’s why financial wellness matters so much in 2026. It’s not about mastering every financial concept. It’s about having the knowledge, tools, and confidence to make steady, informed decisions, both inside and outside your retirement plan.

Financial Stress Reaches Far Beyond Your Wallet

Money worries don’t stay neatly tucked away at home. They often show up as: • Difficulty staying focused at work • Anxiety about surprise expenses • Doubt about long‑term financial security Strengthening your financial wellness starts with the fundamentals: understanding your cash flow, building savings habits, and using available resources to reduce stress and improve stability.

Your Retirement Plan Is Just One Piece of the Puzzle

Your workplace retirement plan is a powerful tool for long‑term savings, but it’s not the whole story. Many people still feel unsure about how much to contribute, how to choose investments, or whether pre‑tax or Roth contributions make sense for them. Financial wellness education helps you: • Understand how your retirement plan fits into your broader financial life • Make confident decisions about contributions and investment options • See retirement savings as part of a larger strategy, not your only strategy When you understand your plan, it becomes a foundation you can build on, not a source of confusion.

Budgeting and Saving: The Core of Financial Wellness

Before investing beyond your retirement plan, strong budgeting and saving habits create the stability you need. Even small steps can make a meaningful difference: • Tracking where your money goes • Building an emergency fund • Automating savings when possible • Setting realistic, achievable goals Financial wellness is about progress, not perfection. Every step you take strengthens your financial foundation.

Investing Beyond Your Workplace Plan

Once your budget and emergency savings are in place, exploring additional investment options can help you grow wealth over time. This might include: • Individual retirement accounts (Traditional IRA or Roth IRA) • Brokerage accounts for long‑term investing • High‑yield savings accounts for short‑term goals • Health savings accounts (HSAs), if available Understanding these tools empowers you to build a financial strategy that supports both your present and future needs.

You Don’t Have to Navigate This Alone

Many employers now offer financial education, tools, and resources to help employees make sense of budgeting, saving, and investing. These programs aren’t about judging where you are, they’re about helping you move forward with clarity and confidence. Using these resources can help you: • Ask better questions • Make informed financial decisions • Align your choices with your personal goals

Looking Ahead

Financial wellness isn’t about quick fixes or perfect decisions. It’s about building habits, understanding your options, and feeling more confident about your financial future. In 2026 and beyond, small steps, whether improving your budget, increasing savings, or exploring investments outside your retirement plan, can reduce stress and put you on a stronger path for tomorrow.

Scott Higgins | AIF ®, CFP®, CPFA®, NSSA®

Financial Advisor

Securities and Investment Advisory Services Offered Through M Holdings Securities, Inc., a Registered Broker/Dealer and Investment Adviser, Member FINRA/SIPC. Rose Street Advisors is independently owned and operated. #5344919

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Over the years of working alongside a number of family offices, I continue to be impressed by the sincere care demonstrated for the family (or families) they serve. While we provide life insurance reviews, on-going service and marketplace insight on their current portfolios, we also strategize with family offices on how life insurance can support their overall objectives. After many discussions about the complexities and challenges of running a family office, could life insurance possibly be a “Family Office’s best friend”?

Initiating the Conversation

The process of buying life insurance is one focused on the next generation. As a mentor of mine told me early on, “Two types of people buy life insurance - those who care about someone and those who care about something besides themselves." Especially when working with younger generations, any opportunity to discuss the sense of responsibility they should have to future generations and their family legacy is meaningful. A conversation regarding life insurance planning is another occasion for the family to consider who and what they care most about

A Business Model of Service

My experience with family offices has been an atmosphere of high touch and high service. Family offices are intentional about being advocates for their families; their service model intertwines both the personal and professional workings of a family. In order to do that well, there must be wealth to manage and revenue generated so resources are available to support all those important functions. When family trees branch farther and farther out, the level of wealth can be diluted while the service expectation from each increasing family member remains constant. One way to counter that reality is to intentionally plan for ways to mitigate depleting family wealth; revenue must match expectations and obligations. With careful planning to minimize income and estate taxes, wealth spent over multiple generations is naturally replenished by an injection of life insurance.

Forced Savings Plan

Paying premiums can serve as a savings mechanism for those who depend on future trust dollars and prevent current recipients from leaving little behind. This strategy can help family offices and those in a fiduciary role balance the demands of the current generation with the responsibility to look out for the interests of future generations.

An Asset Without Equal

Life insurance is still the only asset that avoids taxation at all levels and continues to be a vehicle used by wealthy families to accomplish explicit wealth transfer objectives. While GST-exempt Dynasty Trusts may hold a majority of family assets, inevitably there will be situations where assets outside the trust are susceptible to future taxation. Life insurance does not recognize income or gains requiring complex annual tax reporting (cash values grow inside the policy free from current taxation). As a prime example, private placement life insurance (PPLI) provides access to alternative investments, while being tax-efficient and eliminating the need to track down another K-1 or further complicate tax returns. Life insurance may not be as warm and friendly as a golden retriever, but for a family office, at least you don’t have to worry about cleaning the carpets. If you have questions or would like to see how the advisors at Rose Street Advisors can help you better serve your clients, please contact us below. We are here to help. Click here to request a policy review!

Rob Hunt II

LIC & CLU® | Principal & Chief Executive Officer

As Principal and CEO, Rob spearheads the vision, drive for growth, and pursuit of excellence at Rose Street Advisors. Rob loves being outdoors with his wife Erin and kids. He has slalom skied for the past 35 years, never missing a season. He also enjoys spending time at the lake and on the golf course. This material and the opinions voiced are for general information only and are not intended to provide specific advice or recommendations for any individual or entity. To determine what is appropriate for you, please contact your Rose Street Financial Professional. Information obtained from third-party sources are believed to be reliable but not guaranteed. Securities and Investment Advisory: Services offered through M Holdings Securities, Inc., A Registered Broker/Dealer and Investment Advisor, member FINRA/SIPC. Rose Street Advisors is independently owned and operated. Rose Street Advisors is a member firm of M Financial Group. #6610057.1

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Do you own a business? Do you want to pass wealth to your business and/or your family? Do you want to ensure that your business and/or wealth passes to multiple generations? While the future is uncertain, it is important to plan. When our clients create estate and succession plans, they are limited by the information at hand at this moment; whether that be their current family and business environment, recently updated IRS guidelines, acceptable planning techniques, or current estate and income taxation regulations. Almost all plans will need to extend over numerous decades and multiple generations. Change is not probable, it is inevitable, and that is why liquidity, and the flexibility it provides, will never go out of style. At Rose Street Advisors, we have the unique opportunity to work alongside our clients and their advisors (attorneys, CPAs, etc.) to safeguard their families and businesses to create a blueprint that meets their planning objectives. As a flexible instrument, life insurance provides unencumbered, tax-efficient liquidity when needed most. Life insurance is used as a tool to provide funds needed to: • Help divide an illiquid asset among children; such as a family business, farm, or cottage when interest and ability to manage the asset is varied, but a desire to be “fair” is of utmost importance. • Create a guaranteed market for an owner’s business interest so that a spouse is not dependent on the future success of a business. It can also provide a surviving business partner tax-free liquidity necessary to acquire the deceased partner’s interest in the company. • Provide funds that can be used to pay a federal estate tax that comes due within 9 months following the passing of an individual with a large estate exceeding the current estate-tax exemption amount. • Compensate a key employee’s family in full when a deferred benefit has been promised to the deceased. • Provide working capital to a business needing to replace a key member of a company who has unexpectedly passed. Are you facing an uncertain future? We all are, and the only way to get ahead of it is to plan. If you would like to speak with us regarding your situation or how best to use life insurance in your planning process, please contact us. We look forward to your call!

Rob Hunt II

LIC & CLU® | Principal & Chief Executive Officer

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