Exit and transition planning
CEPA®-led advisory that begins long before a deal, so value is protected and the exit funds the life you want.
Creel Wealth Planning at Farther
Build it, run it, and know what comes next
For business owners, the company is only half the picture. We map your advisory and planning to exactly where you stand in the arc of ownership.
Schedule a callSomeone finally watching both balance sheets
As a business owner, your wealth lives in two places at once: the company you built and the personal life you're supporting with it. But here's the problem: nobody's usually watching both at the same time. Your broker handles investments, your accountant manages taxes, your attorney drafts the estate plan, and your business sits in the middle with no one connecting all the pieces. That gap becomes a crisis the moment you want to transition, sell, or exit your company. That's when both sides suddenly collide.
Creel Wealth Planning was built by people who spent decades watching this exact disconnect play out inside banks, insurance companies, and advisory firms. We step into the center of your financial picture to do what nobody else does: coordinate everything. We work alongside your entire team of advisors to align your business growth, tax strategies, and exit plans with your family's long-term security. Whether you're five years from exit or twenty years away, we help you build a unified strategy that protects what you've worked so hard to create and positions you to maximize its true value when the time comes.
The Lifecycle of Business Ownership
The advice that fits a growth-stage founder is the wrong approach for someone eighteen months from an exit. Our proprietary framework maps the five stages of business ownership, matching our strategic planning to exactly where you are today. Wherever you land on this arc, there is specific, actionable work worth doing right now to protect and maximize your wealth
Building with momentum
In the earliest, fastest-growing stretch, almost everything goes back into the business, and personal financial planning tends to wait. That is understandable, and it is also where quiet risks accumulate: concentrated wealth, no protection plan, and a tax picture no one is managing across the two balance sheets.
We help you keep momentum without leaving your personal financial life unattended. That means the right retirement plan structure for the business, a foundation for tax-efficient investing outside of it, and protection so a single event does not undo years of work. The goal is to grow aggressively while building something durable underneath it.
Talk throughStarting to look ahead
At some point the question shifts from how do I grow this to what happens to this eventually. You may not have a timeline yet, but the idea of an exit, a transition, or simply life after the business has entered your thinking. This is the most valuable stage to start planning, and the one owners most often skip.
As a CEPA®-led practice, we begin the exit planning conversation long before there is a deal on the table. We look at what the business is worth today, what it needs to be worth to fund the life you want, and how the personal side of your plan should evolve to meet it. Early clarity here is what turns a good outcome into a great one.
Start the conversationPreparing for the exit
Now the decision is made and the work becomes concrete. A sale, a management buyout, or a family succession each carries very different tax, estate, and liquidity consequences, and the choices you make in the run-up shape how much value actually reaches you and your family.
We coordinate directly with your CPA and attorney so the deal structure, the tax strategy, and the estate plan are all pointed the same direction. We model what the proceeds mean for your long-term plan before you sign, not after. This is the stage where coordination stops being a nice idea and starts being worth real dollars.
Plan your transitionTurning value into wealth
The transaction closes, and suddenly a large portion of your net worth moves from an illiquid business into liquid capital that needs a home. This is a genuinely different financial life than the one you had a month earlier, and it deserves a plan built for it rather than a portfolio thrown together in a hurry.
We build the investment strategy around your plan first, matched to your risk tolerance and time horizon, with fees kept low and taxes monitored throughout. Daily rebalancing keeps the portfolio aligned as things move. The concentrated risk you carried as an owner gives way to a diversified foundation designed to last.
See how we investThe chapter you earned
Selling the business was never really the goal. The goal was what the business made possible: freedom, family, the ability to give, and a legacy that outlasts you. Life after ownership is its own stage, with its own planning around income, taxes, estate, and the people and causes you care about.
We help you turn the proceeds into a sustainable income and a coordinated estate plan that connects with your attorney and CPA. Whether that means generational wealth transfer, philanthropy, or simply the confidence to spend without second-guessing, we manage the whole picture so this chapter is defined by what you want, not by loose ends.
Plan what comes nextWhat business owners get working with us
Coordinated planning
One team connecting your business, personal balance sheet, CPA, and attorney so nothing falls between the cracks.
Investment management
Portfolios built around your plan and risk tolerance, with low fees, close tax attention, and daily rebalancing.
Estate and legacy planning
Estate work that stays in sync with your investments, so what you built passes on the way you intend.
Questions owners ask us first
Before you trust anyone with a decision this large, you deserve straight answers. These are the questions that come up in nearly every first conversation with a business owner, and here is exactly how we answer them.
How is a family practice different from a larger firm?
You work directly with Art and Corey, not a rotating team or a call center. When your business hits an inflection point or something changes in your life, the people who pick up the phone already know your situation, your goals, and where you stand in the arc of ownership. That continuity matters most when the stakes are highest.
What does fee-based mean, and how do you get paid?
We are fee-based fiduciaries. Being a fiduciary means we are legally required to act in your interest, and our compensation comes from the fees you pay rather than commissions on products we sell. For a business owner weighing complex options, it matters that the advice on the table is not shaped by what someone earns from selling you something.
How do you coordinate with my accountant and attorney?
We build those relationships from the start and treat coordination as part of the job, not an exception. Our platform gives your CPA and attorney secure access to share what they need without a week of back-and-forth. For an exit or transition, that alignment across your full team is often the difference between a clean outcome and a costly one.
Do you work with owners outside of Franklin or Nashville?
Our primary focus is the greater Nashville metro, particularly the Franklin community. We also work with owners who have relocated or have family ties to the region. If your business or your future is rooted here, we should talk regardless of where you sit today.
Meet the team
Ashton Hayes
Trust Services Associate
Julie Ball
Senior Client Experience Associate
Angie Meenan
Client Experience Associate
Ariel Barron
Client Experience Analyst
David Sargent, CFP®
Planning Specialist
Ready to talk?
Tell us where you are in the arc of ownership, whether that is building, thinking about it, or already looking past the exit. We will respond within one business day.