Financial Planning for Tradies and Business Owners
We Help Tradespeople and Business Owners Build Prosperity and Freedom
How the business pays you, what protects your household if you can’t work and what you build outside the business all connect. We can help you plan for the business and the household together.
Our Financial Advice Team Is Here to Help You
We Can Help You
- Pay yourself a regular wage or drawings the business can sustain
- Put money aside for tax and BAS as the work comes in
- Set income protection built for the self-employed
- Fund a buy-sell agreement with insurance, alongside your solicitor
- Build super and assets outside the business
- Keep personal money separate from the business accounts
- Compare finance against paying cash for tools and equipment
- Plan an exit and any small business tax concessions that may apply
Who We Help
- Sole traders running everything themselves
- Employers with a team meeting payroll every fortnight
- Self-employed tradespeople paying their own super and cover
- Franchisees operating inside somebody else’s system
- Business partners planning for what happens if one of them leaves
- Growing small businesses reinvesting while still building personal wealth
- Family businesses with the household and the business tied together
- Owners planning an exit and what comes after it
What we advise on
How Our Advice Works for Business Owners
Cashflow & Financial Wellbeing
We’ll help you manage the gap between doing the work and being paid for it.
Materials and wages can go out on your terms, while invoices are paid on somebody else’s. Any GST and PAYG amounts collected in between are owed to the ATO, so the account balance and the amount available to spend can be two different figures.
Together, we’ll work through:
- The cash buffer that covers the gap between doing the work and being paid
- Money set aside for BAS and PAYG obligations as it’s earned, with amounts checked with your accountant
- A regular wage to yourself, set at a figure the business can sustain and the household needs
- Deposits and payment terms that help reduce how often materials are funded from your own pocket
- Whether to reduce the business overdraft or the home loan first, with tax checked with your accountant
- Equipment finance against paying cash, and what each does to the buffer
- What the quiet months cost, and how much to set aside during busier periods
- Personal spending kept out of the business account, so both sets of numbers are readable
Personal Insurance & Protection
We’ll explain how income protection works when there’s no payslip behind you.
For the self-employed, insurers generally assess income from tax returns and financial records, often over one or more years. The waiting period also deserves careful thought, because it should reflect how long your savings and the business could manage without you.
Together, we’ll work through:
- How insurers may assess income from tax returns and financial records when there’s no payslip
- A waiting period that reflects how long the business could manage without you on the tools
- Whether business expenses cover is suitable for fixed costs such as rent and leases while you’re off
- Whether the policy definition matches manual work rather than an office role
- How a year with lower taxable income may affect the benefit you could claim
- Key person cover, where the business depends on one or two people
- A buy-sell arrangement funded by insurance, if you have a business partner, alongside your solicitor
- What the household would live on while the business is being held together
Superannuation
Together, we’ll set up super contributions for yourself when no employer is paying them.
Sole traders generally have no obligation to pay themselves super. Personal contributions can be tax-deductible if eligibility rules are met, so the question is whether money is available and whether it may do more in super than in the business. We check the deduction with your accountant.
Together, we’ll work through:
- Paying super to yourself when no employer is doing it for you
- What a contribution may cost after any deduction, with your accountant confirming the tax
- Whether to contribute more in a strong year rather than spreading it across leaner ones
- Catch-up contributions in a strong trading year to make up for lean ones, where eligible
- Money left in the business to fund growth, against money moved into super
- The deadline a contribution has to clear the fund by to count this year
- Whether your fund still holds cover, given the inactivity rule and irregular contributions
- How super sits alongside the business as the second retirement asset
Tax & Wealth Strategies
We’ll help you understand the ways money can come out of the business, with your accountant.
Wages, drawings, dividends and trust distributions are each taxed differently, and a suitable mix depends on your structure, any partner’s income and what the business needs to retain. Your accountant advises on tax and lodges the returns, and we coordinate so the plan reflects their advice.
Together, we’ll work through:
- How money comes out of the business, and the possible tax cost of each route
- Wages, drawings, dividends and trust distributions, compared on your numbers
- Whether the current structure still suits the business, to review with your accountant
- Division 7A considerations, if the company has lent money to you as owner
- How any instant asset write-off that applies may affect cashflow, not only tax
- When equipment purchases or a vehicle sale should land, with the tax timing confirmed with your accountant
- Trust distribution resolutions and their annual deadline, managed with your accountant
- The records kept through the year, so less needs reconstructing at tax time
Financial Planning & Advice
We’ll build one plan covering both the business and the household.
For an owner-operator the two are often financially linked: the home may secure a business loan, and the business funds the household. A change on one side can reach the other quickly, so we look at guarantees, buffers and cover as one position.
Together, we’ll work through:
- Business and household decisions considered together, rather than in two separate plans
- Any home used as security for a business loan, and what that may expose
- What you are building outside the business, so it is not the only plan
- What the business is worth to a buyer, and what it is worth to you
- Succession, whether that means a sale, a handover or a wind-up
- How much of the household depends on a good year continuing
- Where your accountant, your solicitor and we each pick things up
- A review timed for after the busy season rather than in the middle of one
Property Investment Advice
We can look at the home and any business debt together, where one secures the other.
A business loan, an equipment lease or a commercial lease may be personally guaranteed, sometimes with the family home as security. Adding an investment property can change both what’s at risk and what a lender may advance, so we look at the full position with you and your broker.
Together, we’ll work through:
- Any personal guarantee behind a business loan, and what it could reach if trade slows
- How lenders may use recent tax returns to assess what they’ll advance, with your broker
- How a lower taxable income may also reduce the amount a lender will advance
- Add-backs for depreciation and one-off costs, and which a lender may accept
- The premises held outside super, and what a lease to your own company needs
- Property built or bought to sell, which may be taxed as trading stock rather than a capital gain
- Whether GST applies to new residential premises, and the margin scheme, with your accountant
- One asset with one tenant, where that tenant is your own business
SMSF
We can help you weigh up whether your business premises could be held in your super fund.
A self-managed fund can hold business real property, so the workshop, yard or shopfront your business operates from may sit inside super and be leased back at a market rate. The definition is specific, the lease must be on commercial terms, and residential property used as a home doesn’t qualify.
Together, we’ll work through:
- Whether the workshop, yard or shopfront your business trades from could be held in the fund
- The business real property test, and whether your premises may meet it
- A commercial lease from the fund to your business, at a market rent
- Whether the fund buys the premises outright or borrows, and what a lender may require
- What a single large property does to the fund’s liquidity and diversification
- Rent paid to your own fund rather than to an external landlord, and what that means
- What happens to the arrangement if the business moves or stops trading
- The possible duty and capital gains costs if the business already owns the premises
Retirement & Aged Care
We’ll help you understand what a business sale might fund, and what else you may need.
What a business earns and what it would sell for can be two different numbers, particularly where the owner is central to the work. Building retirement assets outside the business can reduce how much your plan relies on the sale price.
Together, we’ll work through:
- What the business might sell for, with your accountant or a valuer, against what it earns you
- Any small business CGT concessions you may be eligible for, confirmed with your accountant
- Moving sale proceeds into super, and the caps and eligibility rules that apply
- Whether a sale, a handover to family, or a wind-up fits what you want
- How much of retirement the business is expected to fund, stated plainly
- What you would need outside the business if the sale disappointed
- The years before a sale, and the work that may help support the business’s value
- When to start preparing for a sale, and why starting early may give you more options
What We’ll Work Through Together
Managing the Payment Gap
Plan a buffer for the gap between doing the work and being paid.
Setting Money Aside for BAS
Hold tax and BAS money aside as it’s earned, with amounts checked by your accountant.
Income Protection When Self-Employed
Consider cover suited to self-employed income and a waiting period that fits your business.
Buy-Sell and Key Person Cover
Consider insurance funding for a buy-sell agreement, alongside your solicitor.
Building Wealth Outside the Business
Build assets and super outside the business, so a sale isn’t your only retirement plan.
Paying Your Own Super
Plan personal contributions around the business, and any deduction you may be eligible for.
Owning Your Premises Through Super
Rent paid to your own fund instead of a landlord, where the premises qualify.
Planning to Sell the Business
Start preparing early, so you have more options when you decide to sell.
Proactive, Holistic, and Experienced Financial Planning
When you work for yourself, the business and the household are often the same conversation, even when they’re kept in different accounts. Money can come in unevenly, the good years may need to cover the quiet ones, and there’s rarely a spare evening for any of it. We’ll look at how the business pays you, what you’re keeping and how to build something outside the business itself, with the aim of giving you more choice about when you stop.
You built it for a reason, and often that reason is at home rather than at work. A household that’s better prepared if you’re off the tools for a while, a business that could keep going without you, something to hand on or to sell when the time comes. We’ll help you plan for all three together, and we can review the plan with you as the business and your goals change over time.
Every financial decision impacts the next
Your Financial Life Is Connected
Great advice starts with understanding the bigger picture. Every stage of life presents new opportunities and challenges, from buying property and changing careers to growing your family, planning for retirement and protecting what matters most. At Ryker, we help connect every piece of your financial world into one clear strategy.
Your
Wealth
- Property & Investing
- Career & Income
- Tax Strategy
- Insurance & Protecting Your Family
- Super & SMSF
- Wealth & Investments
- Life Events & Changes
- Business & Wealth
- Legacy & Future Wealth
- Retirement Planning
Frequently Asked Questions
We’re invested in your long-term success. What we do is personal, and we take it personally.
Your financial decisions connect, so we consider the parts of your financial life that are relevant to the advice you need:
- Property & Investing
- Career & Income
- Tax Strategy
- Insurance & Protecting Your Family
- Super & SMSF
- Wealth & Investments
- Life Events & Changes
- Business & Wealth
- Legacy & Future Wealth
- Retirement Planning
This is how we help you make decisions today with your longer-term goals in view.
Everybody’s situation is different, so we listen first, understand what matters to you and explain your options clearly before we make a recommendation.
Sole traders and partners generally aren’t required to pay super to themselves, which is why it can easily become the thing that waits.
You may still be able to make personal contributions and claim a deduction for them if you meet the eligibility rules. That can make super one place to direct part of a strong year.
We can look at what the business can spare, what your contribution caps allow and which year may suit, with your accountant confirming the tax position.
Insurers generally assess self-employed income from tax returns and financial records rather than a payslip, often looking back over one or more years. That can cut both ways: a year where taxable income was lower may reduce the benefit, and one strong year may not carry it on its own.
Two things to understand at application are how the policy defines your income and how it treats business expenses. We go through both with you before an application is submitted, and the insurer makes the final decision.
Your accountant and financial adviser bring different expertise to the same decisions. Your accountant can advise on tax reporting, structures and consequences; we help you plan how cashflow, debt, super, investments and protection work towards your goals. We can coordinate before important decisions.
What an accountant does
- Prepares and lodges tax returns, BAS and financial statements
- Advises on tax structures such as companies, trusts and partnerships
- Manages bookkeeping, payroll and ATO compliance
- Provides tax advice on the consequences of a transaction
What a financial adviser does
- Sets a long term strategy across retirement, investing and cash flow
- Builds wealth from early in a working life, starting with cash flow, a first home and super
- Recommends specific super funds, investments and personal insurance
- Operates under an Australian Financial Services Licence, which is required to give personal advice on financial products
- Handles retirement planning, Centrelink and aged care strategy, and estate planning considerations
Professional roles and authorisations matter. We provide financial advice within our authorisations and work with your accountant for specialist tax advice and lodgements.
Where they work together
- Tax position. Your accountant confirms your marginal rate, deductions and carried forward losses, which shapes decisions on super contributions, investment structures and the timing of asset sales.
- Business and entity structures. Your accountant advises on the structure itself and your financial adviser works within it for investments, insurance and succession planning.
- Cash flow. Your accountant’s figures can help us understand what’s available for debt repayment, protection and longer-term goals.
- Before key decisions. We can coordinate with your accountant on contributions, asset sales and other material choices in time to consider relevant tax consequences.
It depends on your structure, and it’s rarely only one of them.
- Wages are generally deductible to the business, taxed to you at your marginal rate, and may carry super.
- Drawings from a sole trader business aren’t separate from the profit you’re already taxed on.
- Dividends are paid from company profits after company tax, often with franking credits attached.
- Trust distributions depend on the deed and on who the beneficiaries are.
A suitable mix depends on your entity, any partner’s income and what the business needs to retain. We can model each route with you and work with your accountant on the tax advice.
A comparison site can help you compare options on price and headline features.
Advice also considers what you may need. For someone self-employed, that includes how a policy defines your income, whether business expenses cover is suitable, what waiting period your cash position could manage and how it fits with any cover inside super. These details can affect how a claim is assessed.
We can help you understand your needs first, then compare suitable options with you.
It’s worth planning for before you need it, and the answer has three parts:
- Who does the work, and what would replacing you cost?
- What would keep paying fixed costs such as rent, leases and wages?
- What would the household live on in the meantime?
Personal income protection may help with the third, if you hold suitable cover. Business expenses cover may help with some of the second. The first is usually a plan rather than a policy. We can work through all three with you and put realistic numbers against them.
Very much so, and nothing needs pulling together beforehand.
There’s no cost for the initial conversation. Tell us how you pay yourself, what a quieter year looks like and what you’d want to happen if you couldn’t work for a while.
We’ll explain how we can help and what records will help us get started.
Who We Help
Advice for All Stages of Life
From first job to retirement, we help you build wealth, protect it, and live well.
Starting Out
First jobs, first home, first super, HECS debt, budgeting and more.
Growing Families
First home buyers, new parents, school fees, single incomes, young families and more.
Medical & Health
Doctors, dentists, pharmacists, allied health, nurses and more.
Professional Services & Tech
Lawyers, accountants, brokers, engineers, consultants and more.
Trades & Business Owners
Electricians, plumbers, builders, sole traders, franchisees and more.
Corporate & Executive
Executives, senior managers, directors, board members and more.
Public Sector & Defence
Police, firefighters, paramedics, ADF personnel, teachers and more.
Approaching Retirement
Pre-retirees, transition to retirement, Age Pension, aged care, estate planning and more.
Other Stages
Any income, any stage, career changers, separation, second opinions and more.
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Testimonials from Our Clients
Grow & Protect Your Wealth Today
Whatever’s on your mind, we’re here to help. You’ll speak with an authorised financial adviser who’ll listen first and get to know what matters to you.
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