Calvin and Carolyn

Calvin is 32 and a second year gastroenterology fellow. Carolyn, 30, is a stay at home parent to two daughters, three years old and six months old. They own their home in a Mountain West city, and a move to a more moderate cost Mountain West city is planned for fall 2021, when his attending job starts.

Money in is about $105,000 a year: his $70,000 fellowship salary plus about $35,000 to $40,000 of moonlighting income on a 1099. Expenses are itemized in full, and separate savings accounts hold the 1099 taxes, vacation, insurance, annual expenses, and the move, so every dollar sorts into a named lane.

The emergency fund holds three to four months of expenses, and checking runs on about $220. The Roth IRAs take $1,000 a month and are fully funded, with balances of about $21,000 his and $25,000 hers. The hosts restated that stated Roth saving as a savings rate of about 18 percent, and that is the rate the score uses. The girls' 529 accounts hold $2,600 and $2,100 against a goal of $200,000 each by age 18.

There is no student debt. His parents paid the loans off in January, and the only debts left are loans from those same parents: a $217,000 mortgage at 0 percent, $800 a month, and a $32,300 car loan at 0 percent, $700 a month.

Protection is the finished side, with two soft spots. Calvin holds two individual own occupation disability policies totaling $5,000 a month of benefit. Term life is in force on both spouses, $1,030,000 on him and $500,000 on her, and a $2,000,000 twenty year term application on Calvin was pending. A $1,000,000 umbrella policy costs $225 a year. Wills and healthcare powers of attorney are signed; no guardian is named for the girls, and no financial power of attorney is stated.

The Financial Health Assessment grades a household across the same seven frameworks and lands the total in a band. Calvin and Carolyn score 53, in the Corrections band. This household is scored on the resident and fellow rubric path.

The 3-Bucket Framework earns 10 of 26. Milestones earn 0, because the milestone net cannot be determined from what the intake states. The emergency fund earns 3 at three to four months, named lanes earn the full 4 on a fully itemized expense list with bucket accounts behind it, and goals funded earns 3.

The Physician Wealth Equation earns 3 of 6. The savings rate used for scoring is about 18 percent, the hosts' restatement of the stated $1,000 a month of Roth saving, which earns stretch saving partial marks. Residents and fellows are never scored on debt to income.

The Protection Stack earns 16 of 22: health at the full 4, disability at the full 4 on two own occupation policies, life at the full 4, umbrella at 2 because adequacy against total assets is not verifiable from stated facts, and estate documents at 2 because the wills and healthcare power of attorney exist while the financial power of attorney and the guardian are not stated. Malpractice earns 0 because the type and tail are not stated.

The Transition framework earns 8 of 10: the loan strategy earns the full 6 with no student debt at all, and cards and other debt earns 2, because a $32,300 car loan at 0 percent through his parents is still a loan being managed. The Tax Ladder earns 2 of 8: 2 for the Roth choice fully funded in a low bracket stage, and 0 because the federal marginal bracket is not stated.

The Decision Filter earns the full 6 of 6 on ten stated goals, five short term and five long term. The Lifestyle Guardrails earn 8 of 22: the Savings Floor at 6 on the scored 18 percent rate, the leak at 0 because the unaccounted amount is not stated, and wealth first automation at 2.

Read the shape, not just the total. The frameworks that grade decisions already made, protection, goals, the bucket system, are strong. The two soft spots are specific: an estate file missing its guardian, and a savings rate running behind the household's own independence math.

The first deep dive is the savings rate, and the finding is a gap between the rate and the plan. The rate used for scoring is about 18 percent, the hosts' restatement of the stated $1,000 a month of Roth saving, which fully funds both Roth IRAs.

At 18 percent, the boxes pay partial marks: stretch saving earns 3 of 6 and the Savings Floor earns 6 of 12. Full marks sit at 25 and 20 percent. On a fellow's income with a stay at home parent and two children under four, 18 percent is real saving. It is also not the rate the household's own goals are priced at.

Against the household's own goals, the rate is the whole question. Independence by 50, on their own math, needs about $115,000 a year of saving from age 35. Today the Roth IRAs take $12,000 a year. The bridge between those numbers is the attending contract that starts in September 2021 at $300,000, and the move that comes with it.

The hosts spent real time on the other side of that bridge: this household still invests through an AUM advisor, at a 62 percent growth, 28 percent growth and income, 10 percent aggressive allocation, and already plans to leave for DIY investing. The written plan they want inside two months is the document where the raise gets its instructions.

The second deep dive is the Protection Stack, and the finding is timing. This household bought its coverage during fellowship, at training prices, instead of waiting for the attending income that makes it feel affordable.

The stack is nearly complete. Two own occupation disability policies pay $5,000 a month. Term life is in force on both spouses. The umbrella adds $1,000,000 over the top for $225 a year. Health coverage is in place. For a one income household with two children under four, the layer that keeps a bad month from becoming a bad decade is already in force.

Three items hold the stack at 16 of 22. The estate documents state no guardian for the girls and no financial power of attorney, the cheapest unfinished box in the file. The $2,000,000 term application on Calvin was still pending. And the malpractice type and tail are not stated anywhere in the record, the line that gets answered in writing at the attending contract.

That is the whole critique. Finish the documents, land the pending policy, and get the tail answer at contract signing, and this stack is done.

Inside the 3-Bucket Framework, the milestone checklist tracks the markers a training household has already hit. This checklist earns 0 for Calvin and Carolyn, not because the markers are missing, but because the intake never states a milestone list the net can be computed from. The box pays only for stated milestones.

The rest of the bucket picture is stronger: named lanes earn the full 4 on the itemized lists and bucket accounts, the emergency fund earns 3 at three to four months, and goals funded earns 3 of 6. The score grades stated systems; the prescription below works the gaps the record names.

The protection is nearly done. What remains is the documents, and the raise.

No score target is attached to this prescription: the record traces no point gains for it. The honest statement of this file is that the protection is nearly built, the documents are one signature short, and the raise decides the rate.

Protection bought early is protection bought cheap. Two own occupation disability policies, term life on both spouses, and an umbrella, all in place during fellowship: this is the stack most households assemble five years later at attending prices, if they assemble it at all.

The second lesson is about finishing. This household did the expensive parts of the estate file and left the two cheapest: a guardian's name and a financial power of attorney. Documents get graded as a set, and the set is not done until the page about the children is filled in.