It started with the Bank of Dad
My father was an airline pilot who flew 747s for most of his career, and he passed on two lifelong interests: investing and flying. Once a month, we deposited my allowance into the “Bank of Dad,” which paid a remarkably generous, and wildly unrealistic, 20% a year. That bank is long closed, but the lesson in compound growth never left me.
I was born in San Diego, spent part of my early childhood abroad, and have called America’s Finest City home ever since. I earned my business degree from San Diego State and completed my CFP® coursework at Pepperdine’s Graziadio Business School. Along the way, I read everything I could from the great financial minds, especially those who championed the everyday investor. Their core lesson stuck with me: small things, like costs and everyday decisions, really matter, because they compound over time.
Why I built my own firm
Rather than work inside someone else’s model, I built FlightPath from the ground up, so I could do things the way I believe they should be done. When the standard tools don’t answer a client’s question well, I build my own. One example is the decision engine behind The Open Enrollment Workshop, which helps people compare health plans and HSAs based on what they’ll actually pay under different scenarios. Trust me, the results aren’t what you’d expect. That’s the different way of thinking behind FlightPath: look closer, question the usual answer, and get the details right.
The pilot’s checklist
I’ve been flying since I was a kid launching remote-control gliders over Lake Hodges. I went on to become a commercial pilot with an instrument rating, which I earned at Palomar Airport. I haven’t flown in a while, but the lessons from the cockpit have stayed with me. Flying and financial planning have more in common than you might think. Both carry real responsibility, and both reward preparation over guesswork. Before every flight, a pilot runs through a checklist: Am I fit to fly? Is the airplane ready? Is the weather safe? Good pilots plan for what could go wrong, not out of pessimism, but because that’s how you make it home safely every time. I bring the same discipline to every plan I build.
Life outside the office
Amanda and I married in 2020 in Big Sur: just the two of us, the officiant, a photographer, and the redwoods. Today, our life is full with our young daughter and our shelter dog, Toby (short for Toby-Wan Kenobi; he’s mastered the “give me chicken” Jedi mind trick). When I’m not working, you’ll find me cooking, at the beach, learning woodworking, or at the airport.
