SHP’s 2025 Year in Review and a Look Ahead to 2026 – Ep 096

As we kick things off in 2026, it’s a natural time to reflect on how quickly time passes and how important it is to have a plan that evolves as life, markets, and priorities change. Volatility, political uncertainty, and shifting tax laws continue to remind investors that retirement isn’t just about accumulating money; it’s about knowing how to manage it so you can spend it with confidence.

In this episode, SHP Financial co-founders Matthew Peck, Derek Gregoire, and Keith Ellis, Jr. got the band together in the studio to look back on the past year and reflect on how the firm—and the financial planning industry as a whole—has evolved since they first started SHP Financial over two decades ago.

In their conversation they discussed what’s changed, what hasn’t, and why comprehensive planning matters more today than ever before. Ultimately, this episode reinforces a simple but powerful message: while markets and policies will always change, proactive planning, clear communication, and a strong support team provide the stability retirees need to focus on what truly matters in the years ahead.

In this podcast interview, you’ll learn:

• Why having a comprehensive retirement plan matters even more during volatile markets.
• How SHP evolved from a small startup into a fully integrated planning firm.
• The five key areas every successful retirement plan needs to address.
• Why market downturns are easier to manage when you have a clear plan in place.
• How tax planning, estate planning, and investment strategy work best when aligned.
• Why specialization and client service are critical as retirement needs become more complex.

Inspiring Quotes

• “One thing that’s absolutely constant is that if you have a plan, you can manage that. You can manage a rollercoaster a whole lot better.” – Matthew Peck

•  “Most people that come in to visit us have done a really good job saving. They’ve done a really good job to put themselves in a position to retire or at least think about retiring.  But as you build your net worth, you need to start to think differently. And I always say you want to be a good steward of your money.” – Keith Ellis, Jr.

• “ I know we’re always looking ahead, that’s what we’ve been doing for 20-something years. But if you think of where we are now, the value that’s being offered is 20 times better than what I envisioned looking back at ourselves in 2003 as young pups in the industry.” – Derek Gregoire

Interview Resources

• Michael Arone
• State Street Global Advisors
• AllianceBernstein

[INTERVIEW]

Derek Gregoire: Welcome everyone to another SHP Retirement Road Map podcast. We have the original band back together. It’s been a while, I think, since we’ve all been in studio together. But yeah, we’re looking at Derek Gregoire, Keith Ellis, and Matt Peck, co-founders since 2003 here, and we’re kind of looking back at 2025 as a whole. Now, as we start 2026, and I know this gets old saying, Keith and Matt, but it’s crazy how time flies. And the older we get, the faster it seems to go. But yeah, how’s everyone doing? Ready to get off to a new year?

Keith Ellis, Jr.: You’re right. It just flies by, I feel like September and then it’s basically New Year’s, like, within two seconds. And I was talking to some of our younger employees earlier and I was like, it’s kind of, I don’t want to say worse, but time goes faster once you start to have kids, I feel like. You know what I mean? Like, the school years just fly by, the time just flies by. And yeah, here we are, 2026. Happy New Year, guys, and let’s go.

Matthew Peck: Yeah, no, specifically about the kids, I mean, especially as you measure your own age with them, the fact that they’re all approaching college age is still that, that is, I’m having a tough time processing that. So, I know we’re supposed to look back rather than looking forward into 2026, but it certainly really hits home the idea of time flying.

Derek Gregoire: We talk to clients all the time about this and they always joke around because our average client age is probably 62. We have some that are in their 90s, some in their 40s, but our average is probably in the 60s. And they say, just wait, you’re in your late 40s. Well, it doesn’t get any better because think about when we were younger, I always think about summers. And the summers used to seem like it was forever. And now, as soon as it hits July 4th, it’s like done.

Keith Ellis, Jr.: Oh, yeah, it’s Christmas.

Derek Gregoire: Yeah, exactly.

Keith Ellis, Jr.: I just tell my wife, I’m like, get the Christmas tree, it’s July 4th.

Derek Gregoire: It’s so fast. So, I think it’d be helpful for everyone just to kind of understand, as we look back in 2025, I think it’s almost even better to look back at where we were because we have so many clients that remember us back in 2003 and 2004 when we first started. And they said, I remember when I came in and you guys were doing this and that and you had no help and no employees, and you’re running around, and I think we still run around like chickens with our heads cut off.

But with that being said, I think it’s important because, at the end of last year, Laura and I did a little workshop for a pastor at his church. It went really great down in Cedarville. And as we were talking and someone asked a question and I thought it was a great way to kind of transition to last year and even the last several years at SHP, but they asked, what’s the difference between SHP and a huge company that everyone’s heard of compared to a small mom and pop two-person company, right? And I think that’s a good way to start because I’ll give you the answer and then we can talk about a little bit.

But what I always say is, that’s why I’m proud of this team, we still have that small time feel when clients come in, everyone knows them there. They’re welcome. They walk down, they get greeted with coffee and menu and they just feel like they’re at home. And that’s the feeling we want. But I think sometimes you go into these huge big institutions that everyone knows the name and you get kind of like a portfolio and it’s kind of cookie cutter and you have different– I was talking to someone, they said, I’ve had three different advisors since I’ve been there and they don’t really do much more than a portfolio planning.

Then if you do, if you have a small mom and pop that’s like two people, how can they do all the things that are needed within a full plan, from income to taxes, to investments, to healthcare, to estate planning? When we see what it takes to do that, not to bash a small, two-person, three-person company, but how do you actually do all that? And so, I think it’s good to break out, Keith and Matt, if you guys want to start, just where we came from which is just a small company that didn’t know where we were going back 20 something years ago to having different divisions of our team that work for the benefit of our clients.

Matthew Peck: Well, it was interesting. I was talking to the gentleman over at State Street, Mike Arone and Aiden, who is obviously a SHP mate here, about how we were able to grow the company, right? And I talked about how it was a combination of two things. Number one, we did the tried and true method of over-the-top customer service, right, of making sure that people were getting phone calls returned within 24 hours and recognizing every email and doing things that to us seemed absolutely like a no brainer. Like, of course, you do that. Of course, you do that type of customer service.

Derek Gregoire: Common courtesy.

Matthew Peck: Right. And so, we were able to kind of harness that, and then, but at the same time, ride the wave of where the industry was going and cutting-edge planning because when we first started out 20 years ago, even more now, we were still in the land of sort of stock jockeys and just brokers who were out there, making picks and making commissions off of trades. They weren’t really providing planning. So, we were sort of at the very forefront of realizing that, oh my gosh, like people need full service. They need the five areas. They need the income, the investment, the tax, healthcare, and the legacy.

And so, when you combined sort of cutting-edge planning with traditional and tried and true customer service, you really have SHP. And to go back, specifically to your question, Derek, that takes people and that takes dedication and that takes a full fleshed out team that knows what they’re doing that’s specializing in these roles because one example of it is, this past year, the OBBBA was passed, One Big Beautiful Bill. Massive implications to tax planning, and with the SALT deductions and the Social Security deductions and all of those different things. And if you’re not paying attention to that in sorting through all the details, forget about the politics, but if you’re not sorting through all of the consequences of that tax bill, then you’re behind the eight ball, right? You’re losing, basically, because you’re not taking advantage of what’s available. So, you need all of those things. You need customer service. You need people that are getting ahead of it, staying on top of it and providing that full value in those five areas.

Keith Ellis, Jr.: To build on what Matt said, I think it’s the customer service aspect, but also the specialization, like you said. You know what I mean? Like, I always say to folks, most people that come in to visit us have done a really good job saving, right? They’ve done a really good job to put themselves in a position to retire or at least think about retiring. And now, they’ve come to a point where the advisor that they had before isn’t the advisor that they need going forward because they don’t do all these different things. They focus maybe more on just pure accumulation and things like that.

And there’s nothing wrong with that, but as you build your net worth, you need to start to think differently. And I always say you want to be a good steward of your money for both for you and your family. And I think having a plan in place provides confidence to live the best retirement that you can. Like, how do you know what’s possible if you don’t have a plan? Like, people spend months planning for a vacation for a week and people spend an hour retiring. You know what I mean? It makes no sense. You know what I mean? That’s the next 25, 30, 35 years of your life. So, I think that’s where, beyond what Matt just said, I think that’s where we as a company really stand out and really help people know what they have, embrace what they have, and learn how to maximize their retirement going forward.

Derek Gregoire: Well, I think just to take that one step further, if you look back on where we are in 2025, heading into 2026, I think it’s just more of we’ve come, so I think this industry has kind of thought of as sales and our whole philosophy is, no, here’s what we do. If it helps you, great. If not, no big deal. We’re not trying to fit a square peg in a round hole. But I think looking back at where we are, and this is something we dreamed of 20 years ago, but to see it happen, I just looked at it, I’m thinking of a client that Laura and I work with. They’ve been with us for probably eight years. And 15, 20 years ago, this was not possible.

But when they come in, number one, they have a full portal. They can log in, see all their accounts in one spot, and their plan is attached to that. So, they can kind of see where they’re headed, what their projections are, how does things look. If we want to buy a second house, how does that affect things? If we want to pay for our grandkids’ education, how does that look?

But more importantly, so they meet with Laura and I all the time on just general high-level portfolio management planning. But in the last few weeks, at the end of 2025, they had a meeting with our head CFP, one of our CFPs, Alina, and she’s a Certified Financial Planner. She’s geeks out on, for lack of a better word, she knows the OBBBA and all the different congressional terms. She’s brilliant with that stuff. And she took their situation. She met with them, did all applications to their plan, gave them Roth conversion ideas, donor-advised funds, all kinds of like ways to continue to do what they want to do and help organizations and so forth, but also, be very tax efficient and improve their tax situation going forward.

The same client, after I get off this call today, has called myself, Laura, and Zach who’s a Chartered Financial Analyst. But that client now has a call with Zach because his portfolio is done very well. But he had questions on how much of it is AI related and do we want to tweak that at all for his specific situation. So, think about that one client, that one client’s met with our attorney, built a trust plan. They’ve sat with our team. They know what direction they’re going because Laura and I manage a situation ongoing, but behind the scenes, they have meetings with a CFA on our team, a CFP on our team for different situations. And that’s just max.

Think about it, if you just have a portfolio and someone’s picking stocks, bonds, mutual funds, compare that to this type of plan where in the service that our clients are getting on top of just the customer service and making them feel good about themselves. I think that’s what really separates when people ask, looking back the last few years, I mean, level of service and capabilities, we didn’t have that 15, 10 years ago.

Matthew Peck: No, absolutely. And then to bring in kind of like recent events, I mean, if you don’t have a plan, kind of what Keith was mentioning about sometimes, the people will spend all that time planning vacations, but not in regards to retirement, I mean, if you recall in 2025, there was something called Liberation Day, right? April, 2025 is what hit the fan. The markets were plummeting. I mean, they were falling 5%, 10%, 15%, all in sort of a short amount of time.

Derek Gregoire: Is that April?

Matthew Peck: That was April. Yeah, April, 2025, right? And so, the joke was, yeah, those initial policies were liberating you from your money, right? But the reason why I bring that up is because events like that are going to happen, right? Whether it’s because of sort of chaotic foreign policy. Sorry, I have to slip that in. Or whether it is because of COVID, pandemic, or a temper tantrum with the raising interest rates, whatever it may be, there’s going to be times that the market is highly volatile and you’re going to be looking up and you’re going to be seeing red. You’re going to see the S&P dropping and the Dow Jones dropping. If you don’t have a plan, you are going to overreact. You are going to worry. You are going to be concerned. Your emotions will be on the fritz, especially if you’re retired.

Derek Gregoire: Again, let politics get in the way. It takes you to another level.

Matthew Peck: Right. If you put that in there, so it points out of the importance of having a plan during those types of market volatility. So, that was our 2025 market volatility. Who knows what 2026 market? Who knows about 2030? There’ll be market volatility then too. But one thing that’s absolutely constant is that if you have a plan, you can manage that. You can manage a rollercoaster a whole lot better.

Derek Gregoire: So, I was going to say, Keith, one of the things, as we look into 2026, this is something that, again, as we think about it, years ago when we were managing a hundred million dollars, and now we have over two and a half billion under advisement here at SHP. And that’s not saying it to brag, it’s just saying it we have to step up our level. Like, in order the clients to be here and want to stay here for the long run, you have to provide great service and great planning.

And so, one of the initiatives we have in 2026, which is kind of a grim thing, but kind of a very important thing is no one thinks about this. Everyone builds trusts, right? And in Massachusetts, once you hit over $2 million, which can be done, I don’t want to say easily, but if you have houses and life insurance and 401(k)s, once you have over $2 million, guess what? Your estate becomes taxable. And there’s certain planning around trust planning that has to be done to preserve certain benefits and to reduce taxes for the next generation.

Well, one of the areas, most attorneys, they’ll draft trusts and they’ll draft documents. But when someone passes away, there’s so much work that has to be done. Obviously, the worst part is the spouse is going through a tremendous loss and the family, and that goes without saying. But from a planning standpoint, there’s a lot that has to be done to do, to preserve all the planning that was done when they were alive and well. And so, a lot of attorneys don’t do that. And so, we have some that do, but now almost kind of in-house, we’re able to bring in a service. And Keith, I don’t know if you want to elaborate a little bit, that helps, that just basically takes care of that process for our clients.

Keith Ellis, Jr.: Yeah, I mean, a state settlement, it’s just an area that often goes forgotten, I guess, until that time comes, which is obviously not the time to be thinking about it. Just like anything else, you want to have a plan in place, you want to have your trustees in place. You probably want to meet the trustees as well so you’re familiar, your kids are familiar with the person that you’re going to be working with when that time comes.

And sadly, 2025, I went through a few of these with a couple clients that unexpectedly ran in some health issues and passed away, which was terrible. And it’s just a long, arduous process that a lot of people don’t think about. It’s like, hey, I got to get my trust set up. Okay, perfect. Okay, the trust is there to do everything that you want it to do, direct the assets to where you want them to go. Try to minimize taxes as much as possible, avoid probate, keep everything private. That’s the idea of these types of trusts.

But then 10, 15, 20 years goes by and you’ve done all the tweaking along the way on the front end of the trust, sadly, a spouse passes or the second spouse passes, and now the family’s stepping in to deal with the estate settlement and they’re scratching their heads because no one ever talks to them about that, right? And it’s like…

Derek Gregoire: The process.

Keith Ellis, Jr.: You need to talk to them and you need to educate. You need to educate the kids as well because the minute things are tweaked or changed or tinkered with, that could ruin the integrity of the trust and you could lose a lot of benefits there.

Matthew Peck: What absolutely blows me away, honestly, is that you can have a very good estate plan and it’s still a lot of work after the fact.

Keith Ellis, Jr.: Absolutely.

Matthew Peck: That’s what blows me away. I mean, so two things (a), obviously, still sit down with an estate planning attorney and make sure you have a plan; (b) to Keith’s point, make sure you kind of understand it and walk through the people. But I just can’t imagine people that don’t have a plan, I mean, if it’s a lot of work with actually having a really good buttoned up estate plan, imagine if you don’t have an estate plan, it’s even more of a nightmare. I can’t imagine it.

Derek Gregoire: Well, that’s why it’s important to make sure your advisor, if you have a estate plan, make sure they’re familiar with that process. And anyone can say, oh, yeah, I know how to do that, but do they really know how to work with firms on like 706 and filing this?

Keith Ellis, Jr.: It’s so much work.

Derek Gregoire: Yeah. So, that important part is like we’re now adding that as additional, semi-in-house value add with a really close affiliate. So, that’s a huge benefit, I think, as we continue to grow our suite of offerings at SHP Financial. And what we try to do is look at every single dot, every I, and cross every T for our clients so that they can go on vacation, they can go into retirement and off to wonder. Hey, I wonder if this is happening.

Now, if someone’s listening and they’re just like, hey, all I have is a pile of money in 401(k) and no one ever talks to you, any of this stuff, well, you’re someone that might want to benefit from this type of planning because again, without this type of planning, it’s hard to know, like Keith mentioned earlier, what it is that, like, how do you even know what to do, when to do it, how to do it, what accounts to pull from first, how to donate, like, there’s just so many things, so…

Matthew Peck: Well, I was going to say, sorry to interrupt, because you talked about sort of new services that were rolling out. I did just want to kind of thinking in terms of, obviously, it’s a jot in the memory now, jogging the memory now. But think about some of the things that we did roll out also in 2025 is on the investment side of it, two interesting things on the SMAs or the separately managed accounts.

Derek Gregoire: Oh, a good point.

Matthew Peck: There were specific podcasts about this. However, to remind all of our listeners, we rolled out a municipal bond portfolio.

Derek Gregoire: Individual bond.

Matthew Peck: Yeah, all individual bond that works out very, very well. And that’s where tax planning and investment planning work together. So, if you do have a high tax rate, something like municipal bonds in a separately managed account, individual bonds might be of interest as well as direct indexing. That’s another area where people, you’re combining tax management with investment management simultaneously. And I think those are just two examples as well as the trust planning that we’re just talking about that we’re going to continuously get better, right? We’re going to continuously look to add new services, new offerings. So, this is a moment in time, of course, 2025 and 2026, but I certainly want everyone to know that we’re not done, right, and we’re going to continue to look to get better, continue to add new services, new value, and always sort of ride that cutting edge of what modern financial planning needs.

Derek Gregoire: Yeah, I think it’s like, as we internally, the three of us have always been so driven for, this is our 23rd or 24th year in business, so it’s sometimes you have to sit back and be like, it’s good as a year in review to be like, hey, I know we’re always looking ahead, like Matt’s always looking at the next thing, and we always are because that’s what we’ve been doing for 20 something years. We think of where we are and the value that’s being offered is 20 times better than what I envisioned, looking back at ourselves in 2003 as young pups in the industry, as I joke around with clients.

You probably wouldn’t want to go with us at that point 24, 23 years ago. We’re good people. We had no ability or no infrastructure to support what we do now 24 years later. So, it’s been an amazing run and God willing, we have plenty more years left. But anything else, guys, as we look back on 2025 and the previous years or a look towards 2026? Obviously, we can’t control the market, but what you can control is all the other things around tax bracket management and how your money’s invested in risk score and all these things you can’t– there’s a lot of things you can’t control, can’t control the market, but you can control a lot of other things surrounding the market and your plan to give you hopefully some confidence and clarity on moving forward.

Matthew Peck: Yeah, and I think I would just hit on that sort of note that we’ve hit upon is that certain things don’t change, and that is just making sure that people get the best customer service, that people are treated the way they want to be treated. So, that’s not going to change coming into 2026, nor is the need to have a plan. No matter where you are, you need to have a good plan that covers all those areas. So, that’s not going to change.

Everything else in regards to the markets and politics and whatever geopolitics, all of that stuff, yeah, that’s going to be extremely volatile and that’s going to be frantic and hectic and emotional and whatnot. So, just always focus on what doesn’t change as much as you can because as long as you’re doing that right, then the rest of it usually is a sideshow.

Keith Ellis, Jr.: Yeah, and I would just say a lot of people listen to this podcast and other podcasts, and sometimes they can be intimidated. Intimidated to take that first step, intimidated to raise their hand to say, look, maybe I do need help in this area, this area, this area. A lot of clients actually came in last year and met with me and actually said that, “I’ve been listening to you guys for years and I finally took a shot to come in and visit with you guys.” And I said, “Well, what took you so long?” And they were just like, “Well, I didn’t have all my information together,” or…

Derek Gregoire: Yeah, you never will.

Keith Ellis, Jr.: Or I didn’t think like, I didn’t need this service or this service. But then as we sat with them, we uncovered, hey, well, here’s where we could provide value. Here’s what we could do for you. So, what I would say is now that the new year has come and everyone makes these resolutions and we’ve done these resolution shows before, so I’m not trying to– but like, make your resolution a financial resolution, get your house in order, and so then you know how to maximize the next 10, 15, 20, 25 years of your life. That’s the challenge I have.

Derek Gregoire: Yeah, I think as we obviously wrap up this podcast and look forward to what comes ahead, I mean, there’s always something to tweak, some to improve. There’s folks that have listened to us for years, a lot of them are clients, which we appreciate, their support over the years.

And I think one of the things, if you want to take it a step further, is that I’ve been in this business since 2001. I was a finance major for years before that, and myself, I couldn’t do this, if I was retired, I couldn’t do all this. Like, I rely on our portfolio team and CFAs to handle that portion. I rely on our CFPs and our planning team to keep up to date with all the changing laws of Congress, who’s in office, what they’re doing, versus the next president, versus who’s in. There’s so much that goes on that I’ve been in the business for this long and I couldn’t even keep track of it all. And this is what I do for a living, so it’s okay to not feel like you have a grasp on everything, but that’s what we’re here for, to help put you in the right direction.

And I think, hopefully, as you see from these podcasts, like we did a ton this year on so many different topics around donating and the best way to donate money. And Matt did a topic on like AllianceBernstein and the municipal bond portfolio. If you’re in a money market, getting 3% or 4% and you can get a similar yield, but not pay taxes on it, it’s like, hey, maybe we’ll consider that, things like that. So, hopefully, we brought some good value. We’re ready to go into 2026 and add a ton more value on future podcasts, but we wish everyone a great 2026 ahead. And for myself, Keith, and Matt at SHP Financial, we’ll be talking to you very soon. Thank you.

[END]