About Eric

Someone who knows your whole story.

For years I built software that banks and lenders use to read a person’s financial life — tax returns, W‑2s, pay stubs, bank statements.

Today I read these documents for a small number of families. Your financial story is in there — and once I can see it whole, I can do something about it.

One plan, where your taxes and your investments pull in the same direction. One person, in your corner year‑round.

Book a free consultation Free, 30–45 minutes, no obligation.

How I got here.

I have spent my career around other people’s money — how it gets measured, lent, and moved. For the last stretch of it I built the software that banks and lenders use to underwrite loans and weigh risk. Software I helped build is used by institutions including JPMorgan, Citi, and Goldman Sachs.

The heart of that work was reading tax returns. Not as a preparer — teaching software what every line on the form meant, and what it revealed about the family behind it. Thousands of them: W‑2s, 1099s, K‑1s, pay stubs, bank statements. I have memorized a surprising number of tax documents, and I have made my peace with that.

I learned to read a family’s financial story off their paperwork — and I wanted to help them reach the next stage in that story.

None of this was a late discovery. I have been preparing tax returns for low‑income families here in the Bay Area since 2014 — the part of my year I look forward to most. It taught me the thing the software never could: what families need most is not a faster form. It is someone who understands their particular situation and can explain it back in plain language.

Eventually the two halves of that — the analysis and the person — stopped feeling like separate jobs.

20+ yrs

Building software, most recently for banks and lenders

Tax seasons volunteering for Bay Area families

#12

Employee number at StubHub, back when that meant a folding table

Person you call

The practice I’d want for my own family.

Somewhere in all of it I noticed something. A house, a job change, a kid starting college, transitioning to retirement — these elements are all part of one financial life. But all too often they are treated in isolation.

That is how a family ends up with a perfectly sound investment decision and a surprise tax bill in the same year. Nobody did anything wrong. But no one was looking at the whole picture.

So I built the practice I would want for my own family. One person who knows your whole situation. No handoffs, no “you’ll have to ask your accountant about that,” no waiting until February to learn what last year’s decisions cost you.

In practice that means I take on fewer clients and do more for each one, all year instead of once a season. It also means I answer my own phone.

The credentials behind the work.

The short version of why you can hand me this.

Investment Adviser Representative (Series 65)

I am the investment adviser representative of Etu Financial, a registered investment adviser in California. We build the plan together; from there I manage the portfolio for you — placing trades, rebalancing as markets move, and keeping every move aligned with your tax situation. As a fiduciary I am legally required to act in your interest. And because the practice is fee‑only, I earn nothing from commissions or product sales.

Federally licensed tax professional (Enrolled Agent)

I provide proactive tax planning for families and their business entities and file returns for them year‑round — usually in days, not months. As an Enrolled Agent I hold unlimited practice and representation rights before the IRS, and I’m a member of the National Association of Enrolled Agents. Have a tax question come up mid‑year? Let’s talk.

University of Chicago Booth School of Business — MBA

My graduate studies in Economics and Finance reasoned from first principles instead of rules of thumb. Your situation is not the average situation, and the average answer is often the wrong one.

Dartmouth College — BA, Mathematics

I was the guy who thought calculus was fun. It never wore off. Somebody in this relationship should genuinely enjoy running the numbers. It’s me.

Outside the office.

My family and I live in Walnut Creek, California. I coach kids’ sports, serve communion at my church, and play disc golf around Northern California whenever the calendar allows.

That is the life I am building here, and it is the same reason I do this work. When you hire me, you get me — the same person on your taxes, your investing, and on the phone when something comes up. Someone who understands your story, knows your family, and is thinking about your finances so you don’t have to. I would love to serve your family the way I serve my own community.

Now tell me about you.

A short conversation about what you’ve got going on — your taxes, your investments, or both. No pitch, no paperwork, no obligation.

Book a free consultation

30–45 minutes By video or phone Nothing to bring