Eric S. Mathus - Northwestern Mutual

🏈 The $1 Billion Problem
In 2008, the owner of the St. Louis Rams died…
…and left her kids a $1 billion football team.

Sounds like a dream.
It wasn’t.

💰 The problem
The IRS doesn’t take “football teams."

It wants cash.
A lot of it.

Estate tax bills can reach roughly 40%.
That can mean hundreds of millions due… in cash.

😬 The reality
Their wealth was real.
But it wasn’t liquid.

So they had two options:
👉 Find an enormous amount of cash
👉 Sell the team
They sold.

The Rams changed hands in 2010.

💡 What could have changed it?
Life insurance.

Simple idea. Big impact.

The right policy could have:
- Created instant cash at death
- Covered the tax bill
- Let the family keep the team

🔍 Why this matters to everyone
Most people look like this financially:

- House
- Investments
- Business or real estate

Valuable?
Yes.

Cash when it matters most?
Not always.

❓ The real question

If your family needed cash tomorrow… where would it come from?

Because without a plan, they don’t inherit assets.
They inherit decisions:

What do we sell?
How fast do we sell it?
Do we even have a choice?

✅ The takeaway
Life insurance is not just about protection.
It is about creating liquidity the exact moment your family needs it most.

They thought everything was handled… until they saw what was possible.
A couple in their early 60s came to us with approximately $3.2M, primarily in tax-deferred accounts, plus a taxable portfolio and real estate. They already had an advisor, a plan, and felt confident they were on track.
And to be fair, they weren’t doing anything wrong.

But as we dug deeper, a different picture emerged:

Future required distributions were projected to push them into significantly higher tax brackets
Their income strategy lacked flexibility in changing markets
And their estate plan, while in place, wasn’t fully aligned with how their wealth would actually transfer

In other words… their plan was working, but it wasn’t working as efficiently as it could.
So we introduced a more coordinated approach:
- Bucketing strategy for income
We restructured their withdrawals using a bucketing approach, allocating ~$400K for near-term income, while keeping long-term assets positioned for growth. This created stability without sacrificing opportunity.
- Proactive tax strategy
We mapped out multi-year Roth conversions (~$120K annually), taking advantage of today’s lower tax brackets to reduce long-term tax exposure and future required distributions.
- Social Security coordination
By adjusting their timing, we increased their projected lifetime benefit, while supporting their broader income and tax strategy.
- Advanced estate alignment
Working with their estate attorney, we refined their trust structure, helping ensure assets passed more efficiently, with less tax drag and more control for their family.

The difference?
Not just numbers on a page, but a shift in how their entire plan worked together.
More after-tax income.
More flexibility year to year.
And a significantly more efficient path from retirement… to legacy.

Many high-net-worth families feel “set.”
But feeling set and being fully optimized aren’t always the same thing.
The real question isn’t “Is my plan working?”
It’s: “Is there more I could be doing that I’m not seeing?”
Sometimes, that second look is where the biggest opportunities live.