Aggarwal Tax Strategy
A focused approach to multi-year tax strategy for high-net-worth retirees.
Background
I retired from internal medicine in 2004 after a full career and thought I was done working. That turned out not to be the case.
Over the next two decades I worked in several different fields — 18 months as a financial advisor at Smith Barney, a period as director of accounting for a law firm that analyzed business losses for BP oil spill claims, and several years performing Social Security disability evaluations for the state of Florida. I finally retired for good in 2024.
It wasn’t until six months ago, when I finally sat down and modeled out our retirement tax situation, that I realized my spouse and I were looking at required minimum distributions of close to $250,000 per year at age 75. That number was genuinely surprising — even with my background in financial advisory work and accounting, I had never looked at the long-term picture carefully.
Part of the reason is that we had been receiving substantial ACA subsidies for years, which made our current situation feel manageable. The subsidy was working, premiums were low, and taxes each year were minimal. What I didn’t fully appreciate is that the ACA subsidy can actually discourage Roth conversions in the short term — which makes the long-term RMD problem worse. It’s a trap that’s easy to fall into precisely because the short-term incentives point in the wrong direction.
That realization led me to develop a systematic multi-year tax strategy for our own situation first — before offering it to others.
Why This Work
In many cases, the structure of taxes over time has a greater impact on outcomes than investment selection.
Decisions such as when to recognize income, how to manage IRA balances, and how to coordinate withdrawals across accounts can have a significant impact on long-term outcomes.
This work focuses specifically on those decisions—evaluating tax outcomes over multiple years rather than optimizing for a single tax return.
Approach
The analysis is based on building multi-year projections to evaluate tradeoffs between:
- Roth conversion strategies
- Future RMD-driven income
- Tax bracket management over time
- Coordination with factors such as ACA subsidies
The objective is not to minimize taxes in any given year, but to improve long-term after-tax outcomes and maintain flexibility over time.
Positioning
This work is distinct from both traditional tax preparation and investment management.
In many cases, these decisions have a larger impact on long-term outcomes than incremental differences in investment returns.
Credentials
| Physician | Board Certified, Internal Medicine |
| Former Financial Advisor | SEC Investment Adviser Public Disclosure available for verification |
| Enrolled Agent | Previously licensed, worked in tax preparation and planning |
| CFP Exam | Passsed |
Who This Is For
This work is most relevant for retirees who are under 65 with:
- Substantial IRA balances
- Flexibility in income planning
- Interest in evaluating long-term tax outcomes
It is particularly applicable for households with approximately $2M+ in investable assets.