Would surface the Roth ladder schedule against the IRMAA tiers, model the tax-torpedo zone on the Social Security ramp, and quantify the widow's-bracket transition on first death — the conflicts our Wealth engine flagged become first-class strategies with year-by-year dollar deltas.
Sample dossier · excerpt
The dossier the engine hands back, on paper.
A condensed excerpt of the run behind Comparison № 001 — same household, same inputs as Income Lab’s published sample report.
This is an excerpt for reading, not a client deliverable. The full run — every recommendation, all 8 conflicts, and the complete rejected-alternative ledger — is published as Comparison № 001.
The household, on paper.
Both engines saw the same inputs. We changed nothing.
People & place
- Client
- Age 65, retired
- Spouse
- Age 62, retiring Jun 2025
- State
- Florida (no state income tax, homestead state)
- Filing
- Married filing jointly
- Plan length
- 32 years, 7 months (60th percentile longevity)
- Legacy goal
- $200,000 inflation-adjusted
The portfolio
- Joint taxable
- $900,000
- Client IRA
- $1,100,000
- Spouse 401(k)
- $750,000
- Allocation
- 60% equity / 40% bonds (uniform across all three)
- Pension
- $1,200/mo — single-life, no survivor
- Rental income
- $1,000/mo (FL single-family)
- Social Security
- Both claiming at full retirement age, unevaluated
What the engine recommended.
Nine concrete actions across six specialist agents. Each with a documented reasoning chain, considered alternatives, and a confidence score derived from the underlying evidence.
- Entry 01 Estate Planning confidence 1.00
Beneficiary Designation Audit and Update for Retirement Accounts
Immediately review and update beneficiary designations on all retirement accounts totaling $1,850,000 — naming the spouse as primary and appropriate contingent beneficiaries so the assets pass outside probate. Coordinated with the Roth conversion sequencing so both pre-tax and Roth balances carry correct designations.
- Entry 02 Wealth Strategy Synthesizer confidence 0.95
Roth Conversion vs. Capital Gains Harvesting Bracket Conflict
The Retirement Income agent's Roth-conversion plan to reduce future RMD taxes and the Tax agent's plan to harvest capital gains at the 0% rate compete for the same limited low-bracket space in the same tax year — both strategies are valuable, but not simultaneously maximizable. Sequenced correctly, this carries an estimated $180,000 in tax savings and $2,750,000 of value transferred over the plan horizon.
- Entry 03 Real Estate Strategy confidence 0.93
Florida Homestead Asset Protection Preservation
Keep the $450,000 primary residence (net of its $120,000 mortgage) titled in the clients' individual names, or move it into a Florida-qualifying revocable living trust or an enhanced life estate ('Lady Bird') deed — never into an LLC or other business entity. Florida's constitutional homestead exemption gives unlimited creditor protection regardless of equity, and the Save-Our-Homes cap limits annual assessment increases to 3% as the couple ages in place.
- Entry 04 Tax Optimization confidence 0.90
Social Security Benefit Delay for the Higher Earner
Delay the higher-earning spouse's Social Security from Full Retirement Age (67) to age 70, locking in a 24% permanent benefit increase. This maximizes the lifetime, inflation-adjusted survivor benefit for the younger spouse.
- Entry 05 Investment Strategy confidence 0.88
De-Prioritize Estate-Tax Structures; Fund a Foundational Revocable Living Trust Instead
Skip irrevocable, estate-tax-driven vehicles (SLAT, IDGT installment sale, ILIT) — at $3,450,000 net worth in a no-estate-tax state, there's no estate tax to shield. Instead fund a joint Florida Revocable Living Trust holding the liquid investments and real estate, plus the beneficiary-designation audit on the $1,850,000 of retirement accounts. This preserves asset flexibility, the step-up in basis at death, and control, while supporting the ongoing bracket-management program.
- Entry 06 Estate Planning confidence 0.85
Enhanced Life Estate ('Lady Bird') Deed on the Florida Homestead
Record a Florida-specific Lady Bird deed on the $450,000 homestead, retaining full lifetime control and homestead protection while automatically passing the property to named remainder beneficiaries at death — bypassing probate with no lifetime gift consequences.
- Entry 07 Estate Planning confidence 0.83
Foundational Estate Plan with a Revocable Living Trust
Establish a joint Florida Revocable Living Trust with pour-over wills, durable powers of attorney, healthcare surrogate designations, living wills, and HIPAA releases for both spouses. Fund the trust with the $900,000 liquid investment account and the rental-property LLC membership interest — not the homestead directly.
- Entry 08 Entity Structuring confidence 0.68
Florida Multi-Member LLC for Rental Property Liability Isolation
Retitle the $300,000 investment rental into a Florida LLC with both spouses as members, rather than a single-member LLC. This isolates tort and landlord-tenant liability from the homestead, liquid investments, and retirement accounts.
- Entry 09 Real Estate Strategy confidence 0.50
Home Equity Conversion Mortgage as a Sequence-of-Returns Buffer
Establish an FHA-insured HECM line of credit against the primary residence (roughly $330,000 in net equity), providing tax-free, non-recourse liquidity that can be drawn during market downturns instead of liquidating the $900,000 liquid portfolio or retirement accounts at depressed values.
Where two strategies moved the same lever.
These are documented in the result blob as cross-domain interactions. Each fires when two strategies move the same lever. Income Lab surfaces a single tax-distribution strategy comparison; the cross-domain interaction layer is what Rivalta's category is built to produce.
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LLC seasoning gate quantified tradeoff
The entity agent's plan to retitle the $300,000 rental into a multi-member LLC and the estate agent's gifting sequence pull on the same clock: an LLC must be seasoned six to twelve months before gifting interests, or contemporaneous formation-and-gifting invites Section 2036 estate inclusion. Resolution: form the entity at least six months before any gifting.
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Widow's penalty quantified tradeoff
On the first death, the survivor loses one Social Security check and shifts from joint to single tax brackets — a major bracket compression that collides with the Roth-conversion runway. Resolution: accelerate Roth conversions while both spouses are alive, and delay the higher earner's Social Security for the largest possible survivor benefit.
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Low-bracket triple claim quantified tradeoff
Roth conversions filling the 12% bracket, 0% long-term capital gains harvesting on the taxable portfolio, and a direct sale of the $300,000 rental all compete for the same finite low-bracket headroom in a given year. Realizing the rental's gain alone could consume nearly all the 0% LTCG space and crowd out that year's Roth conversions. Resolution: don't run the rental sale in the same year as aggressive Roth conversions or portfolio-gain harvesting — hold the rental (multi-member LLC + cost segregation) for near-term shelter and reserve disposition for a dedicated future tax year.
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Hold-vs-dispose gate quantified tradeoff
The entity agent recommends forming a multi-member LLC around the $300,000 rental for liability isolation (68% confidence); the real estate agent separately proposes disposing of the same property via a 1031/DST or direct sale (40% confidence) — and the LLC's own prerequisites say the two paths conflict. Forming and then unwinding an LLC months later duplicates legal and formation cost and complicates a 1031 exchange. Resolution: decide hold-vs-dispose before any titling action; only form the LLC if the client intends to hold long-term.
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Homestead double-titling quantified tradeoff
The estate agent recommends both a Lady Bird deed on the $450,000 homestead and folding it into the Revocable Living Trust, while investments and real estate each separately reference RLT titling and homestead protection. Layering a Lady Bird deed with an RLT transfer on the same property creates conflicting title interests and can jeopardize Florida's homestead creditor and devise protection. Resolution: use the Lady Bird deed for the homestead and keep the homestead out of the RLT; fund the RLT with non-homestead assets only.
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Income-baseline mismatch quantified tradeoff
The household's authoritative current income is $26,400 — far below the $92,000 prior-year AGI some strategies may implicitly assume — which changes how much 0% LTCG and 12%-bracket room is actually available. Four strategies (Roth conversions, LTCG harvesting, the rental sale, and the Social Security delay) compete for that same headroom across overlapping years, and no single one sized against $92,000 would be correctly scaled. Resolution: re-baseline all bracket-headroom math to the $26,400 figure, and sequence claimants into a multi-year plan — the rental disposition gets its own tax year with no Roth conversions, front-loading conversions in the pre-Social-Security years.
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Titling-sequencing collision quantified tradeoff
The rental is claimed by both LLC formation and disposition — mutually exclusive per the entity agent's own prerequisite — while the homestead is simultaneously claimed by a Lady Bird deed, RLT funding, and homestead-protection preservation. Executed in the plan's current order, this risks duplicate cost on the rental and impairment of homestead protection on the residence. Resolution: gate the rental decision (hold vs. dispose) before any titling action, and pick one homestead transfer mechanism — typically the Lady Bird deed alone — before any RLT funding.
Time-bound triggers.
Calendar windows in which a decision must be made or expire. Rivalta surfaces these as time-bound triggers. Income Lab's report renders a fixed timeline with year-by-year projections; window-bound decisions are surfaced through the advisor's planning workflow, not as a report section.
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Rate environment
The current Section 7520 rate is favorable for GRAT and CLAT planning — the lower the rate, the lower the hurdle for a GRAT remainder transfer to succeed. The opportunity moves with the rate environment, not the client's calendar.
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Pre-RMD gap years
Low-income years before Required Minimum Distributions begin are the structural window for bracket-fill Roth conversions against the $1,850,000 tax-deferred balance. The window runs through age 72.
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One-time, six-month window — NON-NEGOTIABLE
Medigap Open Enrollment starts on each spouse's Part B effective date and lasts six months — one-time guaranteed issue. Miss it, and underwriting applies; the decision is irreversible once the window closes.
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Six-month lookback
HSA contributions must stop six months before Medicare Part A begins, due to retroactive enrollment — calculate the exact stop date against the planned Medicare enrollment date.
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Fund-by-70 lookback
A Medicaid Asset Protection Trust requires a five-year lookback; if long-term care is anticipated by age 75, the MAPT must be funded by age 70 using non-retirement assets.
The same triggers, in the product
Considered and ruled out, on the record.
Thirty-one strategies considered and ruled out, each with a documented reason. This is the artifact that distinguishes reasoning from suggestion. A compliance reviewer can read why a thing was not done.
- Spousal Lifetime Access Trust (SLAT) considered 4 times, rejected: net worth of $3,450,000 is far below the federal estate tax exemption, and Florida has no state estate tax, so there is no estate tax to shield with an irrevocable gift
- Installment Sale to an Intentionally Defective Grantor Trust (IDGT) considered 6 times across the tax, estate, entity, business, and real estate agents, rejected: no taxable estate to freeze at $3.45M net worth, and the structure forfeits the basis step-up at death
- 1031 Like-Kind Exchange of the Rental into a Delaware Statutory Trust (DST) considered 3 times, rejected: the client sits in the 0% federal LTCG bracket, so recognizing the gain tax-free beats deferring it, and DSTs carry illiquidity and fees
- Irrevocable Life Insurance Trust (ILIT) considered 3 times, rejected: no estate-tax liquidity need in a $3.45M net worth household with no Florida estate tax
- Single-Member LLC for the rental rejected: Florida SMLLCs get only weak Olmstead charging-order protection, and both spouses can join a multi-member LLC at no extra cost
- Cost Segregation Study on the $300,000 rental rejected: too small a depreciable base for a meaningful bonus-depreciation benefit (roughly $5,000)
- Florida Two-Member LLC for the rental (insurance-based alternative) rejected: standard landlord and umbrella coverage is materially cheaper than LLC formation and maintenance for this single $300,000 asset
- 1031 Exchange into a Directly-Held Replacement Rental rejected: perpetuates the active-management burden the couple is trying to shed entering their retirement decade
- Charitable Remainder Trust (CRT) rejected: current taxable income is effectively zero, so the income-tax deduction would be wasted
- Defer or take no action on the flagged conflicts considered 2 times, rejected: inaction leaves the FLP-seasoning and widow's-penalty conflicts unresolved
- Run all three bracket strategies simultaneously rejected: spillover into the 15% LTCG / 22% ordinary brackets defeats the premise of each strategy
- Fund the homestead into the RLT (with or without the Lady Bird deed) considered 2 times, rejected: either abandons the cleaner Lady Bird protection or creates redundant, competing title interests
+ 19 additional alternatives in the full result blob, each with reasoning.
Rejected alternatives, in the product
What a full dossier adds beyond this excerpt.
Everything above came from Wealth alone. The Smith household sits inside the addressable surface of five other specialist verticals we deploy on the same household. Each one is built the same way Wealth is: a panel of specialist agents, intra-domain synthesis, documented rejected alternatives, and a result that lands as a coherent plan.
Would extend the Florida revocable trust + Lady Bird deed work into a full document package — durable POA, healthcare directive, beneficiary audit, homestead title review — with sequencing against the rental property's basis treatment and the $200K legacy goal.
Wealth already surfaced the pension-survivor GUL and the term-conversion window. A full Insurance run adds long-term-care positioning, hybrid life/LTC product fit, umbrella adequacy on the Florida rental property, and Medigap carrier scoring against the open-enrollment window.
Would own the Florida rental: depreciation recapture model on exit, cost-segregation feasibility, Lady-Bird vs. LLC vs. revocable-trust title comparison, §1031 routing if the owners ever change posture, and basis step-up arithmetic against the heirs' tax position.
Does not fire for a retired couple drawing income. For households with active trading, concentrated equity comp, or option positions, Trade reads the position book and surfaces bias-aware behavioral signals against the household's stated income plan. Different client, same platform.
Concord reconciliation
This excerpt is Wealth alone. When more than one vertical runs on the same household, their recommendations interact — a tax-optimal move competes for cash with an insurance-optimal one, an estate sequence competes for timing with a wealth one. Concord is the cross-vertical reconciliation pass that resolves those and writes down why. The reconciled plan is what reaches the client.
This is an excerpt. A condensed selection from one run of the Rivalta Wealth vertical, rendered for reading. The full run is published as Comparison № 001.
Sources. Income Lab “Basic Report — Retired Household” sample dated 09/18/2025, prepared by Wharton Investment Consultants, distributed by Income Laboratory, Inc. as public marketing material. Rivalta output produced 2026-05-11 by the Wealth vertical on the same household inputs. Re-issued 2026-07-12: all Rivalta figures re-produced by a fresh Wealth-vertical run on the same household inputs; the original run date and figures are superseded by this dated re-issue.
Numbers. Recommendation count, rejected-alternative count, conflict count, and trigger count read directly from the result blob produced by the Rivalta Wealth vertical for this household.
Disclosure. This is comparative-advertising material. Rivalta is not affiliated with Income Laboratory, Inc. The numbers shown represent one run of one analysis on one household; production output for actual clients varies with profile completeness and the firm's seat tier.