Terms of use

Treat this page as a checklist: what the site is, what you may do with it, and what happens when you send a request. Using the site means you accept these terms. If you do not accept them, please stop using it.

• Education only, no personal advice
• Matching is free and carries no obligation
• Calculators illustrate, they do not predict
• Advisor accounts have their own conditions

1. The site teaches, it does not advise

   Golden State Planner offers general financial education in the form of articles and calculators. It does not offer personal investment, tax, legal or insurance advice, and using it does not make the site your adviser, broker or fiduciary.

2. Calculators are illustrations

   Each calculator lists on the page the assumptions behind its answer and works in your browser. Change an assumption and the answer changes, which is the point: a result is arithmetic, not a forecast of your taxes, returns or benefits. State tax rules, California's included, change often, so check the current figures.

3. What you may do with the content

   You may read, print and quote short passages with credit for your own use. Anything larger, such as copying pages, scraping or republishing, needs written permission asked for through the contact page. We keep the rights in the text, layout and calculators.

4. Sending a matching request

   Matching is free for you and obliges you to hire nobody. A person on our team reads your request and contacts you to confirm what you need; you are then introduced to a licensed advisor who specializes in what this site covers. Advisors are independent of the site, and any advisory agreement is between you and them. Fees are settled with the advisor, after they give you their own disclosures. We may decline a request.

5. Advisor accounts

   Advisors sign up with a name, work email and CRD number. The sign-up check needs the CRD to be found in the SEC's public investment adviser record, currently registered and matched to the name; an advisor who fails can send an application, which a person reviews. Membership and each purchased request are charged to a card by a payment provider, and fees show before purchase. An introduction does not promise a client. We can turn away or suspend any account, and advisors stay responsible for their own compliance, registration and marketing included.

6. Limits on our liability

   The site comes as it is, with no promise that it is complete, current or always online. To the fullest extent the law allows, we are not liable for losses from relying on its content, from a calculator result, or from dealing with an advisor or any other third party.

7. Changes to these terms

   We may change these terms by updating this page. Keep using the site after a change and you accept the new version, so look back here before you send a request.