# McLean Asset Management McLean Asset Management is a Bank / Wealth / Trust based in Tysons, United States. ## Overview - **Organization type:** Bank / Wealth / Trust - **Headquarters:** Tysons, United States - **Region:** North America - **Address:** 1900 Gallows Rd Suite 350, Tysons, VA 22182, United States - **Founded:** 1984 - **Assets under management:** Undisclosed - **Website:** mcleanam.com ## Regulatory record - **CRD number:** 108067 - **SEC file number:** 801-55363 - **Registration status:** APPROVED - **Latest Form ADV filing:** 2026-05-22T05:00:00.000Z - **Reports private funds:** No - **Private funds reported:** 0 - **IAPD record:** https://adviserinfo.sec.gov/firm/summary/108067 ## About McLean Asset Management opened in 1984 and today operates from Tysons, Virginia, with an additional presence in New Hampshire. The firm is run by Managing Principals Alex Murguia, Paula Friedman, Dean Umemoto, and Jessica Wunder, alongside retirement-research director Wade Pfau. Unlike many registered investment advisers, the firm runs an in-house research engine, Retirement Researcher, and owns the Retirement Income Style Awareness (RISA) profiling tool. These instruments feed a planning process built on the premise that a retiree's tax, insurance, and estate variables determine portfolio survival as much as asset allocation does. Asset-class exposure spans taxable and tax-advantaged equity and fixed-income portfolios, annuities, and insurance-based solutions, with each engagement structured around a client's specific retirement-income personality. The firm does not run commingled funds or publish a single model portfolio; instead it constructs individual mandates for high-net-worth households and trusts. Its process models different life-stage events and distribution scenarios to minimize the gap between gross income and spendable cash flow. Tax efficiency figures prominently: the firm's own published research argues that the average tax rate shown on a return is backward-looking and irrelevant for forward planning, and that tax structure must be built, not discovered one April at a time. McLean employs 24 professionals, including eight CFP certificants and multiple holders of the RICP, ChFC, and CFA charters. The firm was named to Financial Planning Magazine's Best RIAs to Work For in 2024 and held a Best Places to Work in Virginia designation every year from 2021 through 2025. In May 2024, the firm maintained that workplace recognition for a fifth consecutive year, which it publicly attributed to an operating model that blends academic research with client-facing planning. Adjacent vehicles include Retirement Researcher, which sells educational tools and academy memberships to self-directed individuals, and McLean Insurance Solutions, an affiliated insurance agency. McLean's structural differentiator is its longitudinal, research-first posture. Rather than benchmark against a composite index, the firm runs a proprietary retirement-income personality framework — RISA — that forces allocations to conform to a client's behavioral profile, then overlays internal academic research to decide which assets to liquidate in which order. This makes it closer in function to an academic consultancy with an RIA attached than to a conventional wealth manager, and it has allowed the firm to retain clients into their third decade of service. ## Sectors - Retirement & Wealth Management ## Offices - New Hampshire, United States ## People - Alex Murguia — Executive Chairman and Managing Principal - Paula Friedman — Managing Principal and CEO - Wade Pfau — Principal, Director of Retirement Research - Dean Umemoto — Managing Principal - Jessica Wunder — Managing Principal, Wealth Management ## Questions ### Who runs investment and planning decisions at McLean Asset Management? Day-to-day investment and planning decisions are shared among five managing principals: Alex Murguia, Paula Friedman, Dean Umemoto, Jessica Wunder, and Wade Pfau. Pfau, a CFA charterholder with a PhD, directs the firm's retirement research and shapes portfolio-construction methodology. The firm lists 24 professionals on its website, including eight CFP certificants who execute client plans. ### What is the RISA profile and how does it influence portfolio design? RISA — Retirement Income Style Awareness — is a proprietary profiling tool that identifies a client's retirement-income personality. The output determines which distribution strategies and income sources align with the client's natural preferences. McLean uses RISA to anchor recommendations so that asset allocation and withdrawal sequencing follow behavioral fit rather than a one-size-fits-all model. ### How does McLean Asset Management generate revenue? McLean offers two engagement tracks: standalone financial planning, which charges a fee for a baseline retirement-income plan without ongoing asset management, and comprehensive wealth management, which bundles advanced planning with discretionary portfolio management. The firm also operates Retirement Researcher, a subscription-based educational platform, and an affiliated insurance agency, McLean Insurance Solutions, where licensed agents sell insurance products in an individual capacity. ### How is Retirement Researcher related to the advisory practice? Retirement Researcher is an affiliate that sells educational tools, calculators, workshops, and an online academy membership to self-directed individuals. The brand operates as a distinct funnel: consumers who want DIY education use Retirement Researcher, and those who need full-service planning or discretionary management are referred into McLean's RIA. Both share intellectual property and research leadership through Wade Pfau. ### What is McLean's posture on tax planning within a portfolio? The firm's published research treats tax-efficiency as a structural design problem, not an annual compliance exercise. McLean argues that the average tax rate on a filed return is backward-looking and that the effective marginal rate on the next dollar of income determines withdrawal strategy. The planning process coordinates tax, insurance, and estate recommendations with portfolio construction, and the firm states that taxes are one of the highest costs in retirement that respond directly to how decisions are made. ## Related profiles - [McKinsey Retirement Trust](https://altss.com/profile/mckinsey-retirement-trust) - [McLean Capital](https://altss.com/profile/mclean-capital) --- Last updated: 2026-06-03T20:00:00.000Z Canonical page: https://altss.com/profile/mclean-asset-management Maintained by Altss — https://altss.com — methodology: https://altss.com/methodology