Advisor Profile

Jermaine CarterCFBS, MSFS, AEP® · Founder & Managing Principal

Fiduciary planning for the whole financial life.

Jermaine founded Applied Wealth Management to answer one question: why do families with good advisors still end up with bad outcomes? Sixteen years of guiding families and business owners produced his answer, an independent, fee-based fiduciary firm where one advisor is accountable for the whole picture.

Email Jermaine
Jermaine Carter, CFBS, MSFS, AEP®, Founder & Managing Principal at Applied Wealth Management
Role
Founder & Managing Principal
Credentials
CFBS · MSFS · AEP®
Office
Bakersfield, California
Serves
Clients nationwide
Focus
Retirement income, succession, and estate strategy
About Jermaine

Our founder and managing principal.

Jermaine Carter is the founder and Managing Principal of Applied Wealth Management. He holds a Master of Science in Financial Services (MSFS), the Accredited Estate Planner (AEP®) designation, and the Certified Family Business Specialist (CFBS®) designation. Over more than 16 years, he has guided individuals, families, and business owners through complex financial decisions: retirement income planning, business succession, estate coordination, and tax-efficient wealth transfer.

His practice runs from retirement income engineering to the situations most firms send elsewhere: preparing a business for sale or succession, aligning estate documents with the financial plan alongside clients’ attorneys, and guiding athletes and entertainers through short earning windows and long financial lives. He built The Vantage Formula, the firm’s planning process, so that every one of those decisions gets made with the whole picture in view.

The firm itself exists because of a question Jermaine could not stop asking: why do so many families with good advisors still end up with bad outcomes? The answer was always the same. The advisor’s incentives and the client’s interests were not aligned, and could not be, in a system built on commissions, proprietary products, and captive insurance arrangements. So he built something different: an independent, fee-based fiduciary firm with no proprietary products and no commissions on investment management.

You are not hiring us to pick stocks. You are hiring us to be accountable for the outcome of your financial life.

Jermaine Carter
How Jermaine Works

One plan, with every part in view.

Jermaine’s practice covers the decisions where a family’s wealth is most exposed: the income, the business, and the estate. Each is engineered inside the same plan, so nothing gets decided in isolation.

Income

Engineer the paycheck that replaces the paycheck.

Social Security timing, Roth conversion windows, withdrawal sequencing, and RMD coordination, built into one tax-efficient income designed to pay you reliably for life.

Business

Make the business transferable.

Succession and sale preparation, owner equity planning, and family business strategy, so the value you built survives the handoff and happens on your timeline.

Estate

Send assets exactly where you intend.

As an Accredited Estate Planner®, Jermaine coordinates with your estate planning attorney so legal documents and financial strategy stay fully aligned, and nothing slips through the cracks when it matters most.

Speaking & Media

In the conversation.

Jermaine speaks on fiduciary planning, business succession, and the financial lives of athletes and entertainers. His appearances will be collected here as they are published.

Placeholder artwork for upcoming podcast appearances by Jermaine Carter
PodcastComing soon

Podcast appearances

Episodes featuring Jermaine will appear here. If you want him on your show to talk fiduciary planning, succession, or the business side of athletics and entertainment, reach out directly.

Placeholder artwork for upcoming speaking engagements by Jermaine Carter
SpeakingComing soon

Speaking engagements

Conferences, panels, and workshops featuring Jermaine will be listed here. He speaks to business owners, professional groups, and teams on building a financial life with every part in view.

The hardest part is starting the conversation. We’ll take it from there.

Tell us where you are and what’s worrying you. We’ll ask questions, listen, and tell you honestly whether we can help.

  • A fiduciary, legally bound to act in your interest
  • Fee-based planning with transparent, plain-English costs
  • Investments, tax, retirement, and estate coordinated under one roof
  • A 45-minute first conversation, with no obligation

Prefer to speak directly? Skip the form and call us. No gatekeepers.

Call (661) 487-1020

No obligation, and no follow-up pressure if it isn’t the right fit.