Your medicine professional corporation is probably your largest financial asset, and it comes with rules nobody else has: the passive income grind, the salary versus dividends decision, restrictions on holding companies, and a tax rate on corporate investment income of over 50 percent.
I'm Hootan Sal, a licensed insurance and investment advisor working exclusively with incorporated medical and health professionals. I plan across both sides, corporation and personal, alongside your accountant, and every recommendation comes as a comparison in dollars.
Each one exists because the corporate side and the personal side are usually managed in isolation. Closing them is the work.
Once your corporation earns over $50,000 of passive investment income, every extra dollar cuts the small business deduction. In Ontario the cost tops out at $30,000 a year, and it is set by last year’s numbers, so it is always discovered late.
Salary or dividends is a yearly decision with six-figure lifetime consequences, but for most physicians it was set once by the accountant’s default and never revisited against RRSP room, CPP, and the corporation’s own tax position.
Many physicians pay personally, with heavily taxed dollars, for coverage their corporation could own. Corporately owned life insurance can also shelter investment growth from the passive income rules and create tax-free capital at death through the capital dividend account.
Cash and GICs inside the corporation feel safe, but interest is passive income taxed at 50.17 percent and it feeds the grind. A retention strategy decides what stays corporate, what moves to an IPP or RRSP, and what the surplus is actually for.
Advice written for business owners in general routinely fails physicians on the specifics.
An Ontario medicine professional corporation cannot be owned by a holding company, which quietly rules out the most-blogged-about corporate tax structures in Canada. Investing has to happen inside the MPC, which is exactly why the passive income rules bite physicians harder than most business owners, and why managing them well matters more.
If you want the technical foundation first, it is all published here: the guide to corporate investing and the passive income rules, the passive income calculator that models the grind on your numbers, and the IPP versus RRSP comparison for the retirement side.
This year's small business limit is set by last year's passive income. Planning done this year pays off next year, which means the best time to look at this is before your fiscal year end, not after.
Bring rough numbers from both sides, corporate and personal. We identify what is already optimised and what deserves a closer look. No cost, and no obligation.
I run your actual numbers: compensation mix, passive income projection, insurance structure, and retirement accounts. Every recommendation arrives as a comparison in dollars.
I share the analysis with your accountant and we agree before anything moves. You end up with one coordinated plan instead of two professionals working in isolation.
No. Your accountant files and advises on tax; I plan across the corporate and personal sides and bring them into the conversation. The analysis is shared with them and we agree before anything is implemented. Most of the gaps I find exist precisely because nobody was looking at both sides at once.
The first conversation and the initial analysis are free. If we implement together, I am compensated through the insurance and investment products involved, which I disclose openly. If the analysis shows you do not need what I offer, I say so and you keep the analysis.
Yes. I serve the Greater Toronto Area and the Hamilton to Niagara corridor in person, and work with incorporated physicians across Ontario virtually. Licensing is provincial, so anywhere in Ontario works.
Early is the cheapest time to get the structure right. Compensation design, insurance ownership, and the investment account setup are all decisions that compound for decades, and correcting them later is more expensive than starting correctly.
Bring numbers from both sides, corporation and personal. You'll leave with concrete next steps either way, and if I can't help, I'll tell you on that call.