💰 The Exit Playbook: How to Make Your Money Work for You (Pre- & Post-Exit)

Lessons from Frits Moonen, who manages a billion euro for self-made founders

Oct 09, 2025

📖 Read Time: 12 minutes

👉 What you’ll learn: The biggest opportunities for founders when they exit, mistakes to avoid, how to structure estate planning, and tips for angel investing
🧐 Who it’s for: Whether you recently sold your company, are close to an exit, dreaming about that future payday – this article is for you. The advice applies whether you’re six months or six years from liquidity.

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👋 Hey, Dan here,

Welcome to this week’s edition of In Founders Words, where I interview founders building big from Europe – sharing real experiences and actionable advice.

This week is different. I spoke with a founder who’s built his entire business advising other founders: Frits Moonen, founder of Momentum Family Office.

In six and a half years, Frits has grown Momentum from just himself to 28 people managing half a billion euros. His clients? Down-to-earth, self-made entrepreneurs with net worths between €5 million and €500 million.

What makes Frits different is his approach: 100% independent advice with zero conflicts of interest – No products to sell. No kickbacks. No performance fees. Just objective guidance on what’s actually best for the client.

And yet, he sees the same financial mistakes over and over from founders who’ve just exited, or are about to.

You’ve built an exceptional company through specific skills, focus and grit. That same specificity means you likely aren’t in the top 10% of people educated in finance. And that’s ok!

⚠️ Quick disclaimer: This article is not financial, investment, tax, or legal advice. It’s a conversation. Do your own research and consult qualified professionals before making financial decisions.
Plus: I don’t get paid if you decide to work with Frits or Momentum Family Office. No kickbacks, no referral fees, no free hoodies. (note to self: negotiate better next time! 😂)
This is just a topic I found interesting and wanted to explore - personally, I feel pretty clueless when it comes to a lot of financial stuff, and I figured some of you might feel the same way.

Let’s dive in 👇

💼 The Pre-Exit Strategy

First, let’s talk about what to do BEFORE you sell. This is for founders still building their companies:

“At Momentum, we’d rather talk to people way before the sale of their company so we can help them set up everything. There’s a lot to be done before the company is sold. Like getting independent people to do a valuation of the company, or having the kids come into it.”

“For example, you can put your kids into a company structure pre-exit, where they don’t have any legal power, but where they do have the economic benefits post-exit. So we recommend putting part of the company in their name. After that, put your best-performing investments – your private equity, your secondaries – in the name of your kids too. That’s going to at least save you substantially in taxes.”

The €500K Lending Trick

For founders who don’t have much liquidity yet but own a growing company:

“You can lend yourself €500K from your personal holding to invest as a private person*. But also, if your kids co-own the company, you can lend to them as well. This way they can invest themselves - for example, in your own company at the current valuation instead of waiting for the future one. This creates huge potential for the future.”

“When you sell, you transfer at least 3, 4, 5 times what they invested in their name. They’ll repay you the loan. Most people – even accountants – don’t know about this, but it’s written in the law [as allowed].”

* This applies to specific jurisdictions and tax situations

🚨 The Post-Exit Mistake: Calling Your Bank

After selling their company, most founders think they need to “do something” with the money. The natural instinct? Call their bank.

“They think, ‘Oh, I’ve always had an account with X or Y bank. Let’s call them and have a chat’ And then someone comes over – definitely not your advisor, but a very nice guy or good-looking person.”

The problem isn’t that these bankers are evil. It’s that they’re salespeople, not advisors:

“They’ll use practiced conversation tactics, show you their nice offices with fine art on the walls - anything to make you feel at home and not too focused on the important details.

Meanwhile, they’ll twist some graphs here, change benchmarks a bit there, and suddenly it looks like they’ve been doing very well. The client – a smart entrepreneur – but most of the time not a hardcore financial expert, usually can’t withstand someone trained in these tactics.”

The result? Founders hand over their wealth to parties that might be “at the bottom tier by means of performance and costs.”

Advice vs. Product Sales

Frits’s entire business model is built on solving this confusion:

“The most important thing in finance is making a division between advice and product sales. Most problems derive from the fact that someone acts as your advisor, but meanwhile they’re selling you something. 98% of parties are selling something – which is not a problem, but that should be very clear.”

“If you say ‘I’m your financial advisor,’ then you should be someone’s independent advisor with no hidden agenda. You should not make your own products. There should be no performance fees, no kickbacks. It’s 100% alignment of interest with the client.”

💡 Find An Actual Advisor

Frits’s advice for any founder post-exit:

“Whatever you do – go find someone who is your advisor. Not only an accountant or a tax lawyer. Someone whose core business is asset management and who works for you, who has no connection to any party, and no preference over any asset class. The advice is going to be 10 times better.”

The Psychological Barrier

There’s a psychological barrier that keeps founders from seeking proper advice:

“People tell me ‘I’m just this tiny entrepreneur, I’m probably too small for you.’ Then 15 minutes later I’m counting in my head and we’re past €20 million in assets. They think of themselves as small, and that’s why they don’t take it seriously enough.”

The mindset shift:

“When you get wealthy at a young age – 30, 40, even 50 is still quite young for full financial independence – it becomes very important to focus on the future.”

🏗️ Build the Fortress: Why Diversification Matters

Frits has a one-line philosophy that guides all his advice:

“Wealth is acquired by concentration and is kept intact by diversification.”

“You got there because you went all-in on your business idea. But now you’ve arrived. There’s literally no reason to go again for full concentration. You should always diversify over different asset classes.”

Asset Mix

“If you sell your business for €30 million, banks or asset managers might advise you on putting something like €25 million into stocks – because they’re selling stocks. While with the ideal asset mix, you’d maybe go for €5-10 million in stocks, because especially when numbers grow bigger, you want more in private markets, private debt, private equity and secondaries.”

His framework: “It’s like baking a pie. You can’t make a pie consisting of 27 eggs. You need all the ingredients to make the right sort of pie that’s going to last.”

🍦 Start Vanilla: The Investment Progression

Frits advocates for a staged approach to more complex investments:

“It makes no sense to take as a first fund a 10-year-plus PE or VC fund, because it’s just too long. You start out with vanilla. And from there you go to the stracciatella, then more exotic over time. But don’t start with the peanut butter mint chocolate chip heavy stuff!”

Secondaries as the Bridge

“Secondaries is a great solution for doing private equity in a more defensive way, with shorter duration and shorter spread in possible outcome. A great way to slowly start your private equity journey.”

The anti-pattern:

“A lot of parties will come to you and say ‘I’ve got this famous private equity fund – KKR, Carlyle.’ The bigger the name, the better, because you recognise it and you’ll say ‘I want it.’ That is their goal – not to look for something that suits your needs best.”

🏠 Real Estate

Real estate is often seen as a safe, straightforward investment for founders. Frits is more cautious:

“Times have changed quite a bit. The government created this crazy narrative, meaning that everyone who invests in real estate is a bad guy instead of a good guy. And they control the narrative. So saying now that you invest in real estate will be frowned upon.”

Beyond the social stigma, the economics have shifted:

“It’s not only the narrative, but also government regulation and taxes. In the Netherlands specifically, it became much harder to successfully invest in real estate. Years ago everyone could make money – those times are definitely gone. Now it’s more specialised parties making money, and even they will say ‘Frits, it’s a lot of work for not too much reward.’”

The International Option

Many founders look abroad – Spain or Dubai:

“Doing real estate abroad means automatically at least times-five complexity. Always. Everyone who’s done their first project in Spain will know – there is money to be made, but you’ve got to pay attention to a lot of things.”

“If something becomes two or three times more risky, you need quite a bit more reward to have the risk-reward work out.”

His warning:

“Anyone coming to you saying ‘I’ve got this project in real estate here or abroad giving you at least 10-15% a year’ – definitely go talk to someone objective first.”

💰 Living Off Returns: The Cash Planning Strategy

Once the portfolio is built, the goal shifts to sustainable lifestyle funding:

“The best thing is to live off the returns of a well spread robust portfolio. By making efficient investments – some with a long-term view, some more short-term and quite a bit of private debt – if people sell a business and lend out €5 million as private debt, mortgage-backed, you’ve already got €400K in income coming in.”

“If you double that and lend out €10 million, you’re gonna have €800K coming in for spending. That bridges you quite far. It doesn’t buy you a yacht, but it can buy you your Porsche and some other life expenses. This also helps because when you have your short-term needs arranged, it opens your eyes to invest the rest with a more long-term vision.”

The Spending Spectrum

Frits works with clients across a wide range:

“We have clients who are very wealthy and tell us ‘I spend maybe €100K a year.’ We also have clients who say ‘I spend about a million as a private person just on living’ – that’s possible if you like to fly private, have some expensive hobbies and like to eat good food. We don’t judge. The client says what they need, and we make sure their asset mix suits their needs and that the money is always available when they need it.”

The key insight:

“You need available cash in hand and cash coming in. If your private equity portfolio goes up €2 million a year, you still don’t have any in hand to spend because it’s locked in your investment.”

📋 Estate Planning

This is where founders leave the most money on the table. Most think about estate planning after they’ve sold. That’s often too late.

“We find estate planning so important that we do it free of charge for every client. Every founder should think about it. It means staying anonymous in a lot of cases, but also investing in the name of your kids, or putting parts of the company in the name of the kids (while you stay in control).”

Compounding

Frits reframes the conversation around estate planning:

“People focus a lot on the lump sum – ‘I’ve got €10 million and I want to give it to my kids’ – and they’re 40 years old. I explain to them that the €10 million lump sum is not the end game.”

“If we do our work well, that will double every 7-8 years at least. So that €10 million is going to be €20, then €40, then €80. We have to make sure that the €70 million is going to be directly in the name of the kids, because otherwise they’ll pay substantial taxes when inheriting.”

😇 Advice for Angel Investing

Many founders want to jump into angel investing or direct startup investments immediately after their exit. Frits understands the appeal – but has strong advice:

“Direct investing is the most high-risk of all asset classes. It’s also the most fun. But fun should not be the main decision factor.”

The Sequence Matters

“First build a diversified portfolio. First build the fortress which is impossible to take down. Whatever happens in the market, you have debt, equity, public and private – it’s all in the fortress. When you’ve done that and know there’s no chance of ever going back to zero and having to start over, then you can slowly start adding on top.”

“It’s like a pyramid. You’ve got to build the base first, then you can put the exotic stuff (like Angel investing) on top.”

The Data on Startups

“Read up on the data. Most startups don’t survive the first two years. So betting on one or two investments sounds nice, but there’s a lot of tremendously good ideas who will never see their third year. So: smaller tickets, diversified portfolio, and: be careful.”

The Time and Money Creep

The biggest danger isn’t losing your initial investment:

“They’re most likely going to come for more money, then for more time. They’ll say ‘We just need another bridge round or we’ll go belly up.’ You want to protect your first €100K, so now you put in another €150K. A year down the road, the investment can become half a million.”

“Then they’ll say ‘We need someone at a senior level on the board to help us, and if you want to protect your investment, you should come on the board for one or two days a week.’ And there you are, sitting on the board of a mediocre company trying to save your investment. That’s not going to make you happy.”

🏛️ The Three Pillars of Momentum’s Approach

Frits built Momentum on three core principles:

1. 100% Objective Advice

“You always work in favour of the client. You cannot make any own products. There can be no performance fees, no kickbacks, no own agenda. It’s 100% alignment of interest with the clients goals.”

2. Advise All Asset Classes

“To be and stay fully objective, you need to advise all asset classes. If you don’t, parties start to steer to whatever they’re selling. We look at cash management, public markets, real estate, private debt, private equity, venture, secondaries, crypto, gold – everything that’s important for each client to get a tailor made asset mix that suits their goals.”

3. Over-Deliver on Service

“Instead of spending on marketing – which we’ve never done at Momentum – whatever we’d spend on marketing, time and resources, we spend on overachieving the expectations of the client. The client is our ambassador and thats great because he lives and operates in an environment where our prospects are.”

This approach led to an unusual outcome for a family office:

“I’m trying to build a love brand where people are proud to be part of. That’s why we’re probably the only family office in the world who has hoodies and grocery bags. A lot of younger clients are proud of this movement they’re part of and will send me pictures wearing their hoodie. Makes my day.” 🙂

💡 Final Thought: Get Advice Before Everyone Calls

The worst time to start thinking about wealth planning is right after the exit, when suddenly everyone wants something from you:

“It’s important for people to hear about this before all the money is there, because then everyone is going to call you, they’re going to send you wine, cake, they’re going to be at your front door. They all want something from you.”

“It’s better to already have your independent advisors so you can tell someone: ‘I’ve got my advisors. If you have a good proposition – send it to them. They’ll have a look and discuss it with me.’ Makes life a lot more simple.”

Get the kids into the structure early. Build the fortress. Start with vanilla. Live off the returns.

And for the love of your future wealth: don’t call your bank, assetmanager or any other salesman for independent advice.

This article is based on an interview with Frits Moonen, Founder at Momentum Family Office.

Until next time,
Dan

↳ PS – are you a founder / CEO who wants to do more with content? Let’s chat – I currently have one slot open for a founder.

In Founders Words