What is a Family Office?

“A family office is the purposeful, organized, and collective effort by family members, with the assistance of non-family professionals, to transition the soul, spirit and ethos of a family, and its tangible wealth, to subsequent generations.” - Carolyn J. Cole

Administrative

The primary function is managing bill payments, creating consolidated reporting, and taking on various other administrative duties. Many times, the family has simply hired a bookkeeper.

Legacy

When family members co-own, or will co-own, assets through multiple generations, succession planning transitions into continuity planning. A team of professionals assists in creating a cohesive legacy and intergenerational harmony.

Embedded

Employees within a family owned and operated company begin to support family on matters such as tax planning, real estate purchases, consolidated reporting, bill payments and other duties.

Institutional

Either through a full liquidity event or cash-flow, a family begins to strategically deploy their private capital with due diligence, measurements, and governance. "Family Matters" are generally not part of the focus. The processes are institutionalized.

Family Office

It’s often easy to invite non-blood family for Thanksgiving dinner. However, when it comes to transitioning shares of your business, your wealth or your heirloom assets, you may feel a bit less inclusive.

Family can be defined differently depending on context. Before you work on keeping your family together for a united purpose, it is important to understand the multiple definitions of family and how they apply to specific circumstances.

Why build and maintain a family office?

Not everyone needs a family office. There must be a desire to stay connected for a common purpose. Throughout history, empires, dynasties, and kingdoms were built with a focus on consolidating wealth and transitioning it by bloodline. Today the methods used by wealth creators to guide their families has evolved.

Most family offices are created to foster a healthy family relationship and to maintain a wealth legacy. A family office is the central hub where priorities such as wealth preservation or expansion, family education and dynamics, philanthropy, communication, and much more, are managed.