Wealth Management Guide

Wealth management, synonymous with wealth planning, is the art and science of managing an individual’s assets. Tailored to the individual, holistic wealth management considers your values, goals, and appetite for risk so you can live more and worry less.

While each wealth management firm follows its own methodology, wealth managers generally tailor their offerings around four key pillars.

Wealth management and financial planning are terms often used interchangeably, but there are key differences between them.

At its heart, financial planning is about understanding your financial goals and generating a plan that will empower you to reach those goals. To accomplish this, a financial advisor will offer advice around (but not limited to):

Wealth management, by comparison, builds upon the core tenets of financial planning by layering on additional tools and specializations that aren’t typically necessary until you’ve accrued sizable wealth. At that point, your financial picture has become more complex and it becomes more important to consider services, such as:

While financial planning can help anyone, wealth management services are typically something you would add as you accumulate wealth. The amount you need to accumulate varies based on several factors, including your age, complexity of your financial picture and potentially the requirements of the firm you’re working with.

All that said, typically it makes sense to begin considering wealth management once you’ve accumulated around $250,000 of investable assets or more. If you’re not quite there yet, that’s ok. In fact, many people will start out with financial planning, which helps them grow into wealth management as they execute upon their plan over time.

To many, the term wealth management is synonymous with investing, but there’s a lot more that goes into this service. For a wealth management strategy to be effective, it must be all-encompassing and highly tailored to you.

In order to understand whether wealth management is worth it to you, it’s important to understand the true value that it brings to your financial plan.

When you hire a wealth manager, you aren’t getting a cookie-cutter financial plan or investment advice from a robo-advisor. You’re hiring a professional or team of professionals whose job it is to listen to you, understand the goals you have for your money, and make those goals a reality. You’re getting a plan that is custom built for your goals, your values, your risk tolerance.

If you’re worried about the costs associated with hiring a wealth manager, it can be helpful to understand the different ways in which a wealth manager might be compensated.

If and when you decide that hiring a wealth manager is the right move for you, the next step will be to evaluate a few firms and select one that you believe will effectively protect and grow your money.

One of the best ways of evaluating a wealth manager is simply having an honest and open conversation. During this conversation, you’ll want to ask them certain key questions that will help you gain some insight into their investment strategy and what you can expect if you decide to move forward working with them.

All investments carry some level of risk including the potential loss of all money invested. No investment strategy can guarantee a profit or protect against a loss. Working with a Wealth Management Advisor or any other financial services provider is not a guarantee as to future investment success.