Financial planning support for family offices
Family offices often coordinate complex financial, legal, tax and investment relationships across several jurisdictions.
The challenge is that the family's personal financial planning can still become fragmented across pensions, retirement accounts, investment portfolios, business interests, insurance, liquidity and future residence.
Josh Clancey works alongside family offices where an internationally mobile family needs coordinated financial planning around retirement, pensions, investments, liquidity and long-term wealth.
Adding financial planning to an existing professional structure
The family office may already coordinate investment managers, lawyers, tax advisers, trustees, bankers and other specialists.
Josh's role is not to replace that structure.
He can become involved where the family needs a coherent personal financial plan that connects:
- pensions and retirement accounts
- investment portfolios
- business interests
- cash-flow requirements
- retirement planning
- protection
- beneficiary arrangements
- estate liquidity
- currency exposure
- assets held across several jurisdictions
The family office can remain the coordinating relationship while Josh focuses on the areas that fall within his financial-planning remit.
Client situations where family-office and financial planning commonly intersect
A family holds assets across several jurisdictions
Different investment accounts, pensions, property interests and business holdings may need to be considered as one financial picture.
A principal is approaching a business exit
A liquidity event can materially change the family's balance sheet and create new investment, retirement and succession decisions.
The family includes US and non-US persons
US citizenship, Green Card history, non-US investments, retirement accounts or beneficiaries can materially affect the financial-planning analysis.
A family member holds significant US-situs assets
The legal and tax exposure may need specialist advice, while the investment and liquidity implications sit within the wider family plan.
A principal is preparing for international retirement
The family's investment strategy may need to support future spending across different currencies and jurisdictions.
A senior executive has concentrated employer wealth
RSUs, options, deferred compensation and employer stock can create concentration and liquidity issues within the family's wider asset base.
Questions that may indicate a wider financial-planning need
Does the family office have a consolidated view of retirement assets?
Pensions and retirement accounts may sit outside the main investment portfolio but still be material to the family's overall position.
Are liquidity and long-term assets clearly separated?
The family may hold substantial wealth while still requiring a more deliberate approach to accessible capital and future spending.
Are investment decisions aligned with personal cash-flow needs?
Portfolio management and financial planning are related but not identical.
Are there significant assets in one company or one jurisdiction?
Concentration can exist through business ownership, employer shares or a large regional investment exposure.
Does the family include US-connected individuals?
US tax and reporting issues can affect investment, retirement and estate-planning decisions.
Is a major transition approaching?
Business sales, inheritance, retirement, relocation or succession can all justify a wider financial-planning review.
Are beneficiaries and ownership structures coordinated?
The legal and fiduciary framework should be reflected in the underlying financial arrangements.
Professional resources for family offices
The Document Centre includes technical briefs, professional guides and practical checklists covering cross-border financial planning, international retirement, business exits, US-connected clients, estate and beneficiary coordination, concentrated share positions and internationally mobile families.
Useful resources for family offices
The Professional Adviser's Guide to Cross-Border Financial Planning
A broad guide to the planning issues that arise where residence, pensions, investments, family and retirement span jurisdictions.
The Professional Adviser's Guide to International Retirement Planning
A broader resource covering pensions, investments, cash flow, currency and future residence.
The Professional Adviser's Guide to Cross-Border Estate and Beneficiary Planning
A professional guide covering the coordination of pensions, investments, beneficiaries and internationally held assets.
Financial Planning Before and After a Business Sale
A technical brief covering the personal planning issues that may arise around a major liquidity event.
Concentrated Share Positions for International Clients
A technical resource on diversification and wider planning where significant wealth is concentrated in one company.
Cross-Border Referral Checklist
A practical checklist for identifying circumstances where additional financial-planning input may be useful.
Connecting separate pools of family wealth
Family wealth is often administered through several different channels.
One institution may manage liquid investments. Another may custody retirement accounts. Business interests may sit outside both. Trusts, insurance, pensions and property may be handled by separate professional teams.
Financial planning can help connect those pools of capital around the family's actual objectives.
That may include:
- retirement funding
- liquidity planning
- investment withdrawals
- currency needs
- pension income
- protection
- beneficiary arrangements
- diversification
- business-sale proceeds
- future residence
The objective is not to recreate the family office's asset-management or governance work.
It is to make sure the family's financial arrangements work together at the personal-planning level.
Working alongside the family office and specialist advisers
Josh can work within an existing multi-adviser structure rather than trying to become the sole point of contact.
For example:
- the family office coordinates the overall relationship, while Josh develops retirement and cash-flow planning
- the investment manager runs the main portfolio, while Josh reviews pensions and retirement accounts held elsewhere
- the tax adviser establishes the cross-border tax position, while Josh incorporates that into the financial plan
- the lawyer and trustee coordinate succession structures, while Josh reviews pensions, insurance and estate liquidity
- the corporate-finance adviser manages a business sale, while Josh plans around the family's post-transaction liquidity
- the family office remains the lead relationship, with Josh involved only where specialist financial planning is required
Josh does not replace the family's tax, legal, fiduciary or investment specialists.
Where a recommendation depends on specialist advice from another discipline, that advice should be established first.
Technical briefings for family office teams
Josh can provide focused briefings for family offices and multi-disciplinary wealth teams dealing with internationally mobile families.
Topics can include international retirement, UK pensions, US retirement accounts, business exits, estate coordination, concentrated wealth and mixed US/non-US families.
Have a family case you would like to discuss?
If a family's pensions, retirement accounts, business interests, international investments or succession arrangements have created a wider financial-planning issue, an initial discussion can help establish whether Josh is likely to add value.
There is no requirement to make a formal introduction simply to determine whether the case falls within his remit.