Richard Wilson creates and manages single family offices for ultra-wealthy families. He also is the founder of the Family Office Club with membership of over 1,500 families of similar net worth totaling over $1 Trillion in Assets. He started off doing risk consulting out of college and joined the angel investing and capital raising world before positioning himself as the thought leader on family offices.

If you listen, you will learn:

What is a family office

The different types of family offices

How to create a family office to manage your wealth and business

Benefits of a holistic wealth management solution

Importance of building a platform business expanding on your niche

How a family office can reduce chaos and stress

Family Office Defined

There wasn’t a ton of knowledge being shared on family offices and Richard saw an opportunity to fill that gap. He saw the extreme benefits of creating a family office for wealthy families. For these individuals, even a 1% mistake on their finances or taxes can be very costly.

Family offices are private wealth management firms that provide a more complete, holistic wealth management solution. They manage everything that affects a family’s balance sheet. They don’t just look at stocks, bonds, market exposure, etc. – They essentially manage everything in your life that has anything to do with finances and investments.

Richard talks about three different types of family offices – single family offices, virtual family offices, and multi-family offices. He works with single family offices for the ultra-wealthy individuals working with families worth $50 million up to a couple billion! Single family offices are set up for just the wealth creator and their family. A single-family office has a staff that only serves that family all day long unlike the other two options.

Family Office Deal Flow

As previously stated, a family office manages to a family’s balance sheet. A family that has this high of net-worth usually has a portfolio including real estate investments, different businesses, and other assets. The office manages all of the family’s deals, income, and cash flow. They help mitigate risk and losses rather than just chasing returns.

The family office staff has to understand the goals of the family. Usually the wealth creator of the family is passionate in a certain industry where they have built-up industry experience and connections. It is important that the family office has excellent deal flow within their niche industry. Richard explains the staff should continuously be looking at deals and making decisions that will “sweat for you (the family) day in and day out” without too much oversight.

“People need a family office if they want to reduce chaos and stress, have a more holistic mindset and oversight on their assets and their service providers that are serving them, define their strike zone and their goals more, organize and prioritize their deal flow, and then as a result do all that so they have less taxes, less fees paid hopefully, as well as better returns because you are more focused and organized in what you’re doing. A little formalization can save a lot of time and grief,” explains Richard.

Selling to a Family Office

When selling a business, people sometimes do not think about selling to a family office. The reality is family offices buy companies all the time. There is a lack of knowledge of where to find a potential family office buyer and the benefits this kind of sale may prov