Along these same lines, advisors’ teams should also offer complementary skill sets—for example, integrating comprehensive financial planning specialists with sophisticated portfolio management professionals.

Perhaps most importantly, adding in-house business consulting specialists can offer significant value for business owner clients. Being able to provide a seamless level of advice to such clients on how to best think through their business financial plans—and align them with personal financial and legacy planning goals—is front and center to success in serving many overlooked millionaires.

Don’t Internalize Every Role—Be ‘Coordinator-In-Chief’

Of course, advisors seeking to serve the overlooked millionaire segment also need to recognize that there are a number of roles that don’t need to be—or shouldn’t be—brought on board as in-house staff members.

CPAs or tax advisors, estate attorneys, corporate attorneys and private bankers all potentially fall into this category. The costs for bringing such professionals into an advisor’s in-house team are generally high, which immediately reduces the advisor’s ability to target the bottom quartiles of the high-net-worth segment on a cost-effective basis. At the same time, each of these roles fill an important part of the checks and balances that ideally prevent certain conflicts from happening.

The solution for advisors committed to the democratized family office model, therefore is to become a “coordinator-in-chief,” who can interface with these various professionals on a seamless basis, while remaining separate businesses.

One central practice in making this work is to share a copy of each client’s full financial plan with every member of the extended team, and make sure that they receive an updated copy and briefing each time the plan is modified.

Additionally, advisors should anticipate and provide the information each team member will need any time a significant financial event happens in the client’s life, or when the client passes certain milestones.

In working with estate planning attorneys, for example, advisors should make sure each client’s estate plan is reviewed every five years, and should update the attorney if the client purchases real estate and titles it differently or expands his or her company in new directions.

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