Top Wealth Advisors: All You Need to Know

As detailed in our guide for investors with $10 million or more in liquid assets, top wealth advisors can make a big difference in your future quality of life and financial security. The right professionals can transform your life by smoothing out your assets and investments in a way that helps you achieve your goals. For example, Pillar Wealth Management has worked with countless investors who have $5 million to $500 million in liquid assets and helped them live a life of financial serenity. Unfortunately, many investors are unaware of the potential benefits of finding the right investor and the dangers of working with the wrong one. This article aims to answer some of the most popular questions we get, such as:

What are wealth advisors?
What do wealth advisors do?
What are wealth advisors’ services?
What are the types of wealth advisors?
How do you spot the top wealth advisors?

If you’re someone who’s been struggling to find the right financial advisor, this article is just for you. Let’s get right into it.

Table of Contents
What are Wealth Advisors? What Do Wealth Advisors Do? What Are the Types of Wealth Advisors? Traits of Top Wealth Advisors Final Words

What are Wealth Advisors?

Wealth advisors are a type of financial advisor that provides a holistic set of services for investors with the goal of preserving and growing their overall wealth. The top wealth advisors don’t just provide financial advice but also completely manage every aspect of their client’s wealth and portfolio in a way that allows them to live a life of financial serenity.

Whenever we’re asked, “what are wealth advisors?” we always give one simple answer: they’re someone who helps you live the life you want.

At Pillar Wealth Management, our wealth managerscomprehensively analyze your current financial circumstances and use your future goals as an anchor to create the best possible personalized financial plan for you. And we don’t just stop there. We execute the plan and use various objective analysis tools to make sure we stay on track. Get in touch with us for a free chat for more information on our wealth advisory services.

What Do Wealth Advisors Do?

In comparison to other types of financial advisors, wealth advisors are usually the more suitable option for affluent investors because of the breadth of services they provide.

To answer the question of “what do wealth advisors do?”, we’ll need to explore “what are wealth advisors’ services?”. Let’s take a close look at some of the services you can expect to find.

What are Wealth Advisors’ Services?

Wealth advisory and management firms typically provide a wide range of services to affluent clients by gathering expertise from different areas and presenting it in a convenient package. Let’s explore some of the services offered by wealth advisors.

Financial Planning

Financial planning is usually the first step in every successful wealth management case. Experienced wealth advisors and managers will have a long chat with you and use techniques to ascertain your future financial and life goals.

Using those goals, the wealth manager will create a financial plan geared towards protecting and growing your current wealth. The financial plan will merely be the first step in a holistic process designed to achieve your goals.

Investment Management

Investment advice and management are some of the most popular services availed by the average investor. They’re also the first thing most people think of when they hear the question, “what are wealth advisors’ services?”.

Investment management for top wealth advisors isn’t just about making high returns; it is also about optimizing the portfolio to reduce your costs and make the optimal returns that allow you to live the life you want. It prioritizes sustainable growth over aggressive investments. Investment management is not an easy job, and it requires years of experience to perfect.

You can find more information on portfolio performance and our optimization techniques in this easy guide. We talk in detail about the importance of consistent asset allocation that enables you to sleep peacefully at night.

Risk Management

Risk management is also a critical service provided by top wealth advisors. The importance of this facet of wealth management cannot be understated. Pillar Wealth Management experts have found that effective risk mitigation techniques can be just as effective in safeguarding and growing your wealth as chasing high returns on a portfolio.

In fact, protecting the wealth of high net worth and ultra-high net worth investors is often more difficult than many people realize. Wealth managers specialize in this area and can help you formulate the best strategy for your unique situation. Our free hardcover book on The Art of Protecting Ultra-High Net Worth Portfolios and Estates – Strategies for Families Worth $25 million to $500 millionfurther details the challenges ultra-high net worth investors face when dealing with their wealth.

Tax Planning

Tax planning is important for all investors but holds extra significance for affluent individuals because the potential to unnecessarily lose money is a lot higher. Since high net worth and ultra-high net worth individuals are already in the highest tax bracket, saving money wherever possible can be pivotal in preventing wealth drain.

Mismanagement of taxes is a complaint we hear way too often from clients who come to us. Many investors don’t even realize that they’re paying way more in taxes than they could be! For example, the most common issue we see with taxes is with capital gains. Short-term capital gains (made through yearly transactions of investments) are taxed as income, while long-term gains are taxed as capital gains.

What’s the difference? Income tax currently stands at 37% for those in the highest tax bracket, while capital gains tax is only 20%. This means that if your manager or advisor moves your investments around often, you could be paying 85% higher taxes than you need to!

Wealth advisors at Pillar Wealth Management work with tax experts to examine your financials and find all the areas you can save money on. We obsess over saving every cent and dollar we can. Schedule a chat with us, and we’ll explain exactly how we can help you with yourtax problems.

Estate Planning

Most people want to leave their heirs with a financially secure future, and that is exactly what estate planning constitutes. Top wealth advisors will also work with you to establish a roadmap for the inheritance of your wealth and assets. Estate planning is often a very critical part of the future for many high net worth and ultra-high net worth investors because of the size of the wealth involved.

Managing your wealth currently to make sure there is enough left for your family and creating a strategy to properly divide their assets between beneficiaries are just two of the many challenges you might face when it comes to estate planning. Doing all this without an experienced wealth advisor to guide you can be difficult, to say the least. We provide more information on effective wealth management services in ourguide on financial advisors for investors with $10 million or more in liquid assets.

Delaying estate planning is risky. Though it can sometimes be bleak thought to have, not having a proper inheritance plan in place is often scarier for the people we leave behind. Don’t delay your estate planning, and get in touch with a competent wealth advisor as soon as possible.

Insurance Planning

This facet of wealth advisory refers to evaluating and recognizing the best insurance policies to minimize the risks identified in the analysis of your wealth and asset portfolio. It’s essential in safeguarding you and your wealth.

Finding the best insurance plan is not easy, and many insurance providers often try to get affluent clients to buy policies they may not need. Top wealth advisors can help you find policies that provide true value to your life.

This is still not a total list of services provided by top wealth advisors. Our ultimate guide on choosing financial advisors provides more insights into the habits and services of professional wealth managers.

What Are the Types of Wealth Advisors?

There can be various types of wealth managers with specific niches of their own, but there is one main distinction we wish to focus on: fiduciary advisors vs. non-fiduciary advisors.

What is a Fiduciary Duty?

A fiduciary duty refers to the obligation on your wealth advisor or manager to always make decisions with your welfare in mind. They should always act on behalf of your interests.

Fiduciary wealth advisors are typically Registered Investment Advisors (RIAs). These individuals are professionals who have undergone rigorous training to be licensed as RIAs by the SEC. Fiduciary advisors must uphold the highest moral and quality standards when servicing clients.

They are not allowed to entertain any conflicts of interest in the process. If any cases do arise, fiduciary managers must eliminate them or inform you of their existence. Pillar Wealth Management experts work tirelessly to uphold fiduciary standards. Contact us for a free chat, and we’ll show complete transparency in how our processes work.

Fiduciary vs. Non-Fiduciary Advisors

The main difference between fiduciary and non-fiduciary advisors is that non-fiduciary advisors do not have the same legal obligation to avoid any conflicts of interest or uphold rigorous standards.

While non-fiduciary advisors also intend to make the best decision for their clients, their circumstances are sometimes not so understanding. For example, a non-fiduciary wealth manager working for a large financial institution may likely have to contend with their employer’s and supervisor’s interests. Some institutions earn money on commissions and other product-based compensations. Hence, there can be pressure on wealth managers to suggest securities that earn higher commissions or compensations for their employer.

When a non-fiduciary advisor has to contend with multiple interests, you can’t be sure that yours will always take the highest priority.

Similarly, non-fiduciary advisors may not be as experienced as fiduciary managers. In order to become an RIA, wealth managers need to meet certain professional standards that inexperienced advisors may not be able to reach yet.

Keep on reading to learn why experience and certain other traits are essential in the search for top wealth advisors.

Traits of Top Wealth Advisors

Recognizing the traits of top wealth advisors is a vital skill that high net worth and ultra-high net worth investors need to have. It can allow you to ensure that your wealth is in expert and professional hands. Having the knowledge that your wealth is safe and sound will allow you to sleep peacefully at night. Here are the traits you should search for.

The wealth advisor has relevant experience.

Notice that we didn’t just write experience. It’s absolutely essential that your wealth advisor has the relevant experience of working with high net worth and ultra-high net worth individuals like yourself.

This experience allows managers to realize the nuances of your particular situation and respond appropriately. Experienced advisors know that affluent investors aren’t always necessarily looking to make high returns all the time. Your goals and priorities can be very different. A special financial plan has to be formulated to cater to your unique situation.

The wealth advisor can prioritize consistent asset allocation.

Pillar Wealth Management experts have found that a consistent asset allocation is one of the most effective ways of mitigating risk in your portfolio. Plus, it also sets up a solid foundation for your portfolio to perform optimally for your goals. Our guide provides more information on optimizing portfolio performance and how to get it right.

The wealth advisor has a plan to reduce your costs.

The top wealth advisors realize that avoidable and unnecessary costs are one of the biggest avenues for loss in your portfolio. Little pesky costs can slowly erode your wealth and cause a significant amount of damage without you even realizing it!

When meeting with potential advisors, inquire about their processes for identifying and eliminating these costs from your portfolio.

The wealth advisor has processes to invest towards in goals without emotions.

A promise to remove emotion from their investment decisions isn’t enough. Top wealth advisors will have processes and components in place that categorically remove the effect of emotions from any investment decisions.

For example, Pillar Wealth Management uses two tools called the1000 Scenario Portfolio Stress Test and the Efficient Frontier. These tools allow us to ensure that your portfolio performance is always on track to exceed your goals in at least 75% of future scenarios.

Final Words

Now that you’ve got a firm grasp of the services provided by top wealth advisors and their distinguishing factors, you should be able to make a decision on what advisor to work with. Always fully explore all your options and ask advisors to explain how they will achieve your goals.

At Pillar Wealth Management, our wealth advisors willonly provide financial recommendations after conducting a thorough study of your future goals and current position. We want to help investorswho have $5 million to $500 million in investable assets live the lifestyle they want with financial serenity. Get in touch with us via a free consultation today, and secure your future.

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