Northwestern Mutual Launches Family Office Services
Northwestern Mutual has launched a new platform to bring integrated family office services to the firm’s advisors serving clients with at least $50 million in net worth.
Northwestern Mutual Family Office Services comprises a team of more than 40 in-house specialists who provide legal, tax, investment, banking and lending, philanthropy, legacy planning, risk management, founder and business planning, and other services. Advisors will pay a retainer fee to access those services.
The firm, which has about $450 billion in retail client assets, launched the service to provide more coordinated advice to ultra-high-net-worth clients with complex needs. That includes business owners, multi-generational families and philanthropic entities.
“As our offering has continued to grow in the marketplace and our advisors have continued to grow into new markets, we’re serving more and more of the higher net worth and even ultra-high-net-worth market and recognizing that to continue to play that role as the central financial advisor for our clients in that high-net-worth and ultra-high-net-worth space, we need to provide a broader suite of services,” said John Roberts, Northwestern Mutual’s chief field officer responsible for leading the company’s wealth and investment management business.
The firm has been providing some of these services, such as estate planning and philanthropic and charitable planning, for some time. But it decided last year to make a bigger push into the family office space, hiring experts and providing a centralized pool that advisors could use as an extension of their team.
“Part of the other reason that we’re excited to bring this forward is that it’s been on the top of our advisors’ wishlist for some time,” Roberts added. “Our advisors have been really telling us, ‘Hey, for us to compete and win clients and for us to appeal to the next generation of clients who aspire to move into these categories, we want to have a robust offering.’”
Northwestern Mutual has about 22,000 advisors and associate wealth management advisors across the firm, but about 500 in its private client group, which tends to focus on higher-net-worth investors.
These family office services may also help the firm reach wealthy clients who may only have insurance protection through Northwestern Mutual. Roberts estimated that the firm works with thousands of HNW households, a segment of which doesn’t yet have a full relationship with the firm.
“This family office service capability gives us an opportunity to go back to those households and say, ‘Hey, let us see if we can win the whole relationship because now we can provide a broader suite of services,’” Roberts said.
This is part of a larger trend among wealth management firms of all sizes adding family office divisions to serve higher-net-worth clients. Wealthspire, Summit Wealth Group, AlphaCore and Farther are just some of the firms that have announced family office divisions this year.
Americana Partners just announced last week the launch of its dedicated multi-family office practice serving UHNW individuals and families. The offering is led by Matt Celenza, managing director and partner.
“We see technology allowing more firms to provide those services at scale, at a lower overall expense,” Roberts said. “And in turn, we think that’s going to be more pervasive in that market. … We also think at Northwestern Mutual, we have a little bit of a scale advantage.”
