How to Choose a Wealth Manager

Choosing a wealth manager concerns the business of devising and deploying a plan to preserve and grow your assets. It’s also about you feeling comfortable that your future is in good hands. With 27,000 wealth managers and advisers at 5,000 firms in the UK, offering different products and services, it can be hard to know where to start. Here are some pointers to help you select adviser that’s right for you.

Measure what you can see

“From the financial advisers I’d met in the past it was definitely product led. They were trying to work out how much money I had and where I should put that money. And how they could get a better return for that money. First Wealth’s approach [instead] was ‘let’s look at you first’.”

We hope you’ll forgive us starting with a quote from a client. It’s from a short video.

Wealth management is more than managing wealth. It requires high levels of trust and mutual respect. After all, you’re essentially putting your dreams into the hands of another, for the rest of your life.

But with so many advisers and companies around – not to mention apps, platforms and all the rest of it – how on earth does one start?

Your task gets harder when you find out that some firms are more transparent that others. Measuring things you can see is one thing, measuring things you can’t is another.

So here are the basics.

The wealth manager service

We’re not going to start with investments. And neither should you.

The most important thing is the service you get.

You can find great service at large and small companies – like First Wealth. And what you really want is someone motivated to look after you, inside a culture that nurtures that motivation, for the long term. These are the two magic ingredients.

What you don’t want, in the words of one industry figure we encountered, is, “wealth managers who spend 80% of their time on 20% of the clients – leaving the rest underserved, at best.”

Your account handler should be thinking about your holistic wellbeing: money manager, money coach and money confidante all in one. Like all good partners, they anticipate your needs and wishes, proposing good ideas before you’ve thought of them – and solving problems before they hit you.

Yes, technology will be a part of their offering. But we advise clients not to get too hung up on the tech. The risk is such shiny baubles may not enhance your experience, steer you towards good decisions and get you closer to your goals.

Culture

The individual and collective beliefs, sayings and behaviours of a firm comprise its culture.

In wealth management company, a good culture has the following characteristics:

• clients first,
• all client business is urgent and important and must and should be dealt with in a measured way,
• good corporate governance with accountable and transparent leadership,
• and a good corporate citizen.

We’ll fly just one First Wealth flag here. We’re a certified B Corp, which means we have the highest possible standards of corporate governance and sustainability in terms of our relationship to people and planet.

And this is partly why we focus on your overall wellbeing – not just your financial performance.

Investment performance

Of course, the return on your money matters. We’re not saying it doesn’t.

It’s here that many wealth managers fall down on transparency. They don’t like to advertise the returns they generate for their clients – hiding behind two things:

1. “Our client portfolios are all bespoke so we can’t generalise.”
2. “It’s compliance. You know what they’re like. They just won’t let us talk about how we help clients, so you’ll have to trust us.”

We’re not sure that’s good enough. We suspect you might agree.

The only way to show you how your money is doing against the other options you might have chosen is to get an independent company in. It’s what we do.

Asset Risk Consultants is one such firm. They have a series of indices for clients just like you, so you can see what ‘good’ looks like.

Wealth manager fees

Some wealth companies have very opaque fee structures. We’ve never understood that … but we don’t chuck mud. It’s never a good look.

All we would say is that if you don’t understand what you’re paying, or why, then you’re probably not getting value for money.

We aim for better than that. We ask clients to pay simple, fair and understandable fees. We also refund financial plan fees for anyone who isn’t satisfied.

We can do this because – for example – we work with investment managers with a shared view. They shave fees off things like trading costs to put more of your money to work.

I hope these simple pointers help. If you’d like to talk about them in more detail, please get in touch. We’re available at hello@firstwealth.co.uk or 020 7467 2700.

This document is marketing material for a retail audience and does not constitute advice or recommendations. Past performance is not a guide to future performance and may not be repeated. The value of investments and the income from them may go down as well as up and investors may not get back the amount originally invested.