2025, And Beyond!
After 3 years it feels like we not only have our feet under us, but we are starting to run forward.
Our firm’s total assets under management has over doubled in size since we left Ameriprise in July 2021. Next year we are on pace to break $500mm of client assets. Our team headcount is up to 7, and everyone on staff has been on board since May 2023. The evolution from what was once a solo-advisor practice, to what is now a ‘mini-ensemble’ has been an incredible ride for us. We have been able to do more and make more meaningful impact in our client’s lives than I thought possible.
I remember when I started in this business just over 7 years ago with no job description thinking it would just be a temporary spot until I found the next thing. Well …. starting year 8 and I still haven’t found the ‘next thing’. I think I figured out the job description though.
Growing, and learning, this much in such short order has been a lot of work, and it’s required that we spend more time than ever carefully considering what it means to grow in a sustainable way.
Ie – can we really do what we have been doing in the same way, forever?
I’ve spent a decent bit of time thinking about what it means to grow sustainably.
Growing sustainably, to me, basically means 2 things:
Give good advice
Stay in business
It makes sense if you think about it. If our advice is bad, we won’t grow. If we don’t stay in business, we can’t give good advice.
Growing at the expense of client service = bad. This year we’ve been really conscious to make sure that we don’t compromise growth over serving our long-time clients.
We have continued to be referred to your family & friends, which has been an incredible honor. We met with 44 prospective clients (almost 1 a week!) last year. Of those, we were able to take on 16 as new clients (6 of which were family members of existing clients). For the rest we met we were able to refer them to other advisors that fit their situation better than we could.
We get this question often, so I think it’s important to outline here. Yes, we are still taking on new clients as a firm. I will be the first point of contact for new introductions, and the best way to introduce people to our firm is to direct them to our website and click the ‘Work With Us’ button on the top right of the screen. Whether we can work together or not, we always strive to make sure everyone has a good experience and is given some direction on any financial questions they have.
Quite honestly, the number of referrals has been so consistent over the years, we have yet to run a single marketing campaign. And I hope we never have to.
As we close out the year, a breakdown of our client base looks like this:
Total Client Count: 223 Core Planning Clients (down from 225), 47 Investment Only Clients, and 7 Corporate Clients.
37 Multi-Generation Client Relationship (6 with three generations)
And 110 Retired Clients
Retirement planning is, and probably always will be, our bread and butter.
Something I pay attention to a lot is our firm-level flows (how much money comes in vs what goes out) from investment accounts. Through the end of November we sent out $23mm of distributions to our clients from their investment accounts. That is $23mm this year to help our clients for retirement income, new home purchases, pay off debt, fund education, make charitable gifts, and so much more.
In many ways, sending money back to clients is the most rewarding thing we do. You trust us with your money, and our goal is to give you back more.
I’ll be taking on a more involved role in a number of the client relationships we have. For those clients specifically I’ll be sending out a more detailed email in the next few weeks.
We will do our best to continue to build on the solutions we’re able to offer, and hope to see you all (at our new Lake Austin Blvd office!) very soon.
William
