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Financial Planning > UHNW Client Services > Family Office News

Settling Into the New Office

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In the continuing story about setting up my new office, we bought the last few pieces of art and other decorative items, but still needed reception area chairs. We had shopped at several places, but alas, could not find the right ones. Then, we went to a store called Kirkland’s, and there it was, the perfect chair. This was it, the end of our search, right? Well almost right. When they checked their inventory, they only found one and we obviously needed two. So they called several area stores and found two, but they were an hour and a half away. Since they don’t ship between stores, we got in the van and took a road trip. Finally, at last, the new office is finished and everything is in place.

During the process of setting up the new office, I conducted several account reviews and made contact with a few prospective clients. The reviews went well, as well as can be expected in a market like we have.

Fortunately, we moved a lot to cash during the second quarter of last year. Even so, we had losses. I shudder to think what they might have been if we hadn’t taken a more conservative posture. In my performance report, I include three indexes as benchmarks: the S&P 500, the Nasdaq, and the Barcap (formerly Lehman Brothers) US Aggregate Bond.

Transitioning to the New Custodian

Now that I’m settled in, I am turning my attention to transitioning clients to the new custodian. I wrote about my decision to change in an earlier blog, but have yet to make the move. The reason for the delay that I use Morningstar’s Advisor Workstation Office Edition for performance reporting and other things. The new custodian didn’t have an interface for this particular tool so they built one. Now that it’s complete it must be tested to assure accuracy.

As soon as this is finished, I will move the accounts. I have enjoyed working with Fidelity, but for my business, Trade PMR should be a better fit. They have provided me with a great deal of personal service, something I greatly appreciate. Oh, I believe their new data aggregation tool is available now. With that tool I will be able to incorporate my clients’ outside holdings in a variety of reports. I haven’t seen this yet, so I’ll write more as I learn of it.


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