Family Wealth Advising

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Comprehensive Wealth Management Without the Family Drama

Family wealth advising is the coordinated process of growing, preserving, and transferring wealth across generations-addressing not just investments and taxes, but the family dynamics, heir readiness, and governance structures that ultimately determine whether your legacy endures. Baby boomers will pass down trillions of dollars of wealth in the coming decades, a substantial portion of it coming from high-net-worth households, yet approximately 90% of large family wealth does not survive to the third generation. The difference between families who preserve wealth and those who lose it rarely comes down to market performance, but rather to planning, communication, and preparation.

A Wealth Management Approach Built for Multi-Generational Families

If you’re an affluent family trying to balance financial growth with family harmony during wealth transfer, you understand how quickly financial complexities multiply. Coordinating estate plans, tax strategies, retirement accounts, and investment management is demanding enough. Adding the human element-deciding when heirs are ready for difficult conversations, navigating family dynamics among siblings, and ensuring the next generation develops healthy financial habits-makes it exponentially harder.

At Godsey & Gibb, we built our approach around the recognition that family dynamics and preparing heirs to inherit your wealth is just as important as your investment plan and estate plan. A holistic view of family wealth management aligns financial affairs with family values, and that alignment is what separates lasting legacies from squandered ones.

Our wealth advisors are prepared to act not just as an advisor but as a facilitator of family discussions about wealth and how to manage it responsibly. We help eliminate the fears that keep families up at night: unprepared children receiving large inheritances, conflicts between siblings, and wealth mismanagement that erodes what took a lifetime to build.

Why Our Family-Oriented Wealth Management Approach Works

Many wealth management firms focus narrowly on portfolio returns. We focus on outcomes for your entire family across generations.

Synchronized planning under one roof

Our in-house CPA team works alongside your fiduciary wealth advisor so that investment decisions, tax strategy, and estate planning coordinate seamlessly. Holistic coordination unifies all aspects of your financial life into a cohesive strategy.

Facilitated family conversations

Our dedicated wealth advisors guide difficult discussions about inheritance, roles, expectations, and values. Open communication among family members reduces conflicts regarding financial matters, and we create the space for those conversations to happen productively.

Heir preparation to help ensure the next generation is ready for inheritance

Younger generations should be involved early to develop healthy financial habits. We champion your judgment on when heirs are ready to discuss future inheritance and your wishes for how they will use your wealth once it’s in their hands.

Privacy-focused approach

We maintain the desired privacy per your wishes. Controlled information sharing means each family member receives only the guidance and knowledge appropriate to their role when you believe they are ready to hear it.

Proactive advisor relationship planning

It is common for heirs to switch advisors after a wealth transfer. It may be easier to set up your heirs with your same wealth advisor in advance of wealth transfer actually taking place, and we are happy to explore those options with you.

Instead of forcing you to coordinate between separate investment firms, tax preparers, estate attorneys, and family counselors, we give you a streamlined team that already speaks the same language.

How Our Process Works

Getting your family wealth organized and protected doesn’t require chaos. Our process brings clarity to complex circumstances.

Step 1: Comprehensive Family Wealth Assessment

We begin by taking a complete inventory of your current financial situation. This means cataloging every financial account, real estate holding, business interest, retirement account (including your 401(k) and other retirement accounts), and illiquid asset you own.

From there, we review your beneficiary designations across all accounts to confirm they align with your estate plan and family goals. We also verify your living will and estate documents are up to date per your wishes-because outdated documents or inconsistent titling can lead to unintended heirs, unnecessary tax exposure, or public probate proceedings.

Critically, we evaluate your family dynamics. Who among your family members is financially prepared? What concerns exist about readiness, fairness, or communication? This family wealth assessment sets the foundation for everything that follows.

Step 2: Strategic Planning and Family Alignment

With a clear picture of your assets and family landscape, we build your plan.

Your investment strategy is optimized in line with family goals-whether that means capital preservation for someone approaching retirement, income generation, or growth to support future generations. Diversifying investment portfolios mitigates market risk and secures long-term growth, and our team calibrates your portfolio to your risk tolerance and timeline.

Our in-house CPA team develops your tax strategy alongside your investment plan. Tax planning can identify potential savings opportunities, from Roth conversion strategies to leveraging the permanently raised federal estate and gift tax exemption of $15 million per individual ($30 million for married couples) under the One Big Beautiful Bill Act. We coordinate estate planning with your legal professionals to ensure trusts, wills, and transfer structures are aligned with your investment and financial planning goals.

Most importantly, we facilitate family discussions about wealth transfer goals. These are the conversations many families avoid-and they’re precisely the ones that matter most. Our advisors guide discussions about legacy, philanthropy, family business succession, and the values you want your wealth to represent.

Step 3: Implementation and Ongoing Management

We implement your plan with rigorous portfolio management, giving your family greater control over what’s held and how tax consequences are managed.

We are ready as needed to facilitate family meetings and heir education sessions, because establishing family governance promotes financial literacy among younger generations. Generational protection helps avoid wealth dissipation by educating heirs-not just handing them assets and hoping for the best.

Periodic monitoring and adjustment of strategies ensures your plan stays aligned with changing financial situations, tax laws, and family circumstances. Regular reviews of a wealth plan ensure it reflects your evolving needs, whether that means updating beneficiary designations after a grandchild is born or adjusting investment allocations as you move deeper into retirement.

What Makes Us Different from Other Wealth Managers

Many wealth management firms organize themselves around assets under management. We organize ourselves around families.

In-house CPA team providing synchronized tax strategy and preparation

Your tax planning isn’t outsourced or siloed. Our CPA professionals sit alongside your wealth advisor, so every investment decision accounts for its tax implications. Leveraging professional advice aids in wealth structuring and tax efficiency that would be near impossible if your tax preparer and investment advisor never spoke to each other.

Rigorous security selection and institution-quality active management

Rather than defaulting to broad mutual funds or generic ETF portfolios, we select individual securities tailored to your family’s risk tolerance, income needs, and tax situation. This approach gives us the ability to harvest losses, manage dividend timing, and control capital gains exposure with precision.

Family discussion facilitation and heir preparation as core services

This isn’t an afterthought or an add-on. Helping your children invest and prepare to manage wealth is central to what we do. Our wealth advisors facilitate the conversations that families find hardest to start on their own.

Dedicated wealth advisors in the greater Richmond VA, Greenville SC, Jacksonville FL, and Phoenix Metro AZ areas

We serve clients across these regions with advisors who understand local circumstances, state tax considerations, and community resources.

Who We Serve

Family wealth management isn’t one-size-fits-all. We work with families whose wealth has reached the point where coordination across investments, taxes, estate plans, and family dynamics demands professional guidance.

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Affluent families approaching retirement seeking wealth preservation within their investment strategy

You’ve spent decades building your net worth. Now the priority shifts: running out of money is the top fear in retirement, and your plan needs to address income, expenses, risk management, and legacy simultaneously. Our retirement planning and financial planning services are designed for exactly this transition.

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Current retirees wanting to prepare heirs and facilitate smooth wealth transfer

Your estate plan may be in place, but the human side-deciding when and how to bring children into the conversation, confirming beneficiary designations, updating your living will-requires ongoing attention and support. Comprehensive wealth management is essential for building and sustaining generational wealth, and aligning your investment plan with your estate plan is crucial as families grow and change.

Our Service Offerings and Investment Approach

Our comprehensive service model addresses every dimension of family wealth, so nothing falls through the cracks.

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Core Wealth Management Services

Investment management with individual security selection – Investment management involves assembling your portfolio with securities uniquely suited to your goals and risk profile. We don’t believe in cookie-cutter portfolios.
Financial and retirement planning coordination – From modeling your savings and expenses through retirement to planning for healthcare costs and creating a financial safety net that protects long-term goals from unexpected issues.
In-house tax strategy and preparation services – Your CPA and your investment advisor operate as one team who aim to capitalize on all tax avoidance opportunities while remaining aligned to your risk profile and financial goals.
Dedicated fiduciary advisor relationship – Your advisor has a legal obligation to act in your best interest. That’s not a marketing claim-it’s how we operate.

Family-Focused Additional Services

Family meeting facilitation and wealth transfer discussions – Open discussions are invaluable when it comes to preparing for wealth transfer, and we are here to help. Our advisors create agendas, mediate concerns, and ensure every family member’s voice is heard.
Heir preparation and financial education – When your children or grandchildren are ready for conversations about money, inheritance, and responsibility, we can help educate them on their future responsibilities.
Estate planning coordination and document reviews – We help you take inventory of your assets, check that you have properly designated beneficiaries, and confirm your living will is up to date per your wishes. We coordinate with your estate attorney to ensure trust structures, TOD designations, and titling all work together.
Multi-generational advisor relationship planning – We proactively introduce your heirs to our team so the transition, when it comes, is seamless rather than disruptive. Families need guidance on preserving and distributing assets, and advisor continuity is a critical part of that guidance.

Frequently Asked Questions

When should we start discussing inheritance with our children?

The ideal time depends on your children’s maturity, financial literacy, and life circumstances-but waiting until a crisis or health event forces the conversation is almost always too late. Our advisors facilitate discussions with sensitivity, ensuring that younger generations are brought into the conversation with appropriate context and knowledge. Younger generations should be involved early to develop healthy financial habits, and our approach gives you a structured way to make that happen.

How do you maintain privacy during family wealth discussions?

Privacy is foundational to our process. We maintain the desired privacy per your wishes, which means we establish clear protocols about what information is shared, with whom, and when. Not every family member needs to know every detail. Some families want full transparency; others prefer controlled disclosure. We respect your preferences and implement information-sharing boundaries that protect both your assets and your family relationships. Family governance establishes rules and meetings to educate heirs on financial matters, but it is always done within the boundaries you set.

Can our heirs work with the same advisor after wealth transfer?

Absolutely, and we strongly encourage it. It may be easier to set up your heirs with your same wealth advisor in advance of wealth transfer actually taking place, and we are happy to explore those options with you. By introducing your children or grandchildren to our team before inheritance occurs, they build a relationship grounded in trust and familiarity. This continuity preserves institutional knowledge about your family’s financial history, values, and goals that would be lost if heirs started fresh with a new firm.

Start Your Family Wealth Management Journey Today

The best time to begin family wealth planning is before it becomes urgent. Every year you delay is a year of compounding complexity-outdated beneficiary designations, unaddressed family dynamics, tax strategies left on the table, and heirs unprepared for the responsibilities ahead.

We can help you take inventory of your assets, check that you have properly designated beneficiaries, confirm your living will is up to date, and-most importantly-start the conversations that protect not just your wealth but your family.

Schedule your initial consultation today

We serve families in the greater Richmond VA, Greenville SC, Jacksonville FL, and Phoenix Metro AZ areas with the fiduciary commitment, integrated services, and family-first approach your wealth deserves.

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