Skip navigation

Average # of FAs each investor has

or Register to post new content in the forum

 

Comments

  • Allowed HTML tags: <em> <strong> <blockquote> <br> <p>

Plain text

  • No HTML tags allowed.
  • Web page addresses and e-mail addresses turn into links automatically.
  • Lines and paragraphs break automatically.
Mar 14, 2008 6:24 pm

I am doing a marketing piece and wanted to quote the average number of FAs an investor has. Does anyone know the approximate number and from where the statistic comes from? I think it was originally printed last year in an issue ofBarron’s.

  Thanks, Greg
Mar 14, 2008 7:03 pm

I thought the average was 3.  I do not have a source for that.

Mar 14, 2008 7:32 pm

Jones has always said 2.5.  No data to back that up.  I just want to make sure I’m not the .5 part of the mix.

Mar 15, 2008 10:15 pm

Over 90% of mine have one advisor. Until you have that, you really don’t have a relationship of trust.

Mar 22, 2008 9:33 pm

Clients may have more than one broker, but typically only one advisor.  The reason is they are searching for an advisor and will keep adding brokers until they find one. 

Mar 29, 2008 2:31 am

According to an article found in Research Magazine Pg. 61 of The Private Client P. Abrams [

Fourth, while these affluent individuals may work with plenty of financial advisors

(most have three to five), very few of them have the kind of trusted longterm

relationship with a single advisor that our research consistently tells us

they are truly looking for. In other words, they are not under-served because they

have no advisors, but because they have too many.]

Apr 7, 2008 2:57 am

I always find it funny when someone says they handle all the money.  Unless you are doing the tax returns over an extended period of time, you have no clue.  I had a client that I did the taxes of and would have bet every dollar I had that I had every investment dollar of theirs.  Woops - they had an IRA rollover with a guy I’d never heard of before and found a valuation statement in their tax documents.  I don’t blame them at all. 

Apr 8, 2008 1:59 am

[quote=iceco1d]Wow…I must be blonde this weekend!  I read that as “Average number of FAs the average person has over their lifetime,” not how many all at once! 

  I agree whole-heartedly with Indy in that regard; I'm still a small producer, but I won't work with anything less than "the whole ball of wax."  I don't necessarily care how big "the whole ball" is, but I wouldn't take half my taxes to my accountant, and the other half to H&R Block, and professionally I expect no less from my clients.  Unless of course, an issue comes up that I do not or cannot deal with, OR if there is a particular circumstance where bringing everything to me wouldn't be in the client's best interest.[/quote]

I have to agree with ice and Indy here. An FA needs to at the bare minimum at least have knowledge of all your money out there. Otherwise any recommendations might not truly be in the best interest of the client. Which, in this case, would be the clients fault for not letting the FA know that they really have .