A different kind of conversation is happening in family meetings
It tends to start quietly. A founder who built the family’s wealth over thirty years sits at the head of the table. Across from them, their children — educated, globally connected, and digitally native — are asking questions that were never part of the original agenda.
Not just “what are the returns?” but “why are we building this?” Not only “which structure is most efficient?” but “does this reflect who we are?”
This shift is not a conflict; it is an evolution. For internationally mobile families across Europe and beyond, where private wealth has expanded significantly over the past two decades, understanding this evolution has become a defining challenge of our time.
The scale of the transition
The numbers behind this generational handover are significant. According to the Bank of America Family Office Study (2025), one in three family offices expects to transition leadership to the next generation within five years. A further 73% of principals who are less actively engaged in day-to-day operations expect the next generation to redefine the family office’s mission entirely.
Globally, an estimated $84 trillion in wealth is expected to transfer across generations over the next two decades — the largest intergenerational transfer in history.
This is not a distant event. It is a present reality that is already reshaping how wealth is structured, how decisions are made, and what families expect from the advisors they trust to guide them through it.
What the next generation actually wants
It would be a mistake to assume the rising generation is simply continuing what came before. The shift in priorities is real and consistent across families and geographies.
- Purpose alongside return. Values and impact are no longer separate from investment decisions they are part of them.
- Direct engagement. The next generation wants to understand and participate in investments, not simply receive a report about them.
- Real-time visibility. Consolidated, digital access to performance and reporting is an expectation, not a request.
- Wealth as legacy. How the family is remembered its reputation, values, and continuity matters as much as what it owns.
- AI fluency. They are already using AI, building with it, and inheriting businesses shaped by it. They expect their family office to understand what that means at the portfolio level — not just as a reporting tool, but as a force actively reshaping the industries and assets they stand to inherit.
The risks of not preparing
The transition itself carries risks that are easily underestimated. Where families lack formal governance structures, succession conversations tend to be deferred until they become urgent. At that point, the combination of competing priorities, differing risk appetites, and unresolved family dynamics can create real instability.
According to research published by Citi Private Bank (2025), 74% of family offices identify succession planning gaps as a key vulnerability. Yet fewer than half have a documented governance framework in place.
The failure point is rarely financial. It is almost always structural and relational — families who never established clear decision-making processes, defined roles, or articulated a shared set of principles before the transition began.
This is particularly relevant for families whose wealth and family members are spread across multiple jurisdictions. When the founding generation, the next generation, and the family’s assets each sit in different countries, the governance question becomes more complex — not less. Who makes decisions? Under what framework? Across which legal structures? These are not questions to answer in the middle of a transition.
What thoughtful preparation looks like
There is no single model, and any family office that tells you otherwise is not being honest. But the families who navigate this transition well tend to follow a recognizable path.
Step 1 — Engage early. Bring the next generation into the investment process before the transition begins, not after. Even in an observer or advisory capacity, early involvement builds perspective, trust, and continuity — without the pressure of formal responsibility.
Step 2 — Build the framework. A family investment committee with a defined scope, a documented investment policy statement, and a clear articulation of shared values is not a bureaucratic formality. They are the architecture that makes a smooth handover possible — and their absence is where most transitions run into difficulty.
Step 3 — Choose structures that travel. For internationally mobile families, jurisdiction is a tool, not a constraint. A well-chosen structuring hub provides the legal flexibility, treaty coverage, and institutional environment to support multi-generational planning across borders. The right structure does not just work today — it works for the generation that inherits it.
The key concept connecting all three steps is purposefulness. Families that face struggles are not simply those who made poor choices; rather, they are the ones who put off making decisions until external circumstances forced them into a choice.
The role of the multi-family office in this transition
A multi-family office is not simply an asset manager. At its best, it serves as a long-term institutional partner — one that understands both the financial and the human dimensions of wealth.
For next-generation wealth owners, this matters more than it did for their parents. They are navigating a transition that is financial, emotional, and often philosophical at the same time. They benefit from advisors who can sit with the complexity of that — who understand governance as well as portfolio construction, succession as well as structuring.
The distinction between a multi-family office and a private bank is worth making here. A private bank manages assets. A multi-family office manages the family. That includes the conversations that do not appear on a balance sheet: how decisions get made, how the next generation is prepared, how the family’s purpose is preserved across time and geography.
At One Family Wealth, we work with families across multiple geographies — from founders still building to second- and third-generation families already in the room. Our Family Strategy & Advisory practice supports families in building the governance frameworks, succession structures, and shared decision-making processes that make generational transitions work. Our Investment Management and Tax & Legal Advisory teams work in close coordination to ensure that the structures holding family wealth remain aligned with the family’s evolving priorities — wherever in the world those families are.
This is where planning starts
The families who navigate generational transitions well do not leave them to chance. They engage early, build deliberately, and ensure their advisors understand not just the numbers, but the people behind them.
If your family is beginning to think about what the next chapter looks like — whether that conversation is just starting or long overdue — this is the right moment to have it. Not when urgency forces it.
We are here.
