America’s Most Advisor-Friendly Trust Companies Showcase - Flipbook - Page 16
2026 AMERICA’S MOST ADVISOR-FRIENDLY TRUST COMPANIES
After all, we’re all here to capture
assets from rivals while protecting
our best clients from ambitious
interlopers and from mortality itself.
Odds are good your best clients want
to integrate trusts into their planning. If
you don’t cooperate with that, you’re
not part of their long-term solution.
the families and ultimately from their
advisors.
They will find someone else. And
when they’re gone, their heirs will drift
toward their own choice of advisors
unless you have found a way to
lock in the relationship for generations
to come.
They’re content to administer the
trusts and let the advisors who built
the accounts go on running the
money. They’re dynamic and offer
more than cookie-cutter solutions.
They’re the future.
We don’t know a lot about what the
future will bring, but that’s a guarantee.
Lock in what you can while you have it.
Otherwise, life will take it away.
The Baby Boomers at the backbone
of most advisors’ books of business
are largely retired, and they’re moving
toward the grave year by year. Fixtures
of the ultra-high-net-worth world
are moving on . . . the last of the
Vanderbilts, the Koch brothers, billions
of dollars are transferring now.
Of course, the trust industry doesn’t
have a great reputation among
advisors. A lot of established names
in the field use their relationships
with trust grantors and beneficiaries
to prospect more money away from
That’s why we concentrate on
companies that explicitly take another,
higher road. They don’t invest in inhouse wealth management operations
of their own.
When they die, their heirs tend to take
the money to new venues—robot
THE ADVISOR-FRIENDLY TRUST STRUCTURE
Conventional trusts lock the advisor out of the relationship, handing
the assets to the trustee to manage. Make sure your clients work with
companies that leave room for you.
GRANTOR
TRUSTEE
ADVISOR
BENEFICIARY
(transfers assets
into trust)
(administers
trust)
(oversees
investments)
(ultimately spends
the money)
platforms and so on. When that money
passes on through a trust, it’s the trust
that decides who manages the money
and collects the fees.
That’s why the establishment covets
these accounts and why advisors in
the know are happy to suggest trusts
to clients who need to develop a
stronger estate plan.
After all, trusts exist because they
provide advantages. Freedom from
estate tax—where and when it’s a
problem—is only the tip of the iceberg.
It’s about relationships.
WHAT “FRIENDLY” MEANS
The companies in this book are
true leaders in the independent
advisor-friendly space, building
on their past success to put even
more space between themselves
and the institutional dinosaurs that
really aren’t more than glorified
custodians. They’re ambitious and full
of innovative ideas, technology, and
new ways to serve your clients better,
faster, and more efficiently.
From Alaska to New Hampshire,
South Dakota to Tennessee, Nevada
to Delaware, these companies are
located across the map, clustering
wherever state statutes provide
favorable treatment for wealthy
families that they may not be able
to get at home. They’re at every
stage of corporate evolution: Some
are affiliated with larger financial
entities, others are practically startups. Here, you’ll find everything from
niche specialists to across-the-board
generalists.
What unites them is leadership and
the willingness to work with you on
your terms. To call these organizations
“advisor friendly” is really an
understatement. What they really are
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