Rating: 
Summary: Priceless wisdom
Review: While literally hundreds of wealth management books already grace the market, this 288-page guide offers some of the best advice to come down the investment pike in years. The volume may help those still accumulating their first million dollars, but will best serve investors firmly established (most commonly through hard work, as opposed to inheritance) in the ranks of the wealthy. Unlike most investment or wealth-management books, offering run-of-the-mill suggestions on how to allocate their assets and invest, this book takes three separate tacks on the subject of money. The first, to which the editors devoted 98 pages, broadly covers the emotional issues surrounding money. That may seem odd. Money is not a touchy-feely thing. But as explained by family business CEO Susan Remmer Ryzewic, who is also a director of her family's foundation, wealth is a two-edged sword providing the freedom to pursue dreams, but can also create discomfort and take control of life. Judith Stern Peck, Director of the family wealthy and life project for the Ackerman Institute for the Family, notes in the second chapter how to overcome the significant challenges of parenting a wealthy family. Similarly, New York City attorney Robert Stephan Cohen shows that marriages have a much better chance of survival when couples create the same degree of financial protection for them as they do for business partnerships--by signing pre-nuptial agreements before they marry. Next, Neuberger Berman co-founder Roy Neuberger provides a lively chapter on the importance of working past retirement age. Mindful of two friends who had long planned their retirements--only to die at 65--Neuberger never retired. At 99, he's still working. Similarly, executive recruiter Janice Reals Ellig notes that those who succeed in a first career can often also succeed in a second. The book's first section concludes with chapters on strategic philanthropy, conflict resolution in family enterprise, and advice for holding successful family meetings. In the second eight-chapter section, readers get a fix on several important asset management strategies. Charlotte Beyer, CEO of the Institute for Private Investors, notes that for many wealthy investors, appointing a team is often the sanest way to manage their wealth. To choose from 20,000 registered investment advisors and 60,000 stock brokers in the U.S., she recommends sticking to common sense dictated by investment fundamentals and to clearly spell out goals and risk tolerance, and to interact with advisors. Tax attorney Charles Lowenhaupt similarly stresses the need to build a <i>team</i> of expert wealth counselors, committed to working collaboratively--and lead by a mediator and coordinator to unscramble technical matters. Investors willing to talk openly with them, he writes, will learn to value their common sense as much as their stock picks and tax recommendations. Sophisticates and novice investors alike can learn from the next two chapters on asset allocation and real estate investment options, by family officer executive Jonathan Spencer and securitized real estate specialist Richard Adler. The first stresses the need to construct objective financial profiles, set investment goals, realistic time horizons and risk tolerance levels and choose asset classes and benchmarks by which to measure their performance. The second outlines real estate's low correlation to other asset groups and outlines the many types of real estate assets and securities. Neuberger Berman Trust Co. Chairman Albert Bellas and Managing Director Diane Lederman inform readers about the use of trusts to preserve wealth across generations. Spiced with some scary statistics (gift and estate taxes can run as high as 55%) and real-life examples, these experienced trust officers show why trusts are both flexible and necessary. Ralph Sinsheimer, another NB trust official, discussed family foundations and their need to implement a "prudent investor" policy and standards outlining investment objectives, time horizon, required return, sensitivity to annual volatility, current and desired future charitable donations, and expected real growth in assets. Ellen Perry, the founder of a consulting firm on family offices, discusses the multiple chores required to manage great wealth. Success in this increasingly complex task, she advises, usually requires families to enlist a team of skilled and experienced professionals. She notes significant benefits and disadvantages of both multi-family and single-family offices and the increasing popularity of large trust companies, major banks and financial institutions. Likewise, famed trust attorney John Duncan explains how to find the right trust officers. The book's final, 35-page section offers readers four fine chapters on how to enjoy their wealth. This is hardly a treatise on how to be self-centered. There are two chapters on art collecting, one by Neuberger Berman art curator Michael Danoff, who was director and chief curator at the Des Moines Art Center for seven years. The clear implication is that the wealthy can also become benefactors, as shown by the example of Ralph Esmerian, who after becoming a great collector of American folk art and president of the American Folk Art Museum, in 2001 donated 400 of his pieces to it. The final two chapters explain how to use wealth to fulfill dreams (again, not a wholly self-centered enterprise), and how to remain secure at home and while traveling. This fine collection of original essays offers something to nearly everyone interested in how to manage their wealth. I cannot think of a better place to find the understanding needed to balance a good and fulfilling life with the just rewards of a lifetime of hard work.
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