By Paul Karger

The global wealth landscape is changing rapidly. Today there are roughly 2,900 billionaires worldwide, collectively controlling an estimated $15.8 trillion. That headline number tends to grab attention, but it understates a more important reality. Ultrawealthy individuals and families are increasingly confronting institutional-level complexity in their personal and professional lives, whether they live in the U.S. or abroad.

What once could be managed with a small team, or even a single trusted advisor, now more closely resembles the management of a midsize enterprise. Investments span public and private markets, operating businesses, real estate, venture capital, and digital assets. Tax exposure transcends borders, disciplines, and generations. Philanthropy has evolved from episodic to strategic and consequential. At the same time, family governance, succession, and next-generation education demand sustained attention, deliberate structure, and meaningful time commitment.

As a result, many wealth creators are confronting a set of fundamental questions: Do I really want to oversee this myself? Is this how I want to spend my time? Do I really have the expertise to manage this competently and prudently?

As we often tell clients, there are pluses and minuses to running a family office. One of the pluses is that you control everything. One of the minuses is that you have to control everything. Ultimately, the decision turns on how you want to spend your time, and where you add the greatest value for yourself and your family.

As we get into 2026, there are three clear trends reshaping how wealthy families think about family offices and advisory relationships:

Investing is no longer the central function of the family office. For decades, investing sat at the center of the wealth management proposition. Large banks and brokerage platforms were built around delivering asset allocation, manager selection, and product distribution at scale, with the central goal of generating investment "alpha." The family office in the traditional model was largely defined by its ability to outperform markets.

Today, that framework is showing severe strain, and these providers have been caught flat-footed, ill-prepared and slow to adapt to the realities facing ultra-high-net-worth families.

These institutions are constrained by rigid compliance regimes, standardized product offerings, and business models that prioritize and reward scale over customization and differentiation. For ultra-high-net-worth families, particularly those coming into significant wealth for the first time, this often translates into an impersonal experience where clients may feel like "just another account."

Increasingly, families are now de-emphasizing investing as the defining feature of their advisory relationship. This doesn't suggest investments matter less. Rather, they are understood as only one component of a much broader and integrated solution. Historically, institutional family office solutions were organized almost exclusively around the pursuit of investment alpha.

My contention is that the modern family office, by contrast, must generate multiple and distinct forms of "alpha." That can range from investment alpha, to income, estate, cross-border tax alpha, wealth structuring alpha, philanthropic alpha, relationship alpha, and even structural alpha that protects family assets from external and internal predators.

Stated differently, clients and families today demand integration: Tax planning that meaningfully informs and integrates investment strategy, estate structures that reflect real family dynamics and complex balance sheets, philanthropic ecosystems aligned with values, family philosophies and long-term objectives rather than optics, and advice that is proactive, visionary, and forward-looking. In this evolution, the family office is evolving from a traditional investment shop into a kind of holistic, operating, "renaissance" partner.

Ultrawealthy families are increasingly global. Today's wealth is global by default. Families may reside in one country, own assets in several others, operate businesses across borders, and educate children around the world. Yet few advisory firms are genuinely equipped to manage the complexity that naturally results from this level of global integration.

Competing tax regimes, diverging legal and political systems, residency and citizenship considerations, and inconsistent reporting and compliance requirements introduce friction and create unforeseen risks.

A strategy that works perfectly in one jurisdiction can become inefficient, disjointed, and even harmful when applied elsewhere. We have seen families implement multigenerational estate plans that are pristine under U.S. laws, only to find these structures become incredibly unproductive and even toxic when acquiring assets abroad or integrating with family members living in different jurisdictions. This challenge is further compounded by the intricate business considerations involved in managing multinational companies within today's increasingly complex tax and regulatory environments.

As families become more internationally mobile, they require advisors who can coordinate seamlessly across borders, collaborate with local specialists, and adapt as circumstances evolve. Flexibility is often as critical as technical expertise. Static solutions are no longer sufficient for dynamic global families navigating an increasingly interconnected world.

Founder-CEOs have unique financial needs. We work with many first-generation wealthy individuals who have built their fortunes through entrepreneurship. Increasingly, we view these founders not just as clients, but as a particular category of client in their own right.

There is a critical distinction between money and wealth -- one that Ray Dalio has articulated for years. Many founders appear wealthy on paper, yet their day-to-day financial reality is often far more nuanced. Their net worth is frequently concentrated in illiquid operating businesses, concentrated equity positions, or contingent earn-outs that may extend years into the future.

Navigating liquidity events, partial exits, recapitalizations, and secondary transactions has become a central and complex challenge. Equally important is helping founders psychologically and practically manage the transition from wealth creation to long-term wealth stewardship, often while they actively engage in building new companies.

For these clients, the function of the family office is less about passive portfolio management and more about serving as a strategic "quarterback." That means coordinating tax planning, wealth structuring, multigenerational strategy, governance, asset protection, and risk management, all the while sharing a strategic vision with the founder's next chapter.

Bottom line. The growth of global wealth is doing more than just creating more billionaires. It is redefining what it means to manage wealth responsibly. For many company founders and wealthy families, the central question is no longer whether they can run their own family office, but whether they should.

Increasingly, the answer turns on how they value their time -- whether they prefer to spend it managing complexity or instead choose to focus their energy on what they do best and what they enjoy most, while partnering with professionals to manage the rest.

Paul Karger is a co-founder and managing partner of TwinFocus , a Boston-based boutique multifamily office serving global ultrahigh-net-worth investors and entrepreneurs. He advises a select group of individuals and families on complex business, financial, and life decisions.

This content was created by Barron's, which is operated by Dow Jones & Co. Barron's is published independently from Dow Jones Newswires and The Wall Street Journal.

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

February 02, 2026 16:17 ET (21:17 GMT)

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