Shared-services Family Office

What is a Shared-services Family Office?

A shared-services family office is an arrangement where two or more families, or their single family offices, pool the operational backbone of a family office rather than each building it alone. Shared functions typically include accounting, consolidated reporting, compliance, technology and administration. Each family keeps its own investment mandate, decision-making and governance, and its information is kept separate from the other families.

The model sits between a single family office and a multi-family office. Families keep more control and confidentiality than they would as clients of a commercial multi-family office, while spreading costs that would otherwise fall on one family. Closely related set-ups are sometimes described as co-operative family offices: a small number of families who share overheads without the growth aims of a commercial business.

What does this mean for family offices?

For families that want the privacy and control of their own office but find the full cost hard to justify, sharing infrastructure can be a practical middle path. Cost allocation, information barriers, service levels and how a family can leave the arrangement should be agreed in writing from the start. Shared administrative and technology platforms are also used by hybrid family offices that keep strategy and oversight in-house.

Further Reading & Resources

• A Simple Guide to Family Offices: Types, Services and Benefits

• Family office structure: models, legal entities and governance

• Private Multi-family Office

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