The family office space has grown dramatically in the last few years. Today, there are over 2,300 family offices that have a minimum of $50 million in assets, which is up 23% from just a year ago. (1)

The industry is exploding.

These family offices provide a wide array of services to their clients, including the implementation of life insurance strategies as an impactful part of the estate plan, a high priority among the ultra-high net worth clients these firms cater to. According to a survey of 366 multi-family offices, nearly four out of five are outsourcing life insurance placement services to outside experts. The reason? One family office managing partner explains it this way: “Life insurance is a specialized field that requires working with extremely competent experts.” (2)

Most of these transactions are fulfilled by highly competent life insurance agents working with the top carriers to place millions of dollars of death benefit into tax-advantaged life insurance trusts. Once the death benefit is placed, the policy (and trust) must be managed. And who can the family offices rely on to provide this management?

Just as placing a significant life insurance policy should be the work of “extremely competent experts,” so should managing the assets and the trust over time, which is why family offices are looking to the Life Insurance Trust Company, and with good reason.

  • The Life Insurance Trust Company is the only trust company in the country that is focused on one asset class only: life insurance.
  • The back-office engine of the trust company is driven by an affiliated company, ITM TwentyFirst, the largest manager of life insurance for trust companies and banks, legal and accounting firms and institutions, in the country.
  • Clients are assigned an experienced trust administrator whose only job is the management of life insurance trusts.
  • The experts at the Life Insurance Trust Company have managed thousands of policies over the years and have dealt with and solved many of the common issues that occur with a policy after it is put in place.
  • The firm is flexible in its service model and can act as a trustee or co-trustee, assuming all investment decisions or partnering with outside advisors, depending on the trust document language.
  • Annual reviews are provided to all appropriate parties, including outside advisors, as determined by the family office and grantor.
  • The in-house policy remediation staff performs all back-office tasks, including the cumbersome contacts with carriers, and if decisions on policy management have to be made, they gather all information into a concise report, allowing all to see how policy decisions are made.
  • The back-office services provided by the firm lower costs for the family office and any advisors working with the grantor, and the secure, proprietary data management system offers a central location to catalog all information about the trust and policy.

The Life Insurance Trust Company understands the family office business model – the high touch services that are provided. It is the same level of service they provide.

If you are a family office looking to expand your service in the life insurance arena, contact Leon Wessels at 605.574.1703.

  1. Rising Rich Boost Stature, Growth of Family Offices, InvesmentNews.com, Adam Shell, April 12, 2019
  2. The Outsourcing of Life Insurance in Wealth Management and Multi-Family Office Practices, thewealthadvisor.com, Lacey Kessler, May 3, 2016