The Gervais Group

Legacy planning transcends the mere allocation of financial assets; it embodies the cultivation of a family legacy that harmonizes wealth with deeply held family values. At the Gervais Group, we champion a distinctive approach to legacy planning that serves the human side of legacy wealth. Our strategy emphasizes the importance of family stewardship, passing on financial literacy, and generational generosity, ensuring a legacy that benefits not just the immediate family but future generations as well.

1. Financial Habits Guided by Long-Term Goals:

   Effective legacy planning begins with cultivating financial habits that align with your family's long-term aspirations. By focusing on sustainable wealth management, families can ensure their legacy endures through generations.

2. Cultivating Financial Literacy among Family Stewards:

   Knowledge is the cornerstone of empowerment. Teaching financial literacy to heirs equips them to manage and grow the family's wealth responsibly. We believe families should share common goals and even financial experiences so they are knit together in unity about what their generational wealth should do.

3. Generosity as the Foundation of Family Stewardship:

   Generosity with money, time, and talents is central to our philosophy. It acts as a potent antidote to entitlement, encouraging a culture of giving and involvement in charitable activities among children and grandchildren.

Creating a family vision is akin to drafting a mission statement for your legacy. It involves defining collective goals, core values, and the family's approach to wealth management, ensuring that these principles guide the stewardship of your assets. This vision cultivates unity, guides the transfer of wealth, and helps prevent potential conflicts and losses. We have developed six steps to caring for heirs that helps ensure your family vision remains intact even through changes and hardship:

Six Steps to Caring for Heirs and Ensuring Family Stewardship

1. Establish an Obligation to Family Stewardship:

   Emphasize the importance of each family member's role in preserving the family legacy.

2. Promote Healthy Financial Habits:

   Model and share financial behaviors that support the family's long-term objectives. 

3. Teach Financial Literacy:

   Equip heirs with the knowledge and skills to make informed financial decisions. Teaching financial literacy to heirs promotes trust, responsibility, competence, and a cohesive family vision.

4. Prepare an Estate Plan:

   Ensure a smooth transition of assets to the next generation, minimizing the impact of taxes and probate.

5. Guard Against Poor Financial Decisions:

   Foster an environment where family members feel supported in making sound financial choices. Share your experiences even if they have been bad ones so your children can get an in-depth understanding of how financial decisions affect their standard of living and legacy expectations.

6. Assemble a Professional Team:

   Collaborate with CPAs, Financial Advisors, and Attorneys to support your family's legacy planning efforts. Cross your T’s and dot your I’s and make sure that heirs understand the plan you have put in place and who they can go to for answers.

Generosity is not just an act of giving but a strategic tool in legacy planning. It teaches heirs the value of wealth beyond personal gain, encouraging a culture of responsibility, sharing among themselves and outward philanthropy. By involving family members in charitable activities, we instill a core value of stewardship that guards against entitlement and encourages a legacy of generosity.