No wealth without Unity
A family broke the main rule of a family office.
And nearly lost a billion dollars.
The #1 rule a family has to follow to preserve wealth?
> Unity.
Not abiding by it will eventually lead to wealth destruction.
In that family, Gen3 disunion caused them to:
• fire sale assets
• disjoint their asset allocation strategy
• extract cash to satisfy immediate needs of some family members
• over-leverage controlled subsidiaries
A self fulfilling prophecy for disaster.
Or in the Principal’s mouth: “There is nothing more expensive than disunion”.
He even created a formula to calculate the cost of disunion on his family’s wealth.
Not being a mathematician myself, I won't go that far.
But I can testify that outlasting families share this one trait in common.
> Unity.
It may seem boring. But it is not an option.