If you needed to ask a friend to help manage your assets, for example, to manage your estate or your investments, whom would you choose, and how would you make that decision? If you're like most people, you'd look for someone you could trust, someone with whom you had a personal relationship, someone who believes the same things you do.
That's what a good trust company does.
Related Blog: The Difference Between Using a Trust Company as an Investment Manager vs. a Broker
Stated simply, trust companies help you manage or invest your money, as well as assist with estate and retirement planning. People work with trust companies when they need help managing their assets or transferring those assets to a beneficiary.
As Investopedia explains:
"A trust company is a legal entity that acts as a fiduciary, agent, or trustee on behalf of a person or business for the purpose of administration, management, and the eventual transfer of assets to a beneficial party. The trust company acts as a custodian for trusts, estates, custodial arrangements, asset management, stock transfer, beneficial ownership registration, and other related arrangements."
Specifically, trust companies:
Every trust company has certain advantages and disadvantages, and only you can decide which trust company is best suited to meet your needs and work collaboratively with you. In general, you want to work with a trust company that stresses maintaining a personal relationship with you and delivers what it promises in terms of quality investment management and estate planning.
Before choosing a trust company, you should ask yourself 3 questions:
Chartered by the State of Florida in 1993, we remain committed to giving our clients the estate planning and investment management services we promise. We believe we can fill a need that conventional, larger financial organizations (who typically charge larger fees) don't. Finally, we are committed to 3 central tenets:
At Caldwell Trust, we offer 3 principal services to help our clients:
1. Trustees and Estates: we work closely with our clients to establish a trust which will give you and your family peace of mind. We offer flexible planning, whatever your estate planning needs and work hard to address your specific priorities and concerns. Our goal is to help you protect your assets now and far into the future.
2. Investment Management: at Caldwell Trust, we think investing your assets is a personal matter. This means working closely and collaboratively with our clients to ensure we build an investment management strategy customized to their individual needs.
3. Retirement Planning: we know that every client has individual needs as they plan for their retirement. To ensure we meet the needs of every client, we offer a wide spectrum of retirement planning services. Since retirement planning can be complicated, we make sure our clients understand all aspects of the retirement planning process, no matter how complex.
Conclusion
Choosing the right trust company for your investment management and estate planning needs can be confusing. To better understand our trust philosophy and learn more about your options, contact us today.