Introduction
Multi-family offices (MFOs) represent a significant and institutionalized segment of the global wealth management landscape, managing capital on behalf of multiple ultra-high-net-worth families. Collectively, MFOs oversee more than $5.2 trillion in assets globally. Willis Towers Watson sized global pension assets at $68.3 trillion in 2025. MFOs therefore represent a significant asset pool equivalent to 8% of global pension assets.
These assets are distributed globally. This analysis places these assets across nine regions: North America; DACH and Liechtenstein; British Isles; Southern Europe; East and Southeast Asia; Benelux and France; Central and South America; MENA; and the Nordics, Baltics and Eastern Europe.
North America represents the largest share of the market, accounting for 35% of the total number of MFOs and 57% of total MFO AuM.
From an allocation perspective, MFOs invest most heavily in traditional asset classes, contrasting with single-family offices, in which alternatives represent the largest allocations.
MFOs are cost-effective way of managing family wealth
The costs involved in establishing a single-family office (SFO) are considerable. Aside from the legal and tax fees involved in setting up an investment vehicle from scratch, a family must then employ in-house staff to manage investments, as well as further advisors for accounting, legal and estate management. These significant costs account for the high AuM of single-family offices, with typical entities holding $50 million or more and smaller entities consisting of only a couple of staff – sometimes just the founders themselves.
Multi-family offices, however, were established to meet the needs of clients with asset levels that did not justify the costs outlined above. Families, typically with wealth of $10 million or more, can use these firms as a “one-stop shop” for tax planning, legal services, estate planning, and, of course, investment management.
Many families with assets large enough to justify the costs of an SFO still prefer the services of an MFO. Where single-family offices are often missioned, reflecting the business history and investment preferences of the founder, multi-family offices offer a more passive option for wealth management.
1,632: Multi-family offices tracked globally by us.
Much like SFOs, MFOs will commonly offer access to alternative asset classes. Investment portfolios are often bespoke (though with options for managed portfolios), and with several families interested in private markets, MFOs can pool investments to access opportunities usually only available to larger institutional investors.
Defining multi-family offices
A typical MFO might serve between 10 and 50 clients, with individual accounts starting from a minimum of $5 million, although number of clients served and minimum thresholds vary. The differences between MFOs, wealth managers and private banks are subtle, and there is often some crossover in asset sizes and services (Figure 1).
Only in a select few jurisdictions are MFOs separately designated by law: Monaco, which instituted Law n° 1.439 in December 2016, is one such jurisdiction that regulates the formation of MFOs and the methods of remuneration. Similarly, Mauritius issues separate licenses for single and multi-family offices, allowing entities that reach minimum capital and asset requirements to access tax holidays. Licensing and regulation in these jurisdictions have been driven by their reputation as centers of private wealth, with favorable tax landscapes. In other jurisdictions, multi-family offices continue to be regulated under more general frameworks, such as in Singapore where they must hold the Capital Market Services License if they have AuM of at least SGD250 million ($200 million).
Multi-family offices tend to offer more bespoke services than wealth managers. Wealth managers, with lower asset thresholds, organize investments through managed portfolios, with a high proportion of assets held in passive instruments like index funds, and a heavier weighting towards traditional investments. Multi-family offices, conversely, will usually offer individual portfolio management, with higher allocation to alternative asset classes. In many cases this will include direct private equity co-investments, with assets pooled to break high barriers to entry.
It should be noted that greater numbers of wealth managers are now offering “family office services” within their business models. This entails bespoke services more typically found in a multi-family office; however, with few regulatory frameworks defining what can be described as such, the quality of services varies considerably. Similarly, although private banks offer services adjacent to family offices, with estate planning, investment management and other ancillary services, their large numbers of customers reduce the level of tailoring for each account. Furthermore, private banks— typically attached to large institutions—are limited in the range of investment products that can be offered.
A smaller number of entities operate as “private” multi-family offices. These firms comprise a small number of families who have typically generated their wealth from the same source (such as co-founding a company). For example, Private Falcon Holdings serves the families of Jamshid Keynejad and Barry Siadat, the co-founders of private equity firm SK Capital Partners; the family office continues the founders’ mission investing in private equity in the US and Europe. Due to the founders’ shared background, private multi-family offices are usually internally aligned to invest in the same sectors and asset classes. With no incentive to attract more families, these companies do not operate commercially and will usually have minimal online presence. For categorization purposes, private family offices with more than two members are classed as multi-family offices on our platform.
Consolidation is emerging across the MFO landscape
Like SFOs, MFO arise wherever wealth is created. To that end, the centers of MFO activity are predominantly in the US and Europe. While new multi-family offices are opening rapidly in emerging markets around the world, the trend in the old world of private wealth is consolidation. News coverage of multi-family office consolidation has been dominated by “big buy” acquisitions, usually by US firms expanding to new markets. For example, in September 2025, Corient acquired Stonehage Fleming and Stanhope Capital, bringing more than $214 billion in client assets to the US wealth business. In December 2025, reports circulated that Corient was looking at another large acquisition, of AlTi Global, the Swiss company with $89 billion in AuM. By March 2026, Corient had withdrawn from talks.
AlTi itself had entered the German market in April 2025 with the acquisition of Kontora, a multifamily office with €14 billion ($16.5 billion) in AuM.
Just as pertinent as these headline-grabbing acquisitions is the trend of consolidation among smaller multifamily offices in Europe. While larger wealth managers expand to access new continents or grow AuM, smaller family offices remain focused on service provision. Several Swiss mergers and acquisitions demonstrate this trend. In November 2025, Genevabased Amadeus Capital acquired Amasus Investment, expanding to Zurich and growing investment capabilities. The two companies already had a relationship stretching back three decades. Similarly, VECO Group and SwissPath Group merged in November 2024, widening coverage and expanding services.
The reasons given by these smaller firms is that, with a business model focused on bespoke provision of services, rapid expansion is counterproductive. Although efficiencies of scale and visibility make such acquisitions attractive, clients can be subject to higher fees and a drop in service levels. Beyond a certain size, wealth management firms struggle to offer the same personal touch expected of multi-family offices.
Global distribution of multi-family offices and assets
We have categorized multi-family offices into nine regions, covering all countries where we maintain MFO profiles. As of December 2025, our database covered 1,632 MFOs globally (Figure 2), with more than one-third located in North America, representing 57% of total MFO assets (Figure 3). The DACH region ranks second after North America in both number of offices and total assets. This strength is largely driven by Switzerland, reflecting the country’s attractiveness to international high-net-worth individuals, its high domestic wealth levels and its long-established expertise in the professional management of private wealth.
Distribution of MFOs by AuM bracket
A large proportion (25%) of MFOs manage between $100 million – $500 million (Figure 4). Smaller firms remain significant, with 31% overseeing less than $100 million. At the upper end, 45% manage more than $500 million. Firms managing over $5 billion account for just over 9% of the market, and nearly half of these manage assets between $5 billion and $10 billion. The presence of larger firms reflects the scale of the North American wealth market, as well as the continued consolidation of the wealth management industry, with MFOs increasingly merging or being acquired.
Distribution of MFOs investing in different asset classes
In terms of asset allocation, public markets remain foundational to MFO portfolios globally (Figure 5). Public equities (74%) are the most widely held asset class, followed by fixed income (66%) and private equity (65%), highlighting a balance between liquidity and private market exposure. Real estate is held by 59% of MFOs, while hedge funds continue to play important roles in liquidity management and diversification. Real assets such as infrastructure, gold, commodities and natural resources are allocated to by 36% of firms and private credit features in 29% of portfolios.
