Selling your business?: Engage Guide to Wealth Management

Selling a business is often the culmination of years of blood, sweat and tears. There is the emotional burden of the unknown and what comes next, along with the fortunate challenge of thinking about what to do with both your time, and the (likely significant) capital now at your disposal.

Wealth management in this space is a sophisticated balance of both emotional and practical elements. It is a combination of understanding the nuances and having deep expertise to help clients manage, protect, and build wealth to last decades.

The mindset for the selling process.

There is a sizable difference between earning well and being fully invested in your business, and not having an income but having significant capital to live off (or utilise). Here, we will outline some ideas/tips/processes for dealing with clients in this position. The guide is designed to offer advice to clients themselves or other professionals who might have their own clients in this position.

Do nothing immediately*

For most clients, we believe that you shouldn’t rush into any major financial decisions immediately after exiting. We believe that you should celebrate the amazing achievement and take some time with the funds in your account. It’s quite possible that you’ve been spending or allocating some capital prior to completion (at least mentally, if not physically), but we strongly advocate for some downtime post completion.

The * in the title allows for some flexibility for those who have a pressing need to take action. This could be paying off a financially stressful mortgage, helping a loved one, or giving yourself a treat you’ve dreamt of since childhood. These things are completely normal, and we’re not against them. We might review these actions with clients as a sense check, but we won’t advise doing nothing just for the sake of doing nothing.

You are a business now

If, after your successful exit, you have £5 million or more of investible assets, this could (should) be generating £300,000 or more of income or growth for you annually. This is more than the revenue generated by a substantial number of businesses in the UK.

For most people in this situation, they don’t really think about how to manage things day-to-day. The investments are set up, the income is coming in, there’s no need to do anything more. They tend to be passive observers rather than actively involved. From our perspective, and as a business who manages many clients of this type, we’ve learned that it’s helpful to think of your financial position as it’s own business, or mini eco-system if you will.

We want our clients to get the best out of their capital. Whether they prefer to tend to their business themselves or leave it in the hands of their trusted team while they spend their time on things that bring them joy, we support them.

We act as the CFO or CEO of these mini eco-systems.