WealthManagement.com column argues sell-and-stay unblocks advisor succession plans

WealthManagement.com published a column on Oct. 13 arguing that what stalls advisor succession conversations is usually identity—not valuation, not terms, not an unwillingness to give up control. The author says the industry has framed succession as a binary: run the practice full tilt or hand over the keys and be done. A sell-and-stay structure, the column argues, is the difference between a plan that gets executed and one that sits on a whiteboard.

The column is written in the first person and draws on the author's account of sitting across the table from advisors who built substantial practices and could sell without working again, yet cannot start the conversation. Their question, as the author frames it, is who they are once they are no longer the person clients call. A 30-year practice carries client relationships built through marriages, health scares and the death of a spouse. It also carries community ties—such as a sponsored golf tournament or a school auction—that exist because of the business rather than beside it.

The author also describes advisors who sold for sums the column calls extraordinary and, months later, looked as though they had lost someone. The column attributes that to a long fusion of identity and business rather than weakness, and argues the all-or-nothing framing is what does the damage. A structure that keeps the seller in place after closing keeps those client relationships in the room through the transition, making the seller's role after closing part of the negotiation.