It was reported recently, that a woman left $100,000 to her three Cockatiels. A friend, knowing the business I am in, asked, "how does that work?" The money is left in a trust for the care of the birds, and a trustee is appointed by the trust document to manage the care of the birds using distributions from the trust. The follow up question was, "what keeps the trustee from taking all the money for themselves?" The answer is nothing really, but it can be prevented using a corporate trustee.

The lesson here is that picking the right trustee for your trust is probably the most important factor as to whether your trust works as you intended or not. Even if your beneficiaries aren't birds, what do you need to consider when looking for a responsible trustee?

Our firm offers a boutique trust and investment experience. Using efficient investment and operational processes, we deliver personal, customized service to our clients, including those considered too small by the larger competitors in our market.

Our trust and investment advisors are here to guide clients through volatile financial markets, tax law changes, complex investment options, family issues and estate planning choices. Our goal is to ensure long-term financial security and optimal investment performance for our individual clients, their families and future beneficiaries.

The management, protection and growth of personal assets are far less challenging with the assistance of a trusted fiduciary advisor. At Arboretum Wealth & Trust Management, we provide professional trust and estate administration, investment management and financial planning services.

We deliver sophisticated, comprehensive financial advice and truly conflict free investment management through a team that smaller competitors are simply unable to match in experience, education and resources.

Members of our team are also regular contributors to publications regarding our areas of expertise:

"Fiduciary Investing: Choose Prudence over Performance"

"Financial Planning for Every Stage of Life"

In 1906, a gentleman named Francis Galton attended a farmer's fair and observed a contest guessing the weight of an ox. More than 800 guesses were registered, including both regular townspeople and livestock experts.

Amazingly, the collective average guess was only one pound less than the actual weight of 1,198 pounds and much closer than any of the livestock experts. He referred to this phenomenon as "The Wisdom of Crowds".

Securities prices are set by similar but much larger groups of people in the open market. Experts and amateurs both contribute their value guess in the form of purchases and sales.

How do we harness the wisdom of crowds to help you build a secure financial future?

Our professional staff also produces white papers covering subjects important to the work that we do.

2018 Market Review

A Division of GreatBanc Trust Company

We value client communication. In addition to informing you, open and informed conversations allow us to do the absolute best job for you.

We put together two regular publications. The first is our Market Update which provide a short and easy to understand overview of economic and market news. Depending on your level on interest, we put together weekly, quarterly, and annual versions of this update. This content is also further summarized in our video market updates.

Here is an example of one of our market updates:

Our video market updates are available here:

Our second publication is The Arboretum Almanac. A wide variety of topics are covered in this quarterly newsletter. Sometimes the topics relate directly to our work, but some of the information is more general. From college funding planning, when to apply for social security, to general educational topics on the economy, our clients have found this newsletter entertaining and helpful.

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Our Mission

Our Client Experience

Our team has the experience and education to speak beyond pure trust and investments to become a true trusted advisor to the client across a variety of financial and wealth planning subjects.

We have helped clients manage through a wide range of situations including death and estate issues, divorce issues, college funding and charitable gifting. Beyond our expertise, we pride ourselves on the high level of communication, understanding and empathy we provide during these times.

Transparency is a key component of our philosophy. From easy to understand fees, open conversations on expectations, and a solid, disciplined investment strategy based on long proven principles, we assure that our clients understand what we do and how we do it.

As a fiduciary, our standards of client care, our responsibility to our client’s best interests, and even our legal duty to our clients are higher than many other financial service firms.

Our relationship with GreatBanc Trust allows us to provide the resources, operational oversight, and financial and business stability of a much larger company.