Hanson McClain sells majority interest to private equity firm

Hanson McClain Advisors, a Sacramento, Calif.-based registered investment adviser managing $2.4 billion in assets, has sold a controlling interest to Boston-based private equity firm Parthenon Capital Partners for an undisclosed sum. The firm will use the proceeds to invest in technology, systems and people, as well as to expand in new markets organically and through acquisitions, it said in a release. It also said co-founders Scott Hanson and Pat McClain will continue to run day-to-day operations. "We've been approached by several firms that wanted to buy us, so we started thinking it was time for us to buy other firms," Scott Hanson told the Sacramento Business Journal. The firm has several offices in California — Sacramento, Roseville, Folsom and Walnut Creek — as well as in Denver. Mr. Hanson would like to add more advisers in those markets, the Bay Area and the Pacific Northwest. (Related: Trial court orders Ameriprise to pay Hanson McClain $1.5 million) Founded in 1993, Hanson McClain initially specialized in serving employees of local utilities in planning and transitioning into retirement. Mr. Hanson once remarked that his firm knew more about the details of those companies' pension plans than the companies themselves. About a decade ago, Hanson McClain tried a franchise model to open offices in several states, but gave it up because it couldn't ensure consistency. Any new expansion will make the new advisers employees of Hanson McClain, according to Mr. Hanson. It launched Liberty Reverse Mortgage in 2004 and sold it two years later to Genworth Financial Mortgage for $50 million.