In what's sure to be one of the biggest RIA deals of the year, Wealth Enhancement has agreed to acquire RWA Wealth Partners, a Boston registered investment advisor with approximately $22.46 billion in client assets.
The deal, which dwarfs the more modest tuck-ins that's driven the Minneapolis firm's rapid growth, arrives after reports that its own private equity owners have been shopping the business.
The acquisition unveiled Wednesday would lift Wealth Enhancement to more than $187.1 billion in client advisory, trust and brokerage assets. That total includes $8.5 billion held with Advisory Solutions Group, an affiliated RIA.
Wealth Enhancement reported $164.6 billion in client assets as of Aug. 31. The RWA deal is expected to close in the fourth quarter while marking an exit for Summit Partners, RWA's private equity backer.
RWA is led by Michelle Knight, its chief executive and chief economist. With a strong standing as one of the largest woman-led RIAs in the country, RWA was formed in 2023 when Adviser Investments combined with Ropes Wealth Advisors, previously a wholly owned subsidiary of law firm Ropes & Gray. Besides its Boston headquarters, RWA has offices in Newton, Mass.; San Francisco and Costa Mesa, Calif.; Chicago; and Traverse City, Mich.
The main attraction is RWA Family Office. It will become part of Reserve by Wealth Enhancement, the acquirer's service line for families that generally hold $25 million or more in investable assets. RWA's trust and estate expertise comes from its Ropes & Gray lineage. Its family office team handles trust administration, professional trustee services, estate settlement, and personal and fiduciary tax work.
For ultra-high-net-worth households, those services have often been split among advisors, attorneys and accountants. With the RWA deal, Wealth Enhancement is joining a wave of other large players betting that the wealthiest clients will pay for a single team that coordinates all of them.
"One of the core founding principles of Wealth Enhancement was to provide complex financial planning to high-net-worth and ultra-high-net-worth clients. RWA's capabilities will strengthen how we meet those needs," said Jeff Dekko, Wealth Enhancement's chief executive. "Its established family office capabilities add depth to how we serve ultra-high-net-worth clients with deep specialization in trusts and estates, tax-aware planning, and the seamless coordination required to turn advice into action."
After closing, RWA Family Office will still be led by Knight, JP Powers, Nicole LaChapelle and Kristin Fazio. RWA's Private Wealth business, which serves high-net-worth clients, will operate as advisor teams inside Wealth Enhancement, with Steve Reder continuing to work with those teams.
"Wealth Enhancement shares our belief that comprehensive wealth management starts with a deep understanding of each client and the life they are working to build across generations," Knight said. "This human side of wealth has always been central to how we serve families, because behind every financial decision is a set of goals, values, and aspirations."
Wealth Enhancement has grown mostly through a steady stream of smaller deals. At the end of August it closed on Arbor Capital Management, a $345 million RIA based in Anchorage, Alaska, which took the firm into its 41st state.
For the second quarter alone, Echelon Partners' second-quarter RIA M&A deal report credited Wealth Enhancement with seven transactions; only Stratos Wealth Network, with 11, did more.
The recent burst of acquisitions is also happening at an interesting time for Wealth Enhancement, which is reportedly being scouted by new prospective PE owners. As a report by the Financial Times had it, Carlyle Group and Bain Capital were competing as the final bidders for the firm, which at the time held a valuation of about $7 billion including debt.
Assuming it does happen, the acquisition of Wealth Enhancement would be among the largest on record for a single RIA, rivaling Mubadala Capital's 2024 deal for CI Financial in 2024.
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