FCS: An Asset Management Company with Midwestern Values
FCSTom Freeman, one of our founders at FCS Private Wealth Management, has always said that “Having wealth, but no time to enjoy it, is pointless.” We firmly believe this to be the case. Our number one goal as an asset management company is to make sure our clients can enjoy the freedom to relax and enjoy the benefits of their wealth. Your joy is our joy.
Our clients are never just clients—we consider them friends and family. That’s why we’re dedicated to providing premier wealth and asset management services in Leawood, the Kansas City area, and beyond!
FCS isn’t here to be just another asset management company, we’re built on a foundation of trust, competence, and discretion. These pillars inform every decision we make in both our private wealth and family offices.
With a combined 100 years of industry experience, a low client-to-advisor ratio, and experience in delivering sophisticated strategies in wealth management, FCS is dedicated to providing our clients with everything they need for their life and legacy.
Your Asset Management Company Should Feel Like a Partner
FCS is able to offer the intimacy of a boutique firm backed by the same sophistication and resources of one of the largest wealth management firms in the world. We are able to offer these services both in our Private Wealth division and Family Office. By structuring our team in this way, we can better serve the unique needs of each audience while maintaining our high standards of service.
Private Wealth Management
“If you don’t determine the purpose of your wealth, your wealth has no purpose.”
– Tom Freeman, Managing Director
As a premiere asset management company, FCS focuses on determining the exact purpose of your wealth. Every client has unique needs, goals, and desires so we work with you to determine how best to serve all of those facets.
Through our portfolio advisory, advance planning and tax-efficient investment strategies. We strive to ensure our clients’ success in reaching their goals.
Wealth Management
FCS offers custom investment planning solutions, financial advice, and a full array of investment services. Through institutional-level asset allocation and completion strategies, customized portfolio construction and implementation, we’re able to provide our clients with the tools they need to meet their goals.
Asset Management
We have experience in everything from traditional to more alternative asset classes. Our investment capabilities are designed for the unique needs of high net worth individuals. We also offer comprehensive planning and education on complex topics like estate investment or estate planning strategies and business succession.
Liability Management
FCS has access to financial markets across the globe, as well as various products and services through Wells Fargo Bank. You can trust FCS to handle your assets with care no matter how the market changes. We will review your portfolio performance and work to mitigate risk.
Alternative and Direct Investments
We are able to offer our clients priority access to a universe of global direct and alternative investment opportunities. Through non-traditional strategies and structures across a broad range of sectors, regions, and asset classes, we can provide opportunities that are typically only available to institutional investors.
The FCS Planning Process
At FCS, we want you to tell us what you’d like your money to do, and then we use our expertise to create a plan. Every client is different, and their investment plan will reflect their unique objectives. We utilize a 4-step process in creating a customized investment plan for each or our clients.
Step 1: Establish Goals
This is the first and most fundamental step. Your financial advisor will develop a comprehensive analysis of your current assets and wealth in order to determine the best way to achieve your goals.
Things we take into consideration include:
- Retirement planning
- Risk management
- Estate planning
- Income preservation
- Tax-efficient investing
- Assisting loved ones
- Philanthropy
We believe our intimate wealth management process is best for clients as it is designed to help you achieve your goals with the least amount of friction. Your advisor’s guidance is always tailored to your individual needs.
Step 2: Develop the Plan
Among our varied strategies, FCS uses the modern portfolio management theory developed by Nobel Prize winner Harry Markowitz. This strategy attempts to maximize returns for a given level of risk. Modern portfolio theory is a mainstay in investment strategy and the potential benefits of diversification are well understood.
We specialize in using the science of wealth management to create a road map for pursuing future objectives, as well as allocating assets tactically for optimal portfolio performance. Every client is different, and their portfolios will always reflect their unique goals.
Step 3: Implement
While this step seems straightforward, wealth management is rarely a simple process. With our experience, we aim to make the complexities of plan implementation flow smoothly.
The implementation phase is why it’s so important to FCS that we develop deep relationships with our clients. It takes effort to establish routines; every client is different and it doesn’t happen overnight. We understand that it’s an evolutionary and developmental process.
Step 4: Evaluate
A plan is a snapshot, but life is a motion picture. Our advisors at FCS know that things are bound to change. To make sure that our clients have the highest probability of success, we meet regularly to update and review the progress of their portfolio. We have decades of experience navigating different markets and economic realities, so we are able to pivot and adjust plans to our clients needs.
One of our core tenets of service is anticipating our client’s needs. We’re here so you never have to worry about your money again and can get back to enjoying the experiences that life is really about.
Family Office
Families come first in our Family Office division at FCS. In our family office, our team uses the same diligent planning process that we do for individual private wealth management.
Managing family wealth comes with its own unique joys and challenges. As an asset management company, we bring over 3 decades of experience to bear in this area, experience that is essential to building confidence in your family’s future for generations to come.
We work with a limited number of wealthy families, which allows us to fulfill our commitments to performance, responsiveness, and discretion as we simplify your life and allow you to enjoy your success.
Teamwork is an integral part of the culture at FCS. When working with your family, we bring the expertise of a Wealth Advisor, Family Investment, and a Family Services Coordinator. Together, our team strategizes and develops a comprehensive plan that coordinates all aspects of your family life.
Our Family Office Services
Peer Networking and Events
At FCS, we’re not looking to just be your asset management company; we understand that your financial advisor is a part of your life. It’s always important to cultivate relationships with your peers and like-minded people. We offer events to facilitate interaction, idea sharing, and connectivity with our exclusive network.
Consolidated Reporting
FCS uses a best-in-class aggregate reporting service. 24/7, our clients have access to their investment strategy and portfolio performance via customized reports and models.
You’ll never feel in the dark about what your money is doing. We review reports with you regularly and are always willing to adjust your investment plan as life changes. We keep an unyielding eye on market trends so you can be confident in our recommendations.
Family Advisory and Philanthropy
We provide advice and solutions for family wealth education in these areas:
- Intergenerational wealth transitions
- Family governance
- Intentional communication and decision making
- Philanthropic legacies
- And more
Every family is unique. At FCS, we strive to understand the intricacies of each family as a whole. We understand the importance of learning the family communication patterns and keeping everyone on the same page.
Referrals
FCS has a carefully curated selection of relationships that offer solutions for personal and family services. We’re always happy to make sure our clients are taken care of, even beyond the services we offer directly.
These include:
- Art advisory
- Healthcare concierge services
- Travel services
- Security and privacy
- Restaurant reservations
- Private aviation
- Yacht leasing/purchasing
FCS cares about our Kansas City roots
We love that we’re from the midwest, and we bring our unique midwestern charm and work ethic to everything we do. Life’s too short to not work with nice people, which is why we focus on cultivating enjoyable relationships with our staff and clients.
Our staff has been working in the Kansas City area for decades. Some of our clients will recognize Tom Freeman from his days on the Kansas City Chiefs. Many of our team members went to school in the area and have been working in financial services for their entire careers.
FCS was founded on putting our clients first and using our knowledge of the financial world to give our clients the best experience possible. Our staff is hand selected based on their experience and aptitude to make sure we are always offering top-of-the-line service.
Not your average asset management company
Money is an emotional part of life. Whether you’re planning for retirement, helping put your children through school, or looking at purchasing property, it’s important to have a financial firm that you can trust to be competent and discretionary.
Built on Trust
At FCS we always do what we say we will, when we say we will do it. Why would you settle for an asset management company that did anything else? We’re here to partner with you in managing your finances, so that you don’t have to worry about any of it. The entire point of having a financial advisor is so that you don’t need to wonder whether your money is working for you.
FCS is not interested in cookie cutter asset management, and that’s why we believe our clients trust us. We have retained clients for 10 to 15 years because they know that their interests are always going to come first.
We work to build strong relationships with each of our clients because as a financial advisory firm we know anticipating our client’s needs based on their lives is vital. FCS can do this because of our low client to advisor ratio. Larger firms don’t have the same luxuries of being purposeful and responsive to the unique, individual needs of each client. That’s why FCS only acquires a select number of clients each year, we never want to sacrifice our familiarity with our clients because it’s such a core part of our enterprise.
Thriving through competence
The purpose of an asset management company is to simplify your life and work towards your financial goals. With a combined over 100 years of industry experience, clients across the country trust the advisors at FCS to help them navigate and thrive through every type of market environment.
Our dedicated staff harnesses a diverse set of skills and tools to the service of our clientele. We offer custom investment planning solutions, diligently research trends, and tailored analysis to provide tactical solutions for all of life’s important transitions and financial decisions.
We partner with Wells Fargo Bank, affording us the resources of one of the largest banks in the world, with one of the highest credit ratings. FCS is uniquely positioned to offer boutique services to our clients without compromising access to financial markets across the globe.
FCS houses advisors that have been nationally recognized, Tom Freeman was named the Forbes Best-in-State 2022. Ted Chartier was named the Forbes Best-in-State 2020. Sarah Tiedt was named to The Working Mother’s Top Wealth Advisor Mom’s list 2020.
Even further, multiple members of our staff are CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNER™ professionals. We believe our clients can trust us because years of experience have given us the confidence to know what we are doing. We believe our experience and success speaks volumes.
*The Forbes Best-in-State Wealth Advisors rating algorithm is based on the previous year’s industry experience, interviews, compliance records, assets under management, revenue and other criteria by SHOOK Research, LLC, which does not receive compensation from the advisors or their firms in exchange for placement on a rating. Investment performance is not a criterion. Self-completed survey was used for rating. This rating is not related to the quality of the investment advice and based solely on the disclosed criteria.
*The Working Mother’s Top Wealth Advisor Moms ranking algorithm based on industry experience, interviews, compliance records, assets under management, revenue and other criteria by SHOOK Research, LLC, which does not receive compensation from the advisors or their firms in exchange for placement on a ranking. Investment performance is not a criterion.
Dependable discretion
Discretion is the third pillar of our financial management philosophy. Every member of our team works to protect the privacy and security of our clients, without exception.
Many high net worth individuals choose an asset management company outside of where they live because they don’t necessarily want their neighbors or community members to know about their financial decisions. At FCS, we meet you where you are, whether you’re local to Kansas City or coming to us from Napa Valley or Miami. You can always trust that your business stays your business.
Service oriented
FCS believes every client deserves to be treated with exceptional service. Our advisory teams work together and do what is asked, when it’s asked, and to the best of our ability. We consider ourselves responsible for uncompromising levels of diligence and working to create unique, memorable, and personalized experiences for our clients.
Community oriented
Our team believes in the importance of giving back to the community. Helping make our community a better place benefits everybody. We know that assisting our clients has a ripple effect within Kansas City and beyond, because many of our clients are also philanthropically minded.
Members of FCS staff have worked in the small business community and serve on the boards of local nonprofit organizations.
FCS Industry Insights
A trustworthy asset management company is finely tuned into the industry. Not only do we believe our staff is best in class, we make sure to give back to our community by providing ongoing industry insights, education and other services.
Family Office Advisory
We advise wealth creators and emerging and established Family Offices on industry trends, best practices for structure and governance, as well as education for their own staff.
FCS invests a large part of our budget into training and educating our staff to ensure we have the best-in-class in-house.
Monthly Market Updates
Our FCS advisors offer monthly, topical market updates via Zoom by invitation for our clients and other industry professionals. We also provide high-level quarterly updates.
Newsletter and Blog
We offer a monthly newsletter and regular blog updates that provide insight both into FCS practices and industry trends because we believe in the importance of education.
An asset management company that feels like home
When we founded FCS Private Wealth Management, we wanted to create an asset management company that felt welcoming and warm. Money is such an intimate part of a person’s life, we work to be the kind of support our clients can rely on.
Everything from how we interact with clients to how we decorate the office is curated to create a place that feels like home. Our clients should enjoy coming to visit us in the office, just as we enjoy coming to work! For us, being an asset management company is not just about investment planning, but about developing a relationship with our clients.
A lot of clients have anxiety about money or are worried about how their money may affect their family relationships or their standing in the community. We’re here to mitigate that. Not every advisor is equipped with the emotional intelligence necessary to navigate those sorts of fears, but we make it a priority both in our hiring and our ongoing internal training process.
We’re not just here to manage money—we see each client as a whole person. Our advisors understand that we’re being trusted with our client’s legacies and hopes. We never take that for granted.
As Susan Freeman says, it doesn’t matter how many zeroes there are in your bank account, it matters what you need us for and how we can deliver. We are grateful for the opportunity to make a difference and we understand that it’s a responsibility.
We are here to serve and to partner with you on your financial journey.
Reach out and discover how FCS Private Wealth Management can serve you in discovering your wealth’s purpose. We’re built on the pillars of trust, competence and discretion with the goal of building strong relationships for life.
With FCS, you can always trust that we’re going to do what we say we’re going to do. You can relax and be confident knowing that your finances are well kept and working to preserve your well-earned lifestyle.
A comprehensive investment plan developed from a deep understanding of your financial goals is the key to finding success in managing your wealth.
We know it’s not enough to be just an asset management company. Your money is an integral part of your life, and you deserve an advisor who cares and knows you like a friend.
Let us welcome you home at FCS Private Wealth Management.