Eugene Harvey Hines
Eugene Harvey Hines

The wealth management industry has a strange way of deciding who needs advice. It looks at the size of the account. We have confused a business model with a client need. A $20 million investor may have accountants, attorneys, multiple advisors, and a sophisticated financial infrastructure already in place. A couple with $1 million approaching retirement may have something much more urgent: 25 years of decisions ahead of them, and very little room for a mistake.

I understand why the industry gravitates toward $5 million, $10 million, or $20 million accounts. Assets under management drive revenue, and larger relationships can make the economics of advice easier to justify. Global assets under management reached a record $147 trillion in 2025, while the wealth, defined-contribution, and insurance segments generated more than 80% of global net flows in 2024. The commercial logic is obvious. The problem begins when commercial logic becomes our definition of who deserves attention.

The size of someone's portfolio tells me how much they have. It tells me very little about how much guidance they need. We let account size stand in for need, and those are not the same thing.

Consider the household with $500,000, $1 million, or $2 million accumulated over decades. These people have already accomplished something significant. Then retirement arrives, and the rules suddenly change. They have spent 30 or 40 years learning how to receive a paycheck. Now they have to create one from their assets.

This single shift unlocks a cascade of decisions. How much can they spend? When should they claim Social Security? How should withdrawals work? What will taxes do to their income? How much investment risk can they tolerate? Can they help a child or grandchild? What happens if one spouse dies? What do they want to leave behind?

Each of these questions is a life decision that carries pivotal financial consequences.

The urgency is hardly theoretical. EBRI's 2026 Retirement Confidence Survey found that only 64% of Americans feel confident they will have enough money to live comfortably throughout retirement, down from the previous year. Meanwhile, the industry continues to see growing demand for human advice: McKinsey estimates that human-advised relationships in the US could rise from 53 million in 2024 to as many as 71 million by 2034.

I see the problem most clearly during moments when someone's financial life suddenly changes. I remember sitting with a widow shortly after her husband died and watching her hand shake as she wrote a check for an investment account. She had assets. What she needed at that moment was confidence about what those assets meant and what she should do next.

Divorce can create the same financial shock. So can retirement, inheritance, a job loss, a major health event, or the responsibility of supporting family members. A person can possess substantial resources and still feel completely unprepared to manage them because wealth is not the same as financial confidence.

My first responsibility is often much more basic than discussing investments. What do you own? What do you owe? What income do you have? Which decisions require action today? Which decisions can wait? Those questions can turn an overwhelming financial picture into something a person can actually navigate.

More often than not, my advice is simple: you've done the work, you're financially secure, go enjoy your life. I have clients who accumulated more wealth over 15 or 20 years and still struggle to spend any of it. They are not necessarily frugal. They simply never learned what their money was allowed to do for them.

Other conversations are harder. A client may be spending at an unsustainable rate. A parent may be repeatedly rescuing an adult child from financial mistakes. A younger person may be tempted by the promise of a 300% return from the latest speculative investment while neglecting debt, emergency savings, and consistent retirement contributions. I have to be willing to tell them what the numbers are telling me, even if they would prefer another answer.

This is where I believe wealth management needs a reset.

Technology can make account management faster. It can make documents easier to exchange and information easier to process. It cannot replace the uncomfortable conversation a fiduciary sometimes has to initiate. An advisor has to understand the family, the career, the retirement plans, the fears and the obligations sitting behind the account.

This matters far outside the financial-services industry. Almost every person eventually faces a decision involving money that carries consequences for a home, a parent, a child, a marriage, or a future they cannot yet see.

So here is my challenge to the industry I've spent my career in: stop measuring success by the size of the accounts you land and start measuring it by the clarity you give the people who trust you with them.

Raise your minimums if you must, but build the next generation of advisors to serve the ten million households making $1 million decisions, not just the ten thousand making $20 million ones. The best advisor has to be willing to understand the person behind the account, challenge assumptions, protect the client's future, and tell the truth about what their money can and cannot do.

About the Author:

Eugene Harvey Hines, CFP®, is the Managing Director of Hines Wealth Management, bringing over three decades of comprehensive financial planning experience since 1993. He specializes in insurance, retirement, tax efficiency, and estate conservation. Previously, he served as Vice President of Investments at Wells Fargo Advisors. Based in South Carolina, Harvey holds FINRA Series 7, 63, and 65 credentials.

Securities and advisory services offered through LPL Financial, a registered investment adviser. Member FINRA/SIPC. Hines Wealth Management and LPL Financial are separate entities.

Hines Wealth Management and LPL Financial do not provide legal advice or tax services. Please consult your legal advisor or tax advisor regarding your specific situation.