Family office exec Braverman known for structured products and derivatives. Harris myCFO, the ultra-high-net-worth arm of Harris Private Bank, has opened its first Northeast U.S. office in Fort Lee, N.J., and named Steve Braverman, former managing director of Tahoe Advisers, to run it.

"[Although] we have been serving clients in the Northeast for a number of years, this new location allows us a more intimate level of access to our clients as we deliver our comprehensive suite of family-office services," says Graham Parsons, head of private banking for Toronto, Canada-based BMO Financial Group, Harris Bank's corporate parent.

Braverman's move to Harris myCFO puts an end to Tahoe Advisers. Last year the three-year-old firm nearly merged with Garrison Financial, a Fayetteville, Ark.-based multifamily office, but the deal fell through.

Harris myCFO's new bridgehead in the Northeast is right across the Hudson River from Manhattan, arguably the biggest -- and perhaps most competitive -- high-wealth market in the world.

Big guns

But then Harris myCFO's New York-area office may have a built-in differentiator in Braverman. He's a respected wealth strategist whose Englewood Cliffs, N.J.-based Tahoe Advisors racked up an impressive track record as a specialized derivatives and structured products consultancy to high-net-worth families.

Harris myCFO isn't the first out-of-town ultra-wealth shop to summon extraordinary leadership to lead the charge in New York and other northeastern markets, however.

Early this year Houston-based U.S. Fiduciary recruited hedge-fund specialist David Zale to establish its first New York-based private-client advisory. Last fall St. Louis-based Lowenhaupt Global Advisors hired Heidi Steiger, formerly head of private-asset management at Neuberger Berman, to run the firm's New York practice and to act as a sort of in-house consultant on customization for the firm as a whole.

In 2005 Gig Harbor, Wash.-based Threshold, originally the family office of Russell Investment Group chairman emeritus George Russell, named veteran wealth manager Lee Miller, formerly a managing director of U.S. Trust, to build out its ultra-high-net-worth business in New York and the rest of the Northeast. A few weeks before that Rockville, Md.-based Lydian Wealth Management tapped Jamie McLaughlin, former head of Mellon's private-client business in New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut -- and a former Connecticut state senator -- to help the firm make its mark in the Big Apple and to spearhead business development nationally.

Similarly, Harris myCFO has carved out a dual role for Braverman. In addition to overseeing the delivery of family-office services in the Northeast, Braverman will manage Harris myCFO's investment advisory platform as president of Harris myCFO Investment Advisory Services (IAS).

Joe Calabrese, Harris myCFO's president and head of ultra-high-net-worth services at Harris Private Bank, figures the bank is "extremely fortunate to have someone with Steve's expertise, namely in the areas of complex and alternative investment vehicles, overseeing our approach to providing best-in-class investment choices to our clients."

Though Braverman's former Tahoe Advisers colleague Matt Sher has joined Harris myCFO IAS as a principal, Braverman says the group is dedicated to providing advice with "the overall investment needs of high-net-worth individuals and families" in mind. In other words, IAS isn't anything like an all-alternatives platform. "We're differentiated at the core [by our specialist capabilities], but our focus is on meeting the needs of families."

Close to home

In fact, Braverman's own family has agreed to become a client of Harris myCFO. "As CIO of our family office, I can say that we were very glad to have found in Harris myCFO the solution in terms of trust, tax and estate planning as well as risk management and consolidated reporting that we'd been looking for."

Braverman's father Neil Braverman founded and sold several companies including Safeskin (now part of Kimberly Clark), a manufacturer hypoallergenic examination gloves for health-care professionals with sensitivities to latex. The Braverman Family Partnership is a private multifamily office that oversees nearly $1 billion in assets.

As for Harris myCFO's business-development strategy in the Northeast, Braverman says the plan is simply to "serve the families" and let growth take care of itself -- though he adds that potential clients may be "a bit more engaged now that they can draw on local expertise."

Until now much of Harris myCFO's northeastern business had been handled by its Atlanta and Chicago offices.

The New York-area office is Harris MyCFO's first new location since it established one in Chicago, Harris Bank's home turf, late in 2004. In addition to Fort Lee, Chicago, Atlanta and its Redwood City, Calif., headquarters, it has offices in Seattle, San Francisco and Los Angeles. It closed an office in Denver last year.

BMO paid $30 million for myCFO in 2002. The late 1990s brainchild of Netscape founder Jim Clark, the firm was hailed as a tech-edged alternative to more traditional private-wealth advisories -- a kind of web-based "virtual" multifamily office for the New Economy. Since its acquisition, the firm has taken a decidedly more low-key approach than in its high-flying infancy; a stance perhaps in keeping with its role as a bank-affiliated advisory for families with liquid assets of at least $25 million.

Harris myCFO doesn't give out its assets under advisory or administration. At the time of its acquisition BMO said it had "client relationships representing about $5.7 billion in assets under management." According to a 2005 survey by the Family Office Alliance, an Oak Brook, Ill.-based consultancy to wealthy families, Harris myCFO advised on $29 billion in client assets at the end of 2004 -- a 93.3% increase over 2003, though, in part at least, this surge may have been the result of re-positioning Harris Private Bank clients. -FWR

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