A family office is a structure built to receive, govern, and grow a family's wealth, not a person you hire. We've built these end to end, including for a founder whose payout landed six weeks after the structure was commissioned. Same discipline, applied before the money arrives.
What a family office actually is
The term covers a wide range: a single-family office (SFO) serving one family exclusively, a multi-family office (MFO) serving several, or, more often at the point of first setup, a single holding vehicle plus a small set of governance documents. What makes it a family office rather than "a wealth manager" is that the family owns and controls the structure itself, not just the advice running through it. That ownership is also why the structure decision comes first: it's a tax, control, and succession decision made simultaneously, not three separate ones.
Why the structure decision can't wait
Most family offices get built reactively, after a liquidity event has already happened, a family business is already in transition, or assets are already scattered across entities and countries. Every one of those situations is harder and more expensive to structure after the fact than before it. The families who avoid that cost are the ones who treat the structure as infrastructure to commission ahead of the event, not a project to start once the money has already landed.
The six decisions that set up a family office
In order, and each with its own page: choosing the entity and vehicle, setting it up and registering it, choosing how the family's capital is actually invested, building the succession and governance framework around it, getting the tax and cross-border position right, and putting in place the reporting that keeps it running quietly.
01
Structure & Vehicle
There is no single correct vehicle for a family office. The right one depends on how much weight the family places on control, succession, and tax, in that order or another, and most real structures end up combining more than one.
02
Setup & Registration
Each vehicle from the previous page has its own registration path. Sequencing them correctly, and starting the slower ones early, is what keeps a family office from being commissioned after the money it was meant to receive.
03
Investment Strategy
How a family's capital actually gets invested is a separate decision from the entity structure holding it. Here's how we frame the options, by what the family is trying to do, not by which one is "best."
04
Succession & Governance
A structure without a governance layer around it just relocates the family's disputes into a more expensive venue. The documents below exist to make sure that doesn't happen.
05
Tax & Cross-Border
For families spread across India, the GCC, and the US, the tax position is rarely set by one country's rules alone. Three areas come up in almost every family office we've built.
06
Reporting & Operations
A family office that only reports well once a year isn't really being run, it's being reconstructed. The steady-state layer is what makes the difference.
Proof, not a pitch
A family office, built before the money landed
Founders after a liquidity event
Prefer a packaged starting point? See the Family Office Launchpad →
Common questions
What is a family office?
A structure the family itself owns and controls to receive, govern, and grow its wealth. That ownership is what distinguishes it from simply hiring a wealth manager: the family owns the vehicle, not just the advice running through it.
What legal structure should a family office use in India?
Most real family offices combine more than one vehicle: a private trust for succession, an LLP or company for active investment, and a Section 8 company if philanthropy is a formal part of the structure. See our Structure & Vehicle page.
How should a family office actually invest its capital?
It depends on the goal: AIF Category II for pooled private-markets access, PMS for a segregated discretionary portfolio, direct holding for full control, or a GIFT City Family Investment Fund for global-scale families above roughly $10 million.
What is RNOR status and why does it matter for a family office?
Resident but Not Ordinarily Resident (RNOR) status lets a returning family member keep foreign-sourced income outside Indian tax for up to 3 years after return, a real, time-limited planning window that has to be sequenced before the move, not after.
Does a family office need to register with SEBI in India?
No. A family office that manages only the family's own money isn't required to register with SEBI as an investment advisor, portfolio manager, or AIF, though the underlying investment vehicles it uses may carry their own registration requirements.
Family office insights
AIF or PMS: choosing how your family office actually invests
How AIF and PMS actually differ for a family office: minimum ticket, tax treatment, and how the capital is held.
Read the briefing →RNOR status: the planning window most returning NRIs miss
RNOR status lets a returning family member keep foreign income outside Indian tax for up to three years, a window planned before the move.
Read the briefing →Building your family office.
The structure decision is a tax, control, and succession decision at once.
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Talk to us about your family office.
Bring the situation, however incomplete; leave with a written, fixed-fee plan for the structure, on the same calendar as everything else we file for you.