Jamie Hopkins, the financial planning expert and attorney heading Bryn Mawr Trust's private wealth management business, has taken on a new role as a strategic advisor at Wealth.com, a provider of digital estate planning technology for financial advisors and consumers.
Hopkins' appointment comes about three months after Wealth.com's leadership team formed a new advisory council that, in the words of co-founder Tim White, would be "dedicated to helping more financial professionals access the educational resources and planning solutions they need to deliver sophisticated legacy planning services to clients."
Speaking with ThinkAdvisor about the announcement, Hopkins says the world of financial planning continues to grow more demanding and sophisticated, and clients are expecting support with much more than just the investment portfolio. In fact, with the impending expiration of key provisions of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017, Hopkins expects estate planning matters will become a major client touchpoint in the next 12 to 18 months.
Hopkins said he would draw on his financial planning and legal experience as he collaborates closely with the company's legal and product development teams to drive further innovation.
"I've been getting to know the team for a year or so now, and I've been very impressed," Hopkins said. "One thing I can say is that their document creation process is one in which their AI tech not only cuts down on the time required to do this planning, but it also delivers a superior result to what you could do by hand. That's really impressive."
According to Hopkins, there are a number of peer organizations that can do some of what Wealth.com does for financial advisors and consumers, but he sees Wealth.com as the current estate planning service market leader. To that end, Hopkins himself has previously invested in the company.
