The Great Wealth Transfer has been discussed for decades. Twenty years ago, people were already predicting it. Now it's here, and like most things, it's turning out to be more complex than expected. It’s not just about a new generation inheriting money. It's about what that generation does with it, and what it means for generational wealth, estate planning, and family legacy.
Estimates on the size of the great wealth transfer vary. Cerulli Associates, the research firm most cited on this topic, has put the number as high as $124 trillion by 2048, with roughly $105 trillion passing to heirs and $18 trillion to charity. Other researchers have offered more conservative estimates. The figures move depending on who's counting and what assumptions they use, but every serious estimate lands in the trillions.
When I sat down to write this, I got curious about the word "estate." Today, "estate planning" implies planning for the end of life. In its original sense, estate meant a person’s state or condition, their standing in life. The word later came to include a person’s property, financial means, and legal interests...think Downton Abbey.
That broader idea makes “estate planning” feel like more than planning for death. It can also mean bringing order and intention to your financial life today—so you are better prepared for the life you are living, the people you care about, and the decisions that may come next.
This isn't a new idea. The Stoics practiced memento mori, "remember you will die," not as a morbid exercise but as a tool for clarity. Marcus Aurelius wrote about it constantly, the idea being that keeping death in view sharpens your sense of what actually matters, so you spend your days on the right things instead of drifting. Other cultures have built this into daily life more directly. For some in Mexico Día de los Muertos treats death not as an ending to avoid but as part of an ongoing relationship, with families building altars, telling stories, and staying connected to those who came before. And a growing death positive movement, led by death doulas and end-of-life planners, is built around a similar premise: talking openly about death well before it's urgent tends to produce a better life, not a darker one. Families who've had those hard conversations early report less regret and more clarity about what mattered all along.
My point is this: we should think of financial planning as estate planning in the broadest sense. In this fuller version of life planning, we stop treating our lives and our parents' lives as separate chapters and start seeing them as one continuous story: the money, the family dynamics, the traits passed down, all connected. We plan not just around major life shifts like having a child, changing careers, retiring, or facing a terminal illness, but around how to live well through all of it. Wealth transfer and estate planning are starting to catch up to that idea.
Families are spending more time getting to know each other. Parents are working to make sure their children are better prepared to handle money than they were. Some are also working to understand where their children's values diverge from their own, including on things like politics. For families with significant estates, finding some alignment on how the money will be used has become part of the process. When parents aren't initiating that conversation, kids increasingly are, pushing their parents toward a more progressive approach to money without necessarily asking them to abandon their financial values.
Money is deeply emotional. Very few financial decisions happen without some emotional undercurrent. Even the stock market, for all its supposed efficiency, has ultimately been driven by how people feel (although machine trading could be changing that).
The Great Wealth Transfer needs to protect more than money. It needs to protect legacy, values, and family structure. It needs to make room for reconciliation where there's estrangement. A growing number of professionals are now helping clients with that deeper work too, going beyond the traditional planning process of goals, cash flow, wills, trusts, medical directives, and risk management. I think this approach matters as much to our wellbeing as a strong balance sheet.
I'm fortunate to know a few professionals working at the leading edge of this work. Here's how some of them describe their own work:
"Succession planning is not simply about transferring ownership documents; it is about preserving relationships, identity, intentional stewardship, tax efficiency, and enduring legacy."
- Marie Feindt at Members' Wealth
“Our mission is to help families build generational wellness - the kind that goes deeper than finances. It’s about living fully now, healing old patterns, and having the conversations we’ve been avoiding. It’s about creating a legacy that’s clear, kind, and aligned. “ -
Brittany Dobson at Mimi's Porch
“Families or couples seeking to craft meaningful legacies and forge purposeful futures must develop: a shared vision; collective goals; the tools to forge a path; and the mutual understanding to walk it together. Financial structures, such as trusts, estate plans, or prenuptial agreements, can provide material governance, but more is needed to address the relational complexities nested within.” -
Charles Eckhart at Cathexis Group
About the Author – Tim Thomas, COO
Tim Thomas is the co-founder of Members’ Wealth and serves as the firm’s Chief Operating Officer. Prior to this position, he worked in a variety of roles including consultant to the Bank of New York’s investment platforms, branch manager and Director of Service and Operations at Lockwood Financial, and as a specialist clerk on the New York Stock Exchange. In recent years, Tim started and operated an RIA, consulted other RIAs, and worked as a financial coach and consultant on financial strategy for small companies and nonprofits.
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