A short, honest self-check

Are you ready for a wealth manager, or not quite yet?

Six quick questions about your goals, your timeline, and how complicated your finances have become. Two minutes, no email required to see your result.

Takes about 2 minutes. Your answers are not saved or shared.
The short version

There is no single net worth figure that means you are "ready" for a wealth manager. It usually comes down to complexity, not just size: multiple accounts that do not talk to each other, a business or equity compensation that complicates your tax picture, or a plan that has not been looked at as a whole in years. If any of that sounds familiar, it may be worth exploring what coordinated planning would actually look like for you.

This self-check is educational. It reflects your own answers back to you, not a professional recommendation, and it is not a substitute for speaking with a qualified advisor about your specific situation.

The self-check

Six questions. About two minutes.

Answer honestly rather than aspirationally. There are no wrong answers, and nothing here is scored against you.

How this works

What happens after you get your result

01

You see your result immediately

No email gate. Your answers stay in your browser and are not sent anywhere or stored by us.

02

If it is useful, book a conversation

A 15-minute call, not a sales meeting. We ask questions and tell you honestly whether we think we can help.

03

You decide what happens next

If it is not a fit, we will say so and, where we can, point you somewhere more useful.

Worth understanding

What actually changes as your finances grow

Most people do not wake up one day needing a wealth manager. It happens gradually: a workplace retirement account here, a taxable brokerage account there, maybe a business or some equity compensation, and eventually you are the one holding all the pieces without a clear view of how they fit together.

The risk is not that any single account is mismanaged. It is that decisions get made in isolation. A tax strategy that makes sense for one account can work against another. Nobody is coordinating the whole picture, because nobody has been asked to.

Coordinated wealth management is not about picking better investments than you could pick yourself. It is about having someone whose job is to see the whole picture: how your accounts, your tax situation, and your longer-term goals interact, and where the gaps or overlaps are.

That coordination has a real cost, typically an ongoing advisory fee, and it does not guarantee better investment returns than managing things yourself. For some people, especially those with simpler finances or the time and interest to manage things closely, DIY investing remains a reasonable choice.

A note on timing

Why "not yet" is a completely reasonable answer

We would rather tell you honestly that now is not the right time than take on a client where the fee is not clearly worth what we can add. If your finances are still relatively simple, if you enjoy managing your own investments, or if the numbers involved do not yet justify an ongoing advisory relationship, DIY investing or a lower-cost robo-advisor may serve you better for now.

The moments that most often shift the answer: a business sale or liquidity event, taking on cross-border complexity, a inheritance that needs a plan rather than just a place to sit, or simply reaching a point where you are spending more time worrying about your finances than you would like to. If none of that applies yet, this self-check will likely reflect that back to you, and that is a genuinely useful answer.

Who we are

A small, independent private wealth practice

Northgate Private Wealth works with a limited number of individuals and families at a time, by design. This is a fictional, illustrative firm created as a design example.

2011
Founded, independently owned since day one
Fee-only
Compensated by clients, not by product providers
Fiduciary
Legally obligated to act in your best interest
Toronto, ON
Serving clients across Canada and cross-border
Common questions

Before you book a call

Most clients we work with have investable assets in the high six figures or more, though complexity matters as much as the total. We would rather have an honest conversation about fit than apply a hard cutoff. If it is not a fit, we will tell you.
Fee-only advisory relationships are typically charged as a percentage of assets managed, a flat annual retainer, or some combination. Costs vary by firm and by the complexity of your situation. We disclose our fee structure clearly before any engagement begins, and it is always something you can walk away from.
Yes, this is a common arrangement. Some clients want ongoing investment management, others want a coordinated plan and periodic check-ins while continuing to manage day-to-day investing themselves. We can talk through which structure fits your situation.
It means we are legally required to act in your best interest, not simply recommend suitable products. Not every financial professional operates under this standard, so it is a reasonable question to ask anyone you are considering working with.
Cross-border finances add real complexity around tax filing, account eligibility, and estate planning in both countries. This is an area where coordinated advice tends to matter more, not less, and it is worth mentioning early in any conversation with a prospective advisor.
That is a genuinely useful outcome, not a rejection. Plenty of people are well served by managing their own investments, at least for now. If you would still like a second opinion, we are happy to have a short conversation regardless of what your result says.
How this self-check works

The method behind your result

Each answer you select is assigned a simple weight reflecting how much it typically suggests coordinated planning could add value: things like the number of separate accounts you hold, whether you have business or equity income, how confident you feel about your current plan, and how much time you want to spend managing it yourself. The weights are added together and mapped to one of three general outcomes. This is a simplified, educational tool, not a scored assessment or a personalized recommendation, and it does not take the place of an actual conversation about your situation.

No pressure, just a conversation

Whatever your result said, we are happy to talk it through.

Fifteen minutes. No obligation, and no cost. We will tell you honestly whether we think we can help.

Book a 15-minute conversation