Family Office

A family office is a structure, not a firm: the people, entities, systems and rules a family uses to run its wealth across banks, companies, jurisdictions and generations. It can be a dedicated company with its own staff, a provider shared with other families, or a coordination layer above the banks and advisors the family already has. What makes it a family office is that someone holds the whole picture.

What is a family office?

A family office is the private structure through which a family runs its wealth: consolidated reporting across its banks, the entities that hold the assets, the advisors, the investment process and family governance. There is no legal minimum. Deloitte counted 8,030 single-family offices worldwide in 2024, 2,020 of them in Europe; most families run the same functions without one.

Two principal forms

Single-family offices serve one family exclusively. They are fully bespoke, designed around that family’s asset base, jurisdictions, family dynamics and operating preferences. A dedicated team and infrastructure cost money whatever the assets, which is why they start at tens of millions. In Spain, Rankia’s 2026 guide puts the practical floor at €20–30 million with €300,000 to €1 million a year in fixed costs.

Multi-family offices serve several families under one roof and share the platform cost. The same guide puts the entry point at €2–5 million. They are more standardised and, by definition, cannot be fully customised to any single family.

Which of the two, or neither, a family needs depends on complexity, not on a wealth figure. The decision table by number of banks, entities, jurisdictions and generations is in The Minimum Viable Family Office.

What a family office actually does

The scope varies, but the functions are stable:

• Investment governance: defining investment policy, selecting and monitoring external managers, consolidating performance reporting (Investment & Wealth Architecture, oversight of capital allocation).
• Wealth planning and structuring: coordinating the tax and legal advisors across jurisdictions and maintaining the entities, trusts, holding companies and foundations (Wealth Planning & Structuring).
• Administration and reporting: bookkeeping, cash management, consolidated reporting and document control (Administration & Back Office).
• Governance: the family constitution, investment committees, next-generation education and family meetings (Family Governance & Education).
• Philanthropy and impact (Philanthropy & Social Impact).
• Lifestyle support (Lifestyle & Family Support).

Family offices in Portugal and Spain

Portugal has around 250 family office structures and is expected to reach 500 by 2030, according to the Havos Investment Pulse barometer published in April 2026. Spain is further along: its multi-family office market is large enough that Rankia publishes euro entry points and running costs for each model.

The legal form is usually ordinary. In Portugal the family office is a sociedade por quotas or an SGPS holding that owns the family’s entities; in Spain a sociedad limitada or a holding, sometimes with a regulated investment vehicle for the portfolio. A structure that serves only its own family is not a financial intermediary and needs no licence.

Supervision starts when the office advises third parties. In Portugal, investment advice is an investment service under Article 290 of the Código dos Valores Mobiliários, and independent advisors need CMVM authorisation under Article 301. In Spain, advice to third parties requires registration with the CNMV as an EAF under Ley 6/2023; Rankia notes that the multi-family office “como tal no está regulada en España”. The banks that custody the assets answer to Banco de Portugal, Banco de España and the ECB.

Two tax points come up in every Portuguese conversation. IFICI is the income tax regime for people who become resident to do qualifying work; whether a family member qualifies is a tax advisor’s call. The Golden Visa still exists, but its routes change often, so they belong in the Portugal moving checklist, not in a definition.

The coordination problem

The deeper purpose of a family office is to solve a coordination problem that grows with wealth: as advisors, managers, entities and jurisdictions multiply, so does the risk that each specialist optimises their own domain while nobody holds the full picture. A family office, or a coordination layer acting in that role, is the integrating layer above the specialists. PWA designs that layer. PWA does not manage money, hold mandates, take commissions or give regulated investment, tax or legal advice.

Sources

• Deloitte Private, Defining the Family Office Landscape, 2024: 8,030 single-family offices worldwide, 2,020 in Europe. Checked 2026-10-06.
• Rankia, Family office: qué es, cuándo tiene sentido y qué cuesta en España, updated 2026-08-25: entry points and running costs by model; regulatory note.
• Jornal Económico, Estruturas de Family Offices em Portugal deverão duplicar para 500 até 2030, April 2026, citing the Havos Investment Pulse.
• Código dos Valores Mobiliários, Article 290 and Article 301. Checked 2026-10-06.
• Ley 6/2023, de 17 de marzo, de los Mercados de Valores y de los Servicios de Inversión: investment advice to third parties in Spain requires an authorised firm (EAF) registered with the CNMV. Checked 2026-10-06.

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This entry is part of PWA’s plain-language glossary of terms used in modern family office architecture.