We often think intergenerational wealth transfer begins when assets pass from one generation to the next. In practice, responsibility transfers first.
An adult child starts attending appointments. Someone begins managing paperwork, taking calls from care providers, checking in after medical appointments, updating siblings and learning to navigate a new system. Long before any inheritance or estate administration takes place, the family are often making important decisions without knowing what Mum or Dad would have wanted.
This transfer of responsibility is becoming increasingly important for the financial advice and wealth management profession to recognise. Clients are no longer seeking investment strategies alone. Families increasingly need guidance that supports the complex decisions surrounding wealth, care and ageing.
But the conversation is not only about who inherits wealth. It is also about who carries responsibility before wealth is transferred.
In many families, one person quietly becomes the project manager of ageing. They organise medical appointments, communicate with providers, understand aged care fees, manage siblings’ expectations and carry the emotional weight of decisions that rarely feel simple. While this is not always the eldest daughter, the pattern is familiar: one person becomes the organiser, interpreter, advocate and emotional shock absorber for the family.
This pattern is reflected in broader wealth transfer research. Australia is facing the greatest wealth transfer in its history, with an estimated $3.5 trillion expected to transfer across generations over the next 20 years. JBWere’s The Growth of Women and Wealth report also notes that women are poised to take charge of $3.2 trillion over the next decade, while its research identifies the “oldest daughter effect”, where the oldest daughter is most likely to manage family finances at wealth transfer and is 50 percent more likely to carry responsibility for managing the family estate.
In practice, that role often begins months or years before wealth changes hands, as care needs increase and families look to someone who will simply “know what to do”.
This is where aged care becomes a critical part of intergenerational wealth planning.
Aged care extends well beyond end-of-life care. It intersects with retirement planning, estate planning, housing, cash flow, government entitlements, taxation, family dynamics and emotional wellbeing. Decisions about whether to sell, retain or rent the family home often carry financial and emotional consequences. A choice that appears straightforward on paper can become deeply personal when it involves the family home.
Adult children often ask, "Do we sell the house?" The real question, however, is how to fund care, preserve parents' dignity, keep the family informed and ensure no one feels they made the wrong decision.
Following a fall, a hospital discharge or a sudden conversation about the family home, both the emotional and financial stakes become significant. By the time wealth transfers, many of the hardest decisions have already been made. Aged care is often one of the earliest and most significant triggers in the broader wealth transfer journey.
At Story Wealth, we saw a clear gap in traditional financial planning model. Families navigating aged care needed more than advice on cash flow, Centrelink/DVA, RADs, DAPs and the family home. They also needed support understanding the aged care system, coordinating multiple moving parts, communicating clearly with family members and making confident decisions during an emotionally demanding period.
That recognition led to the creation of Ageing With Grace Advisory, a specialist sister company to our financial planning business. Our goal was to build a service model designed around aged care transitions, rather than trying to fit those conversations into a traditional advice framework.
For us, the innovation was not simply establishing a new business. It was recognising that aged care advice has its own rhythm, language and support structure. Families need technical expertise, but they also need practical guidance, calm communication and a trusted adviser in their corner when responsibility has already shifted but the path ahead remains unclear.
This type of advice is becoming more important as families increasingly think about wealth transfer while parents are still alive. Research shows 88 percent of affluent and high-net-worth Australians intend to transfer wealth during their lifetime, yet 55 percent worry about running out of money.
That makes aged care planning essential. Before parents gift assets, support children financially or fund major family experiences, they need to understand their own future care needs. How will they fund support at home? What happens if residential care is required? What if one spouse enters care and the other remains at home? What role will the family home play? How much liquidity will be required?
Without clear planning, generosity can create financial risk.
The adviser’s role extends beyond financial calculations. Advisers help families understand their options, model financial outcomes, explain trade-offs and provide enough structure for informed decisions to be made calmly. They also need to recognise when someone is carrying decision fatigue, exhausted from carrying responsibility, managing emotions and making difficult choices on behalf of the entire family.
At Ageing With Grace Advisory, we see aged care advice as far more than a technical exercise. Families often come to us feeling overwhelmed, guilty, worried or uncertain. At the same time as they are watching someone they love grow older, they are making decisions about care, accommodation, affordability and family wealth.
Advice in this area must be both technically sound and deeply human. Funding options, means-tested care fees, Centrelink and DVA implications, family homes, cash flow sustainability and estate planning all require careful consideration. Equally important is the ability to slow the process down, explain options clearly and support the family member who has become the anchor, advocate and organiser.
The next evolution in intergenerational wealth advice is not only helping families transfer assets. It is helping them navigate the responsibility, care and decisions that come before the transfer.
Responsibility transfers before wealth. For financial advice firms, that presents both a challenge and an opportunity to build services that support families earlier, more holistically and with greater emotional intelligence.
