Association Française du Family Office (AFFO)

The Association Française du Family Office was established in 2001, which makes it one of the oldest national family office bodies anywhere. Its stated aim is to be the reference association for family offices and the professionals who support them in France, and it is a founding member of the International Federation of Family Offices alongside its Italian counterpart.

Who joins

Membership covers single and multi-family offices together with the specialist professionals who work with French families. It is a professional association rather than a principals-only peer group.

That said, AFFO puts real effort into keeping peers together within the wider membership. It runs what it calls clubs restricted to peers, and describes them as a valuable opportunity in a profession marked by discretion. In a national body that also admits advisers, sub-structures like that are what allow candid conversation to happen at all.

How membership works

Membership is paid and dues vary by category, but the association does not publish its rates, so ask directly.

What members get

AFFO is unusually well organised for a national association, with four distinct structures rather than one calendar.

Clubs are the peer groups, including one for the next generation, which recently ran a weekend gathering in Munich. Commissions are working groups on particular subjects, including external relations. Regional delegations take the association beyond Paris, which matters in a country where a great deal of family wealth sits in the regions rather than the capital. Technical workshops, called Ateliers Technique Métier, cover the practical craft of the job.

Around those sit training seminars known as Matinales, annual meetings, and study trips. A mobile application, AFFO Connect, is in preparation.

The publishing programme is the other substantial asset. AFFO produces white papers, a practical guide introducing what a family office actually is, a regular barometer of the French market, a newsletter and press reviews, and awards an annual prize.

For a French family office, this is the obvious national membership, and the French-language material has no real equivalent. Most family office literature is published in English and assumes American or British structures, which is of limited use when your questions concern French civil law, the reserved portion of an estate or the wealth tax on property. AFFO's output addresses the market you are actually operating in.