Caldwell Fairfield Advisors

Caldwell Fairfield Advisors provides financial planning and consulting services to individuals, business entities, trusts, estates and charitable organizations, including non-investment advice such as tax and estate planning. The firm does not provide investment supervisory or discretionary management itself; when clients seek ongoing investment management it recommends independent investment advisers for implementation.

In practice the firm acts in a promoter/referral role by recommending independent managers and expressly discloses that it will not supervise or review those managers and that clients must seek recourse directly from the selected manager for any disputes. For its planning and consulting engagements the firm typically charges hourly fees and may require a portion of fees paid in advance; it also discloses that it may receive referral fees from investment managers, paid from the manager’s fees and disclosed to clients.

Notable aspects disclosed in the brochure include an affiliation with a certified public accounting firm owned by the firm’s principal, which may provide accounting and tax services to clients and may recommend the adviser, and an ownership-related distribution interest tied to that affiliation. The firm also does not use percentage-of-assets-under-management fees, does not custody client assets, and emphasizes selecting other advisers rather than providing direct portfolio management, which are features less common among firms in the investment-manager category.