Chartwell Family Office

Overview

Chartwell Family Office was established in 1998. Fred A. Fern serves as managing member. The firm operates as a multi-family office with headquarters in Palm Desert and provides wealth management and family governance services to affluent clients. Investment activity spans private equity, private credit, hedge funds, real estate and direct co-investments. Confirmed holdings include The Shops On El Paseo retail asset in Palm Desert. Geographic reach covers North America, Europe and Asia. Focus Partners Wealth operates under Chartwell supervision following acquisitions of firms including Buckingham Strategic Wealth in June 2024, Gratus Capital in August 2024 and Churchill Management Corporation in July 2025. The team includes eight named principals. Additional vehicles under oversight encompass multiple SEC-registered advisors that merged into Focus Partners Wealth during 2024 and 2025. Michael Fox-Rabinovitz, a managing partner, participated as co-organizer in the November 2023 application for Chroma Community Bank in Jersey City. Supervisory control over Focus Partners Wealth creates a hybrid structure that combines family-office capital allocation with regulatory oversight of a growing advisory platform. This architecture differs from pure single-family offices by embedding operational responsibility for multiple merged entities.