Friends Wealth Management

Larry Pham, the firm's founder, serves as the primary wealth advisor and directs both financial planning and investment strategy. According to the firm's public disclosures, Pham operates with a fee-only fiduciary obligation, meaning all advice must place client interests ahead of the advisor's compensation incentives. There is no indication of an external investment committee or outsourced chief investment officer arrangement.

The firm structures private allocations through direct real estate syndications rather than closed-end private real estate funds. In the public markets, it primarily uses exchange-traded funds and mutual funds to achieve factor exposures across asset classes. This suggests a preference for manager-vectoring (selecting specific operators) in illiquid property alongside indexing in liquid public markets.

Friends Wealth Management operates on a fee-only model, charging clients a percentage of assets under management or a flat retainer fee depending on the engagement. The firm explicitly states it does not accept commissions from financial-product sales, which distinguishes it from broker-dealer-affiliated advisory practices that can face incentives to recommend higher-fee products.

The firm concentrates on medical professionals, such as physicians and surgeons, and corporate executives in the Minneapolis–St. Paul metropolitan area. These clients tend to have high W-2 income, compressed career peaks, stock-option or deferred-compensation complexity, and a need for tax-reduction strategies that small-business owners often access differently through entity structures.

In its real estate syndication activity, the firm acts as a limited partner — effectively a co-investor — in deals sponsored by operating partners it selects. It does not claim to originate or manage properties directly. This means the firm is underwriting both the property-level economics and the track record of the sponsor operator before allocating client capital.