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Lili Vasileff enters people's lives when they are at their lowest emotional stages. She enjoys it. The contradiction is part of the charm as a certified divorce financial planner, and Vasileff is one of the industry pioneers.
"This is the time people are the most vulnerable,'' says Vasileff, who serves clients throughout Connecticut and the New York metro area from her Greenwich-based office. "You have to be educated and experienced, so that everyone stays on the same page to move forward with confidence post divorce. I can't begin to tell how many people stand at the court house, and say, 'Now what?'''
Vasileff started her career as a divorce financial analyst in 1991 after working in the corporate world. The change occurred by accident. "I was listening to a support group, and not a single person knew what the financial choices were,'' Vasileff says. "How do you go through that trauma and not know what to do? They need the knowledge to make good decisions, and they need someone to turn to."
Vasileff has been acknowledged as one of the best. She was recently named one of the top wealth managers in Westchester County, N.Y., and in Connecticut in an independent survey of high net worth households and of peers in the financial industry. The honors are particularly meaningful for Vasileff because she's an independent Registered Investment Advisor. "To be independent, objective and fee only is a rarity among investment advisors,'' she says. "I don't have anything to sell except my expertise." Fewer than 7 percent of wealth managers in Westchester County area and Connecticut received the rating.
While recognition is nice, Vasileff's reward is getting clients and attorneys to work together with a focus on the future.
"It should be a seamless project,'' she says. "When the coach tells you something, you have to stick with the game plan. I'm there to keep reading them the strategy." The icing is when her clients succeed in preserving their wealth because of her investment management.
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