Modus Family Office Allocation Index

How do single-family offices invest? How is that changing? And why?

Principals and beneficiaries, chief investment officers and their staff, asset managers, consultants, investment bankers and others perpetually ask these questions. So does Modus, but reporting about this is a challenge.

Various family-office reports shed some light on the portfolios of the wealthiest private investors, but which one focused on their strategic asset allocations is the best reference? Is it the report that surveyed the most offices? The one with the most recent data? Or the report with the most detailed parsing of their portfolios?

Referencing different family-office reports in Modus newsletters and articles could potentially confuse readers and necessitate repetitive explanations. To avoid these issues and help everyone better understand how family offices invest, Modus aggregates data from select reports into a single, comprehensive resource: the Modus Family Office Allocation Index.

The index reflects the average strategic asset allocation across hundreds of large, single-family offices recently surveyed by financial services firms.

It is imperfect and requires explanation and footnotes. Below the visualization is the index methodology and more detailed analysis.

Index Methodology
The Modus Family Office Allocation Index is constructed using analogous data from recent family-office reports published by four financial services firms: Goldman Sachs (2025), UBS (2026), Citi (2026), J.P. Morgan (2026). A previous version of the index included a 2024 KKR report, which Modus determined was too old to include.

The four reports used are based on surveys of hundreds of single-family offices that are clients of these firms in some capacity. For example, an office might be a client of a company's investment bank, private bank, asset management business, or all three. Across the four surveys, the average number of participants was 309, and the average family-office investment portfolio was $2.23 billion. On average, 51% of respondents were based in the Americas, 28% in Europe, the Middle East or Africa, and 21% in the Asia-Pacific region.

Some offices participate in more than one of these surveys, but the extent of overlap is unknown. The descriptions of each report's survey participants suggest that aggregating the results is still worthwhile and that the Modus index has utility. For example, unsurprisingly, a much higher percentage of the UBS survey participants were in EMEA (51% in 2026).

These surveys are conducted annually, every other year or less often. Data can change meaningfully from survey to survey, but that is uncommon. Like most institutional investors, large family offices typically do not make significant changes to their strategic asset allocations year over year.

Survey timing (typically conducted over several weeks, but not longer) can also materially affect year-over-year results. Much can happen between surveys, and sentiment about markets and certain asset classes during a survey period could shift offices’ target allocations—only for that to change shortly after the survey and not be captured. Data on how much of a portfolio is earmarked for certain asset classes remains relevant one or two years after collection.

Other important considerations
Strategic asset allocations might not change significantly over a 12-month period, but an office's approach to an asset class can.

For example, in Goldman's 2025 report, the average fixed income allocation was 11%, just one percentage point higher than in 2023. But the durations of their securities looked very different. In 2023, just 39% of their bonds had an average duration of three to five years. By the 2025 survey, 57% had a duration of three to five years, suggesting offices expected interest rates to fall in the near future.

And a change of one percentage point (or a few percentage points) in allocation can be major. For example, private credit was absent from most family-office portfolios until recent years; UBS didn't begin surveying offices about it until 2021. This year, offices told UBS their target allocation to private credit was 5%. In dollar terms, that's huge. Today, there are at least several thousand single-family offices globally, and With Intelligence estimates that they collectively manage $4.67 trillion in assets. Out of that pool, and given UBS respondents' target allocations, that could be $178 billion invested in private credit.

With an average portfolio of $2.3 billion, the Modus index represents many family offices, but not the typical one. Most single-family offices manage roughly $250 million in assets. Out of the 3,000 offices analyzed globally by With Intelligence, more than 30% reported having between $100 million and $500 million in assets under management.

Relying only on similar survey data from four large banks has other drawbacks. In addition to the average size of the family-office respondents being larger than the true average, these offices surveyed may invest in a relatively homogenized way. Goldman Sachs, UBS, Citi and J.P. Morgan have investment banking, private banking and asset management businesses, which undoubtedly attract certain offices as clients. Those offices are also getting certain advice about portfolio construction and wealth management, pitched products and services, and ultimately, as a group, could look much different than many or even most other family offices.

Why the index doesn’t include more details about asset classes
The reports used for the index ask offices different questions about their investing, or the financial institutions don’t share certain data in publicly available reports.

For example, Morgan Stanley's 2025 family-office report is based on a survey of more than 400 respondents, but unlike other reports, it doesn't include data on the average allocation to private credit, an asset class with a growing presence in portfolios. BNY Wealth's 2025 family-office survey specifically asks about allocations to crypto and other digital assets, an asset class often lumped into an "other" category in other reports, alongside art, wineries, sports memorabilia and more.

For example, all the reports used for the index include information about private-equity investments. But not all of the reports break it down the same way. Some slice it by common subcategories including buyout, growth and venture capital. Others don’t make those same delineations, but do share whether certain allocations are to funds or directly in companies.

Why reports are excluded from the index
The index can use only similar allocation data. That means some reports, which might still be accurate and valuable, don't fit well with the four used for this version of the Modus index.

Have a suggestion?
Like the Modus Family Office Technology Map, the Modus Family Office Allocation Index will continue to evolve and improve.

Recommendations for the index are encouraged and should be emailed to Modus Editor Michael Thrasher: [email protected].