The great wealth transfer in numbers: what the data shows

Estimates of the great wealth transfer differ because they measure different things. Cerulli Associates' December 2024 projection puts transfers in the United States at $124 trillion through 2048, of which $105 trillion goes to heirs and $18 trillion to charity. UBS's Global Wealth Report 2025 expects more than $83 trillion to change hands globally over the next 20 to 25 years, of which $74 trillion moves between generations and $9 trillion between spouses. The numbers are not comparable: Cerulli covers one country but counts every step, including the $54 trillion it expects to pass to a surviving spouse before reaching the next generation. The useful reading for a family office is less the headline than the sequence, since most wealth passes to a spouse first and to children second.

The two headline estimates

Cerulli's figure is the one most often quoted. Its 2024 release states that households in the baby boomer and older generations will account for nearly $100 trillion, or 81% of all transfers, and that high net worth and ultra high net worth households, which make up 2% of households, will account for $62 trillion, more than half of total volume. Over the next ten years Cerulli expects Generation X to inherit the most, at $14 trillion, while millennials inherit the most over the full 25 years, at $46 trillion.

UBS's 2025 global estimate is built differently. It projects more than $83 trillion over 20 to 25 years, with the largest volumes in the US (over $29 trillion), Brazil (nearly $9 trillion) and mainland China (more than $5 trillion). Its split between horizontal and intergenerational transfers is much smaller on the spousal side than Cerulli's.

Spouses come first

The spousal step matters for planning horizons. Cerulli expects $54 trillion of its $124 trillion to pass horizontally, with nearly $40 trillion going to widowed women in the baby boomer and older generations. On its numbers, the first transition in a large share of families is to a surviving spouse, often a woman, and the transition to children follows years later. UBS counts a much smaller $9 trillion horizontal component within its global figure, which illustrates how sensitive these estimates are to definitions and demographic assumptions. Either way, a succession plan that only addresses the move from founder to children misses the first step.

Inherited versus self-made at the very top

UBS's Billionaire Ambitions Report 2025, published in December 2025, tracks the shift at the top of the distribution. It recorded 91 heirs inheriting $297.8 billion in the year to April 2025, a record and 36% more than in 2024, while 196 self-made billionaires added $386.5 billion. Around 860 multi-generational billionaires oversee $4.7 trillion, up from 805 overseeing $4.2 trillion a year earlier, and wealth in third-generation hands grew 12.3%. UBS expects about $6.9 trillion of billionaire wealth to transfer by 2040, including at least $5.9 trillion to children directly or through spouses. Spear's coverage of the same report notes that growth in transfers is expected mainly in the US, followed by India, France, Germany and Switzerland.

The attitudes recorded alongside the numbers are relevant to how the transfer is managed. More than 80% of billionaires with children want them to succeed independently, over two thirds hope heirs will pursue their own passions, and 43% hope their children will carry on the family business, brand or assets.

What the family office surveys add

The family office surveys describe where the transfer stands inside offices rather than in aggregate. UBS's Global Family Office Report 2026, based on 307 offices with average family net worth of $2.7 billion, found that 57% have a wealth succession plan for family members and that 45% involve the next generation to some extent; most of the offices surveyed serve the first (56%) and second (58%) generations. Bank of America's 2025 Family Office Study of 335 North American offices found that 87% had not yet passed to the next generation and 59% expected the handover within ten years. The 2025 RBC and Campden Wealth report found 47% of North American offices expecting control to pass within ten years and 22% within five.

The aggregate numbers will keep being revised. The pattern beneath them is stable: a large stock of first-generation wealth, a first step to a surviving spouse in many cases, and a second step to children who, on the survey evidence, are often not yet involved. How offices prepare for that second step is covered in succession planning versus continuity planning and engaging the next generation. Whether inherited wealth really dissipates as quickly as the folklore claims is examined in the third-generation wealth loss claim.