01
Life First
Money is downstream of life.
Most firms start with your portfolio and work backward. We start with your life — your Enough Number, your North Star, the practice that serves them.
About Nicholas
Twenty years inside the system.
One conviction it had to change.
Nick spent two decades inside the wealth industry — at banks, Fidelity, CPA firms, and the RIA world — watching the same pattern repeat: good people selling products, great families getting mediocre advice.
He founded Grounded Wealth™ on a single conviction — that advice and execution should not be the same thing, and that fiduciaries should be paid to think, not to sell.
Nicholas Tilli
Founder & Lead Advisor
What He Believes
Three convictions.
Everything else follows.
02
Paid to Think
Advice and execution are not the same thing.
A fiduciary should be paid to think clearly — not to sell what pays the most. We separated the two so the only thing on the table is your interest.
03
Relationship Practice
Your advisor should know your grandchildren’s names.
This is a relationship practice, not a transaction. The work is measured in decades, not quarters — and treated accordingly.
The Path
Two decades.
Five vantage points.
Early Career
Banks
Saw firsthand how product shelves dictate advice — and how the language of "planning" is often used to sell.
Institutional
Fidelity
Worked inside one of the largest custodians in the country. Learned how the plumbing of money actually moves at scale.
Tax & Accounting
CPA Firms
Lived inside the tax engine that drives most household outcomes. Understood why most "financial plans" miss it entirely.
Independent Advisory
The RIA World
Joined the fee-only side and saw the same conflicts in a quieter wrapper — fiduciaries still paid to gather assets, not to think.
Today
Grounded Wealth™
Founded a firm where advice and execution are separated by design. A flat membership for the practice. A transparent fee for the portfolio. Nothing else.
Held to a fiduciary duty across every client interaction — at the firm level, not the product level.
CFP®RIA
The Process
Discuss. Dream. Design. Do.
Every client relationship begins the same way — with your life, not your portfolio.
01
Discuss
It starts with a call. No obligations, no sales pitch — just a conversation to see if we are the right fit for each other. We listen to where you are and what you are hoping to build.
02
Dream
We explore your life. Your definition of enough. Your North Star. Your family, your work, your vision for what comes next. No forms. No projections. Just clarity about what matters most.
03
Design
We map your ten Practice Domains together. We identify where you stand, affirm what is already working, and build a financial system — your Grounded Flow — that moves money with intention.
04
Do
We implement. Portfolios built. Flow activated. Practice Solutions deployed across the domains that need them most. Then we review quarterly — bringing Visibility, Affirmation, and Pursuit.
Chat with Us
Start with Step 1 — a conversation costs nothing.
Ready to see your full picture?
A conversation is on the way. No obligation. No sales pitch. Just clarity.