Max Haspel

Max is the Co-President of Colony Business Owner Services and a Senior Wealth Advisor. With over 25 years of experience, Max leads Colony’s national Business Owner Services practice and its Long Island-based team in serving the needs of successful entrepreneurs and their families. He and his team specialize in advising business owners on exit planning by helping prepare owners, their businesses, and their families for success during and after the transition. Max founded, grew and ultimately exited a business, and has experience in business exits both as an advisor and entrepreneur.

Through Colony Family Office, Max and his team deliver a vast array of relevant services including investment management, tax planning, multi-generational gifting and wealth transfers, family wealth education, family governance, philanthropic advice and business management. Max is also actively engaged in investment- and wealth-planning research and is a member of Colony’s Investment and Executive Committees.

Max is a co-author of the book Personal Financial Planning for Executives and Entrepreneurs: The Path to Financial Peace of Mind (Second Edition). He has been named one of Forbes Best-In-State Wealth Advisors for New York. Long Island Business News awarded him a Business & Finance Award, which recognizes financial professionals for their outstanding performance as financial stewards of Long Island’s corporations, governments, and nonprofit organizations.

He helped develop and refine Colony’s time-tested wealth management client process, one that provides structure and transparency starting at the initial meeting and lasting inter-generationally.

Max founded Blue Water Advisors in 2000 and merged it with The Colony Group in early 2018. Previously, he was an equity research analyst at firms including Credit Suisse First Boston and Deutsche Banc Alex. Brown, where he learned the inner workings of Wall Street, investment research, capital raising, and mergers and acquisitions.

Max graduated from Colgate University with a Bachelor of Science in Economics. He remains active in the Colgate community and is an Emeritus Member of the Alumni Council and a past President of the Colgate Alumni Club of Long Island. A lifelong learner, Max attended the Advest Institute at Harvard and obtained a Wharton Certificate in Retirement Planning.

Max’s personal passions include traveling with his wife and teenage children, fishing, sailboat racing and skiing.