RIAs didn’t always have an RIA tech stack. The evolution of a tech stack began in the 1990s when advisors broke away from their wirehouse firms and needed a way to piece together back office technologies because they lost all their back-office capabilities. Without a corporate and proprietary system advisors had to shop around and find their own CRMs, portfolio management systems, and other RIA technologies to build their businesses.
Kitces Research tracks more than 300 software solutions built for advisors, and now report lower satisfaction with how their tools connect than with the tools themselves. Most advisory firms report that a shortcoming of their tech stack is lack of integration. Those firms who had fully integrated workflows had the highest levels of satisfaction.
Key Takeaways
- RIA firms use up to 12 technology solutions for 20 business functions
- Kitces Research found that time efficiencies and cost are the most important factors in choosing a tech stack
- Strad compliments an RIAs tech stack to solve the RIA swivel chair problem -- saving both time and money
What is an RIA Tech Stack?
An RIA tech stack is a set of technologies working independently to support the business functions of an RIAs daily work. The goal is to make RIAs work with more efficiency. An RIA tech stack operates on separate levels depending on the work it is supporting. Examples include:
- Front office: client-facing technology, traditionally a “client portal”
- Middle office: financial planning software, portfolio management, performance reporting, trading and rebalancing
- Back office: billing, compliance, document repositories, and workflows
Those tiers matter because they're where the seams are. Within a tier, tools tend to overlap and compete. Between tiers, they have to hand data to each other, and that handoff is where most stacks come apart. A CRM and a planning tool aren't rivals, but if they disagree on a client's marital status or account list, someone is fixing it manually before every meeting
Advisors don't rate their tools poorly. They rate the connections between them poorly. The industry built 300 solutions and no standard for how any of them talk to each other.
— Stephanie Abraham, COO, Strad
What Actually Belongs in an RIA Tech Stack?
Three core technology solutions in a RIA tech stack are: a CRM, portfolio management tool, and financial planning software. Supporting technology solutions may include: a client portal and a document repository. Bolt-ons to the tech stack may include embedded billing, for example.
Core Layers
| Layer | What it does | What breaks without it | Common tools |
| CRM | Central record of clients and tasks | Client history lives in inboxes | Wealthbox, Redtail, Salesforce FSC |
| Portfolio management & accounting | Reconciliation, performance, billing data | Manual reconciliation, reporting delays | Orion, Black Diamond, Addepar, Envestnet |
| Financial planning | Goals modeling and cash-flow projections | Advice becomes hard to evidence | eMoney, MoneyGuidePro, RightCapital |
Supporting Layers
| Layer | What it does | What breaks without it | Common tools |
| Client portal | Client-facing view of accounts and documents | Clients call for routine answers | Varies by provider |
| Compliance & document storage | Audit-ready records and retention | Exam preparation becomes manual | Comply, SmartRIA |
| Trading & rebalancing | Model execution and tax-loss harvesting | Trading doesn't scale past a point | Tamarac, Orion |
| Billing | Fee calculation and invoicing | Revenue leakage, billing errors | Orion, AdvicePay |
Tools listed are widely used examples for context, not recommendations. Fit depends on firm size, custodian, and service model.
Why Doesn't Adding More Tools Free Up More Time?
More isn’t always better in the world of RIA tech stacks and here’s why: adding more tools to free up time actually back-fires, the opposite occurs. More fragmentation creates more work, compounds errors, and takes more time to reconcile. Other factors that contribute are: cognitive fatigue to keep up with all the technology solutions, and maintenance overhead to update passwords, security, and debugging.
Research from Broadridge and the Financial Services Institute (2026), found that 68% of advisors aren't confident their firm's current technology supports their growth goals. That's not a group of firms without software. It's a group of firms with plenty of it.
The Kitces Research's 2025 advisor technology study found that integration of technology solutions in an RIAs’ tech stack stood out the most important driver of RIA satisfaction. Without integration, RIAs experience time-consuming, error-prone work doing data entry across multiple systems that don’t interoperate. Manual labor plus the swivel chair effect, bouncing from one system to another, creates fatigue and the more systems that are added to the work, the worse it gets.
What’s Normally Missing from Most RIA Tech Stacks?
Most RIA tech stacks are missing four things: 1) structured transition and onboarding management, 2) centralized AI governance layer, 3) conversion engine, and 4) a seamless API-driven integration. These omissions require work-arounds.
Look at the table above and you'll notice something. Every layer is organized around a function — the portfolio, the plan, the fee, the file. None of them are organized around the household. They are missing a shared layer organized around the household.
Each piece of a RIA tech stack has a discrete function, but each holds only part of the client picture. The advisor is left to fill the gap.
Here’s an example: A CPA needs information, an estate attorney requests a document, or the next generation becomes involved… the financial data may exist, but the relationships, documents, and decisions are scattered across systems..
Strad provides that missing coordination layer. It works alongside an RIA’s existing CRM, planning, and portfolio tools, giving the advisor and the households they serve a secure place to organize and share the information. It does not replace the core technology stack. It makes the stack more connected, collaborative, and useful.
How Do You Audit the Stack You Already Have?
There are a few simple steps to audit your tech stack: Inventory, map functionality to business processes, map to outcomes, and then assess redundant or under utilized tools.
- Inventory your technology: List every tool from every business function. Look in your subscription list for those technologies that you may have long forgotten about. Document who uses the technology, what it does, how much it costs, when it renews, how often it is used (number of active users)
- Map the work and data flows: Trace the movement of data from system to system and log when work is manual to fill gaps
- Evaluate use and ROI: Review your firm’s usage rates on technology dashboards, if the usage is low, that’s a data point. Tabulate license fees, required add-ons to run your business, any administrative overhead, and training costs.
- Cut and Consolidate: Remove redundant or useless technology and cancel underutilized subscriptions
The future of wealth management won't be defined by who has the largest office, it will be defined by who delivers the most connected client experience. Strad empowers advisors to provide family office-level service to the mass affluent, all from a single, secure platform.
— Richard Benoit, EVP, Strad
What Should You Ask Before Adding Another Tool?
What gap does this fill and which gaps do we need to prioritize filling?
Decision makers should organize and prioritize the problems worth solving once they’ve been identified. If a firm can’t name a specific weak point or point of failure such as a compliance gap, workflows that don’t scale, or a client experience that’s costing the firm retention, the proposal for new tools becomes more about desire rather than a need. To get the most out of demos and the reps you speak to throughout the process, write down the firm's goals along with the problem(s) you need to solve and check the tool against your source of truth.
Which system owns the data once it's live?
Tools are often touched by multiple departments and personnel inside of the company. Which tool holds the source of truth for your data? Plan before implementation and decide which tools are authoritative. And make sure the sync is set up to run in one direction for any data that’s contested. The last thing you need is two versions of client records that conflict, with no reliable way to tell which one is right.
Who administers it day to day?
Just like the last point, the question of who administers and keeps items up to date is impacted by the multiple parties who might be inside the platform every day. Eliminate the risk of failed adoption by assigning ownership to a specific person or department. The owner should act as a steward of information, prepared to be responsible for configuration, permissions set up, and training. If you know who the parties responsible will be before you adopt a new tool, include them in the decision-making process early to ensure their needs and requirements are considered during this process. At the end of the day, a tool is only as good as the people who use it, making adoption a top priority.
What tools are we retiring to make room for it?
Tech stacks can grow because adding tools is easier than removing them. We get it, sometimes it’s hard to let go of familiar systems. But before making the decision to purchase, identify what this new tool consolidates or replaces. It’s not inherently bad if the answer is nothing, but if it is, consider the number of tools you already have your firm utilizing, then revisit the goals and problem set you wrote down at the beginning of your journey. Weigh the pros and cons and consider the impacts adding a new tool might have on your team.
How Strad Supports Your RIA Tech Stack
Strad sits alongside the systems you already run. Your CRM keeps the relationship record, your portfolio platform keeps the performance data, your planning software keeps the projections. Strad holds what those tools weren't built for: the household in full, the documents behind it, and the professionals working around the client.
That means the CPA, the attorney, and the advisor can work from the same information ahead of a meeting rather than assembling it separately. Nothing gets migrated, nothing gets replaced. One connected layer, secured to SOC 2 standards, across the stack you've already built.
FAQs
- What is an RIA tech stack? An RIA tech stack is the collection of financial technology used to manage clients wealth, investments, accounting, planning, compliance and household operations. The tech stack may also include a CRM, portfolio management software and billing.
- What does a small RIA actually need to start? Most new RIAs need a CRM, financial planning software and portfolio management tools for reporting supported by a custodian. Document storage and e-signature and communications archiving helps improve service to the client. What matters most is establishing clear systems of record and repeatable workflows to best support your clients.
- How much should an RIA spend on technology? Technology spend is commonly benchmarked as a percentage of revenue, though the range varies widely by firm size and service model. Kitces Research places the typical technology spend around 4%-6% of revenue. Advisors should also consider the implementation fees, software security, employee training and maintenance fees associated with the technology tools.
- All-in-one or best-in-breed — which is better? All-in-one platforms reduce integration risk by keeping data in one system, at the cost of some depth in individual functions. Best-in-breed gives stronger individual tools but makes integration your responsibility. Most firms end up with a hybrid solution.
- How often should a firm review its stack? At least annually, with a lighter check every six months, especially if the firm is growing quickly. Your evaluation should include security controls, overlapping functions, data ownership, and vendor risks or integration failures.
Sources
- https://www.seic.com/financial-advisors/our-insights/building-your-ria-tech-stack - Mar, 2025
- https://www.envestnet.com/financial-intel/building-ultimate-ria-technology-stack - Feb, 2025
- https://wealthtechtoday.com/2025/05/17/stack-the-deck-a-smarter-approach-to-ria-tech-stack-planning/ - May, 2025
- https://smartasset.com/advisor-resources/ria-tech-stack - Apr, 2026
- https://www.kitces.com/blog/the-latest-in-financial-advisortech-may-2026-morningstar-byallaccounts-data-aggregation-finny-advisor360-wealth/ - May, 2026
- https://www.broadridge.com/insights/independent-advice-at-an-inflection-point - date not confirmed
- https://www.kitces.com/kitces-report-independent-financial-advisor-technology-fintech-software-tools-research/ - Aug, 2025