A HARROGATE-BASED financial advice firm with clients across Yorkshire has joined one of the UK’s largest independent financial services groups in a deal worth up to £4.5m.

Richard Evans, who has more than 35 years’ experience and has been a financial adviser since 2006, will continue to serve his 470 customers of PWM but has now joined AFH Financial Group's adviser team. His colleague Andrew Huby joins AFH’s growing number of employed IFAs.

He has been an IFA for more than 25 years, having worked at Yorkshire Bank and Skipton Building Society, and is also authorised to advise on complex pension arrangements like occupational pension schemes.

Tom Frane, who started work at PWM in 2017 after graduating from the University of York, will also move over to AFH as a trainee IFA. Mr Evans’ daughter Lottie, who also joined PWM in 2017 after graduating from the University of York, will continue to manage the team’s offices just outside Harrogate.

Mr Evans said: “For a while it’s been clear that to take the business to the next stage we needed to become part of a larger organisation. Frankly with all the admin and red tape it’s becoming impossible to deliver the proposition we want for our clients at a cost that’s competitive. With AFH we’re going to be able to drive costs down for our clients while delivering a great investment proposition.”

As well as providing wealth management, stockbroking, mortgage and insurance services, AFH manages a £110m property portfolio that includes industrial units in Normanton and Rotherham, an office block in York and a retail park in Darlington. In the half year to March 30, its turnover was £22.7m, up more than 60 per cent on the same time the previous year.