Community Service Is Important To Financial Planners Ben And Joanna Boynton

Ben and Joanna Boynton have been financial professionals in Wellington for more than 20 years. Ben is a fourth-generation native of Palm Beach County who grew up in Wellington, while Joanna hails from Gainesville. They met while studying finance at the University of Florida in the early 1990s.

Ben’s great-grandparents were pioneers in Palm Beach County who became active in the agricultural industry in the Glades in the 1930s. His parents came to the Wellington area because it was uniquely situated between the Glades and the coastal Palm Beach area. Ben remains active on the board of the family’s agricultural company, Wedgworth Farms.

Wellington was a vastly different community back when Ben was growing up in the 1980s. “I still remember when a fast food restaurant came to Wellington,” he recalled. “It was a Checkers, and we were all very excited to check it out.”

When the couple first met, Joanna had never heard of Wellington, but she still recalls her initial impression. “It’s very flat,” she said. “North Florida has a lot of hills.”

Both Boyntons graduated from the University of Florida with bachelor’s degrees in business administration with majors in finance. After graduating, they became certified financial planners (CFPs) and decided to settle in the Wellington area with the intention of starting their own financial firm. At the time, there were few financial services available locally.

“Our goal was to bring the first full-service financial brokerage to Wellington,” Ben said. “We achieved that in 1997.”

The offices of the Boynton Financial Group are located within the Mizner Place plaza on South Shore Blvd. They are currently in the process of renovating the interior of their building, which they recently bought, to make it feel more like a home. One of the rooms toward the center will designed to resemble a living room. Among the features is a vintage Coca-Cola machine, as Ben is a noted collector of antiques.

The Boyntons have two children: a son, William, and a daughter, Catherine. They attend the Oxbridge Academy, where they engage in a number of sports and activities. William is pursuing his pilot’s license, while Catherine is interested in the performing arts and recently appeared on stage in Wellington as Elle Woods in Legally Blonde for the Dance Arts Conservatory Broadway Stars program. Neither child has yet shown interest in a career in finance and following in their parents’ footsteps, which is fine with Ben and Joanna.

“We try to maintain a balance,” Joanna explained. “We encourage and support them, but we remind them that not everyone is as fortunate as they are.”

Ben and Joanna remain as active as their children. In addition to antiques, Ben enjoys hunting, water skiing and scuba diving. Joanna also enjoys outdoor activities and marathoning, and she has recently embraced her artistic side through oil painting.

The Boynton family currently resides on an estate in Loxahatchee’s Fox Trail neighborhood, which is zoned for livestock.

“We have a herd of Herefords,” Ben explained. “We take them up to Ocala.”

Herefords are a breed of beef cattle that originated in the United Kingdom in the county of Herefordshire and were first imported to the United States in 1817 by Sen. Henry Clay of Kentucky.

Over the years, both Ben and Joanna have been very active in the community with service on numerous boards. Ben is a trustee of the Central Palm Beach County Chamber of Commerce, chair of the Business Development Board of Palm Beach County and chair of the Wellington Regional Medical Center Board of Governors. Joanna is on the board of the Wellington Community Foundation.

In this capacity, they have been involved in many community events and charitable functions, with the goal of enhancing the Wellington community and Palm Beach County as a whole.

While modest about their contributions, others in the community have taken note and recognized them for their combined efforts.

In 2009, the Boyntons received the Frank T. Gladney Award from the Wellington Rotary Club. The award is presented each year to Wellington locals who devote time, energy and resources to the betterment of the community. In receiving the award, the Boyntons became the first couple to be given the honor.

The Boynton Financial Group, which is affiliated with Raymond James, offers a number of financial services for a select clientele. Among these services are financial planning, including business and retirement, portfolio and investment management, and estate planning, including charitable giving and trusts.

Their relationship with Raymond James allows the Boyntons the freedom to run their business, but also provides their clients with additional resources. The Boynton Financial Group is in the top five percent of independent Raymond James offices in terms of managed assets.

Having been established for more than 20 years, Ben and Joanna agree that it is extremely important to maintain a quality of service for their customers.

The clients they serve come from a number of different roles, including corporate executives and business owners, but also families and retirees. A number of clients are healthcare professionals, and there has been an emphasis on women investors.

The Boyntons employ a select team of relationship managers and associates to assist their clients and have seen promising results from their internship program.

Ben explained that many of the lessons he learned at the University of Florida are still relevant in their business, and both are eager to assist in the education of the next generation of financial professionals. For their part, interns have reported back that the hands-on knowledge they gained working with the Boyntons has not just improved their academic work, but also their early job prospects as they graduate and enter the workforce.

The Boynton Financial Group is located at 12400-B South Shore Blvd. in Wellington. For more information, call (561) 795-9156 or visit www.boyntonfinancialgroup.com.