Evelyn Zohlen

Evelyn Zohlen has spent roughly 25 years in financial services, on both the institutional and personal-advisory sides of the industry. She began her career in an unusual place for a financial planner: as an intelligence officer in the United States Air Force. She holds a Bachelor's degree from the University of Texas, a Master of Science from the Joint Military Intelligence College, and an MBA with a concentration in Finance/Portfolio Management from Villanova University, along with the CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNER™ (CFP®) designation.

Before founding her own firm, Zohlen was a Relationship Manager at The Vanguard Group in Malvern, PA, where she served as the trusted advisor for institutional clients with retirement-plan assets ranging from roughly $175 million to $500 million. In 2003 she founded Inspired Financial, a fee-only wealth-management firm in Huntington Beach, California, which she built around a deliberate niche of serving "women in transition." By the time the firm merged into Apella Wealth in July 2023, Inspired Financial had eight employees and approximately $275 million in assets under management. Today she serves as a Regional Director and Senior Financial Planner at Apella Wealth.

Beyond her practice, Zohlen is a widely recognized leader in the financial-planning profession. She served as Chair of the Financial Planning Association (FPA) in 2020, the principal membership organization for CFP® professionals (then ~23,000 members). She has been an adjunct professor in the Personal Financial Planning Program at UC Irvine and serves on the Advisory Board for UCI's Center for Investment and Wealth Management. She has been quoted in outlets including The Wall Street Journal and Kiplinger's Personal Finance, and volunteers with organizations such as Savvy Ladies. Her community and board service has included WomanSage, the American Poetry Review, and the Long Beach Symphony, and she provides pro bono financial planning to low-income women and families.

*Note: Zohlen is a fee-only wealth manager, not a venture/angel investor. The following describes her advisory practice and client-selection philosophy rather than startup investing.*

• Client model: Fee-only, fiduciary comprehensive wealth management — no commissions or product sales.
• Deliberate niche: Women in financial transition, most commonly recent widows and divorcees, in Southern California. She built the practice by narrowing focus rather than broadening it — a strategy she has spoken about publicly (e.g., on the Kitces "Financial Advisor Success" podcast about "pivoting an advisory firm's niche to serving women in transition").
• Philosophy: Inspired Financial's stated aim was to be "the kind of advisor our clients didn't know existed," providing a level of personal care and understanding that goes beyond expectations.
• Approach: Emphasis on planning-led relationships and matching clients to a specialized, empathetic service model rather than transactional investment products.