Imagine being able to teach your children or grandchildren how to be financially responsible - while at the same time passing on family wealth and values to help them with the financial milestones they'll face during their lifetime.

Imagine helping them pay for their college education or make a down payment on a house without significantly cutting into your family's accumulated wealth.

This is all possible with the creation of a family co-op, or family bank.

This is a way for high net-worth families to avoid the disturbing statistics that lend credibility to the expression "shirtsleeves to shirtsleeves in three generations." More likely than not, when financial assets are dumped onto future generations without the understanding of the human values, the life's experiences and skill sets that created them, financial assets are dissipated.

Grandpa may have done a great job building a company. But if he passes it to his son and his son doesn't understand its heritage, values and morals, he may not have the skills or relationships to carry it on. There is the danger that wealth will be lost in two generations.

Luckily, families that plan have the luxury of setting up what they can use as a family bank. It's one thing to set up the legal parameter for the family bank. You can do this with the help of a lawyer and CPA under the terms of various legal and tax structures.

But families desiring success should look beyond the legal structure. First, they must assess their values, their goals and desires, so they can set the guidelines for how their family co-op or bank will exist and function.

We all possess an abundance of "human assets." These are the credos that have made us who we are. They are our sense of well-being, our values and morals, our heritage, skills, relationships, strategic alliances, our interpretation of health and happiness - our life's experiences.

While most of us can prepare a financial statement and quickly see if our financial wealth has risen or fallen, it becomes much more challenging to assess our "Human Values Statement." How can we create deposits into this vital aspect of our wealth?

Sharing family stories and experiences, whether spoken or written, is the beginning of understanding a family's true wealth. Financial assets without human assets are merely numbers, things, and stuff.

Financial assets are certainly important. But with the addition of human capital, financial assets will exponentially flourish. The marriage of financial and human assets leads to comprehensive, satisfying and fulfilling estate planning.

It's vital for the family to come together to develop and write the governances that dictate how the family bank will be run. Is it important to fund education or housing, or to establish a line of credit for the children or grandkids? The family must determine how the money will be used and who will get it. This way, there is a system in place that governs the use of family wealth.

What can families do with their co-op or family bank?

Once the family has settled on its values and financial goals - and in many cases has come up with a family mission statement to formalize that vision - it's time to act.

The family bank could be used to help a newly married couple fund the down payment on their first home. They could borrow the money from the family bank, and when they sell the home to move into something larger, they would reimburse the bank. This way the family is helping the newlyweds, they are being taught about investing and saving, and they are tied to the family assets.

In my experience, family banks have been used to fund education, to pay mothers to stay at home while raising children, to lend a hand in times of crises, to support a family business, to contribute to community nonprofit causes, to fund extreme medical interventions and to allow for a myriad of other human needs not usually met or fulfilled in other ways.

If the family has contributed to charities in the past, the family bank could be used to fund continued contributions, through trusts, foundations or donor-advised funds. These can also be set up in a way that saves the donors taxes - leaving more money for the causes they support.

All of this is possible - with introspection, dialogue, visioning as well as planning, guidance and goals. A family bank that includes human assets, as well as financial assets, can help perpetuate a family's wealth throughout the generations. The key lies in linking group values (human capital) to financial decision-making.