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We are excited to announce two new additions to our team!

We are excited to announce two new additions to our team!

Keith’s son, Matthew, has joined our team as an Associate Financial Advisor. Matthew has interned with our team the last 2 summers and most recently graduated from the University of Florida with a bachelor’s degree in Business Administration and Finance. It has been special having two family generations working together on our team with Ralph and Ginny and now it is even more special we can name our second between Keith and Matthew! He is an avid outdoorsman, loves the game of golf, and is looking forward to how he can serve clients and make Allen & Company a better place.   We look forward to you meeting Matthew in person and are thrilled he is with us full-time!

Additionally, we are proud to announce that Mark Sutton has joined our team as a Registered Client Service Associate. Mark brings 8 years of industry experience to our team and he has already made meaningful impact in just a few short weeks! Mark is married to his high school sweetheart, Tiffany and has one son, Logan. Tiffany is the Food Service Director at Lakeland Christian School and Logan is a kindergartner at LCS. Mark has also started his own business making chocolates and confections (Andrew Logans Confections LLC) in May of this year. When he is not spending time with his family or making chocolates, he enjoys playing ice hockey and woodworking.

Congratulations are in Order!!

In 2017, Forbes Magazine began looking for the “Next Gen” Wealth Advisors in Florida, those under the age of 40.  With an average tenure of over 12 years, there are millions of families entrusting their futures with this group, they have proven that they stand out among the very best in wealth management.   Chris Hammond, CFA™, was selected to be one of just over 100 “Next Gen” advisors within the state of Florida.  He has truly excelled with in our team, firm and industry and as a team we congratulate Chris on this distinguished industry recognition.

Our team will be participating in our annual team retreat early September. This is always a meaningful time for us to continue to improve on our internal procedures and further enhance our service model. We recently had most of the team together at the Rec Room for some fun and games!

With the arrival of September, not only are we willing cooler weather around the corner, but also if you are like many on our team we are thrilled for Saturday’s and the opening of college football!

The Albritton’s & Gwyn root on the Gators, Ginny is strong for Bama (with FSU a close second), Chris follows UGA, Karen is a Ragin’ Cajun for LSU and Lyle is our SEC outlier for Iowa. We all have our teams and there is no better sound than the Game Day opening song on Saturday mornings!

Therefore, with the season of college football upon us, we thought it would of interest to dive into the economics that it brings. The Power Five conferences combined for more than $3.3 billion in revenue during their 2022 fiscal years and below is the annual revenue breakdown by conference:

The Big Ten:       $845.6 million

SEC:                   $802 million

ACC:                   $617 million

Big 12:                $480.6 million

Pac-12:               $580.9 million

Drilling down closer to home here in Florida, the impact is huge as well. According to an ESPN report, public school Power 5 athletic departments derive, on average, nearly 50% of their total operating revenues from football, with 14% coming from ticket sales. The economic benefit goes well beyond the schools and seeps into the local economies. For example from the last pre-COVID season from Gainesville, the Gator football program had a direct local impact of $71 million while Tallahassee saw revenue of $51.1 million in spending to local business and a total of 219,000 out-of-town visitors. Last year the total economic impact of collegiate athletics was a total $5.5 billion dollars, which generated a total of $559.4 million in total state and local tax revenues.

Idalia Tax Extension for Florida Residents!

You may not have heard, but the Internal Revenue Service has announced tax relief for individuals and businesses affected by Idalia in parts of Florida. These taxpayers now have until February 15, 2024 to file various federal individual and business tax returns and make tax payments. The extension applies to 46 of Florida’s 67 counties, of which Polk is included. Individuals and households that reside or have a business in these counties qualify for tax relief, but any area added later to the disaster area will also qualify.

September 2023

Ginny Houghton 

Ginny Houghton

Ginny’s love of finance is rooted in a rich family history of financial services as the Allen’s have been setting industry standards since 1932. She received a degree in Finance and Economics from the University of Alabama and has since worked in several capacities within the industry.

Ginny came to Allen & Company from a national banking firm in Atlanta where she served as a Financial Analyst. She joined our firm as a Mortgage Broker for Allen & Company Mortgage Corporation in 2002, before becoming a Financial Advisor with the Allen/Albritton Group.