Meet the team
Mick Elfers
Founder and CEO
Mick Elfers is the Founder of Investor Advocates. He began his finance career in 1980 and over the past 40 years has worked with Piper Jaffray & Hopwood, Shearson Lehman Brothers and was one of the early investors in the start-up firm of Ragen MacKenzie in 1989, a Seattle based brokerage firm. Ragen MacKenzie was taken public in 1995 and finally purchased by Wells Fargo Bank in 2000. At Wells Fargo, Mick’s team managed investments for 40 Ultra High Net Worth families with assets totaling $1.7 billion. Mick left Wells Fargo in 2008 to create Irvington Capital, a private research investment company. Mick was approached by former clients in 2018 asking for his help with their overall wealth planning, prompting him to build a new kind of advisory firm called Investor Advocates focused on smarter investments and dramatically lower fees. Mick graduated from the University of Oregon in 1978 with a BBA in Business Administration and Finance.
Kelli Bagby
Operations Manager
Kelli is Director of Operations and the go-to-guru of all things at Investor Advocates. Kelli graduated with a master’s degree in Business Administration from the University of South Florida in 2005 and holds over 20 years of office management experience and a strong accounting background. Kelli’s skills in communication, organization and efficiency create a positive impact in the lives of our clients. Kelli liaisons with all of our outsourced teams, coordinating asset custody, annual accounting audit, compliance, IT/security infrastructure, and client account management.
Michelle Kline
Operational Due Diligence
Michelle Kline is a Senior Research Analyst providing outsouced Operational Due Diligence with 30 years of experience analyzing private fund investments. From 2011 to 2020, Michelle focused on operational consulting and due diligence reviews of private fund strategies, private equity, and venture funds with Catalina Partners and HedgeAssist, LLC. From 1990 through 2010, Michelle served as the CFO, COO and CCO of Genesee Investments, an SEC registered investment advisor and a pioneer in the private fund industry. Prior to Genesee, Michelle worked in public accounting with a national CPA firm focusing on audits of public companies and public securities offerings. Michelle is a CPA registered in Washington State and also holds a CGMA designation.
Kyle Stewart
Investment Research Consultant
Kyle Stewart is a Senior Analyst providing outsourced investment research and asset allocation. Kyle was a Research Analyst at CTC myCFO where he was responsible for sourcing and researching private fund strategies across and asset classes for client portfolios. Prior to CTC, Kyle worked as a Fund Analyst and Investment Committee member at Taylor Investment Advisors in Dallas, TX. At Taylor, Kyle was responsible for sourcing new investments and assisting in the management of the firm’s numerous private fund investments. Kyle received his B.B.A. in Accounting from Texas Tech University and his master’s in finance from Southern Methodist University.
