Sarah von Helfenstein, MBA, AVA
Director
With Braver Valuation Services since inception, Sarah has more than sixteen years in the valuation profession in a number of different roles.
As champion for business valuation on behalf of the American Institute of CPAs, she provided the educational and political foundation for the public accounting profession to become an integral and critical part of the current valuation field. As partner with the American Society of Appraisers, she created business valuation’s first think tank, The Center for Advanced Valuation Studies, and initiated CAVS’ first line-up of cutting edge courses. She served as the first Director of Marketing for KPMG Forensic and Litigation Services, Midwest. She performed seminal research for the Department of Defense Office of Force Transformation in the areas of valuing human and information system assets and applying real options analysis to critical DoD problems. She authored papers, courses, and exams, developed curricula and conferences, and edited a number of key valuation books.
More recently, as a practitioner in the Boston area, Sarah has managed and performed business valuations across a wide spectrum of industries and valuation purposes. She has published in Business Valuation Review, The Value Examiner, and Research in Finance and has presented academic research at the XXV Union of Panamerican Valuers Congress of the Appraisal Institute, the NACVA/IBA 2010 Annual Consultants’ Conference, and a number of times at the annual International Real Options Conference. She currently sits on the Appraisal Issues Task Force and the Valuation Uncertainty Project for the International Valuation Standards Council.
Other chapters of Sarah’s professional history include ten years as Vice President and Chief Financial Officer for a high-powered boutique wealth management consulting firm and community foundation and a number of years as principal in and/or consultant for high tech start-ups.
Sarah received her MBA from DePaul University’s Kellstadt Graduate School of Business and her B.A. from Randolph-Macon Women’s College. She is a designated member of the National Association of Certified Valuators and Analysts.
