Kara Downing, CFP^®

Co-Founder & Financial Planner

As a young college student, I helped settle my mother’s estate when she passed away from a chronic illness and helped to get my father’s affairs in order as he dealt with the onset of Alzheimer’s disease. This difficult experience catalyzed my future: one in which I would dedicate my life to using my psychology and accounting education to assist other individuals, no matter what circumstances they are dealing with in life.

After spending a wonderful tenure at a premier wealth management firm in Cleveland, it was time to deliver my own holistic and unique approach to wealth management. In 2016, I created Younity Wealth Partners to bring a deeply individualized, more balanced approach to wealth management grounded in both personal experience and interdisciplinary expertise. It was important to me that my clients felt seen and valued, and Younity afforded me the ability to achieve this by serving a smaller number of clients at a higher level of service. Younity took my passion for bringing order out of chaos and using it to help my clients accomplish their own dreams.

In late 2019, Younity Wealth Partners and Laurel Tree Advisors joined forces to create Endeavor Wealth Advisors. This joint venture enhanced the breadth and depth of our knowledge and experiences to provide even better service to our clients, no matter which phase of life they are in. 

I am a CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNER™ (CFP®) practitioner and earned a Bachelor of Science degree in Business Administration, cum laude, with a concentration in Accounting from Bowling Green State University. I am the former Chair of the Financial Planning Association (FPA®) of Northeast Ohio Board of Directors, a non-profit volunteer organization that supports high standards of professional competence, ethical conduct, and growth of the financial planning profession as a whole.

As a proud Northeast Ohio native and lifelong resident, I enjoy giving back to the community in which I live. When I’m not in the office, I volunteer on the Board of Directors and serve on the Finance & Investment Committee for the Cleveland Animal Protective League (APL), a non-profit organization whose mission is to foster compassion and end animal suffering through adoption, spay/neuter, cruelty investigations, and education. I also volunteer my time and expertise to help underserved individuals and families by providing free, no-strings-attached, objective financial planning services.

To unwind, I enjoy hiking with my rescue dog, a lab mix named Moki, in the Metroparks and trying new recipes in the kitchen. I currently reside in Hudson.