There are many ways to get all your accounts in one place.
There are also ways to automate your budget.
Mint.com comes to mind.
Your bank may even offer online banking that budgets for you and allows you to add outside accounts to your dashboard.
That’s all great. I love automation. But I’ve found the cream of the crop.
All your accounts in one place? Check. An effective automatic budgeting system? Check. And that’s not all they do.
Personal Capital is great for budgeting, but it’s really great for investing!
Let me show you what sets Personal Capital apart from the rest…
An Overview
Personal Capital is easy to use and completely free. It’s a great way to keep track of all your finances, from bank accounts to mortgages to investment accounts. And it literally took me less than one minute to sign-up.
Personal Capital gives you the ability to:
- Set up an automatic budget
- See all of your accounts in one place
- Add additional assets and liabilities to calculate your net worth
- See a performance overview of how all your investments are performing
- See every transaction from all your accounts to monitor your finances
That’s pretty impressive. Best of all, you can access your information on the website or with the free app.
All the Tools You Get
- Net Worth Tracker – Link your accounts, add your assets and liabilities and keep an eye on your net worth.
- Cash Flow – See where your money is going and track your spending habits.
- Portfolio Tracker – Track all your investments on one screen and see your overall performance.
- 401k Analyzer – Uncover the fees you’re paying and see the impact your 401k is making on your retirement.
- Investment Checkup – Track your performance and see if you can do better by investing elsewhere.
- Mutual Fund Analyzer – See how well your funds are performing and how much they’re costing you.
Track Every Single Account
There are many services for linking your accounts together, but Personal Capital makes it easy to get all your accounts together.
You can link more stuff too! Do you have some expensive jewelry or a vehicle? You can easily add assets and liabilities automatically or manually to accurately calculate your real net worth.
This includes adding the value of your home if you have a mortgage. Personal Capital will even calculate the value if you want them to (based on Zillow’s calculations).
Automation At it’s Finest
I love the ability to automate my budget. I also track it manually, but I use the automated budget to make sure everything lines up.
Personal Capital makes it super easy to see all your transactions on one screen. It will set each purchase to a category automatically and it’s simple to change the category if you prefer.
I like to check my bank accounts and credit cards for fraudulent activity everyday. I know, I’m a little OCD, but I want to catch it as soon as it happens. I also like to make sure there weren’t any inaccurate charges by accident (that happens a lot!).
It’s easier when you can see all your transactions in one list, instead of having to go from website to website.
Personal Capital Wealth Management
If you have (or once you have) $100,000 in investable assets, Personal Capital will assign you a personal advisor, if you wish.
This is how Personal Capital makes money. If you were wondering.
To give you an idea of “what they stand for” in their investment advising, these 6 points are taken from their website:
- Objective: We provide objective financial advice, held to the highest standard, in our clients’ best interests.
- Dedicated: Our personal financial advisors are dedicated to our clients’ well-being and deliver conflict-free advice.
- Holistic: Our software helps our clients make well-informed financial decisions with a holistic view of their money.
- Strategic: We help clients build a financial plan, avoiding high-priced products in favor of affordable solutions.
- Transparent: We ensure a transparent experience for our clients, with no gimmicks or hidden fees.
- Personal: Our clients each have unique financial needs. We deliver customized strategies for each individual.
I’ll be honest, I’ve never worked directly with their advisors, but I like their principles and I’ve heard great things. But like I said, if you have less than $100,000 in investable assets, you won’t hear from an advisor.
If you’re interested, they are straight forward about their fees, which is nice. And all of their fees are less than 1% as of this writing, which is also nice.
Personal Capital’s Security Measures
Personal Capital is safe to use. They use the same security measures as online banking and they don’t even collect as much information. Here’s the details:
- Secure Authentication: They use a two-factor authentication when you sign in.
- Read-Only Service: You can’t make changes to your accounts, it’s all read-only.
- Data Encryption: They use military grade encryption algorithms for maximum security.
One Last Thing
I want to mention one more really cool thing about Personal Capital: The “You Index”™ .
The You Index™ is an index created by Personal Capital that combines all your investments and tracks your overall performance in one index. You can see how well you’re doing as an investor, overall.
You get all of this and it’s completely free. You might as well take a few minutes to try it out…
Personal Capital Rating
Summary
Personal Capital is a great budgeting and investing tool Plus, it’s completely free, so I really have no complaints. I think everyone should at least give it a try.
What do you think about Personal Capital? Leave your rating…