Acorn App

[Riot]

My coworker uses it, I believe you have to set a weekly amount to be invested, plus all the change rounded up to a dollar on purchases… he seems to like it.

Does anyone use it? Does anyone have more details on how it works? I’m sure I could find some YouTube videos, but you all seem more like real people.

Thanks!

[autococker04]

I’ve been using it for 5+ years as an extra way to save and I really like it. It’s pretty much what you described, link your cards and it will round everything up to the next dollar (or more if you turn on a multiplier), and optional weekly set dollar amounts. It’s a good interface and there are a bunch of company’s they work with, you can get additional money invested if you purchase through links provided on the app (regular stuff like Nike, blue apron, ect)

I recommend it.

[Riot]

autococker04 - Do you pick where the money is invested? I’ll download it and look around, but definitely curious!

I assume it also links to a bank account for when you want to cash out? Do they take fees? Any additional information you have would be great!

[autococker04]

You pick your risk tolerance, so I set mine to high risk because it’s not my main investing account and it’s up significantly over the life of the account. So you don’t pick individual stocks, just your risk tolerance and acorns picks the stocks for you.

Yep you link to a bank account for it to draw money from. I have all my credit cards linked, but it just uses those to know when and how much to round up. All the money is drawn from the bank account. Cashing out is very easy, I’ve done it a few times. They even came out with an acorns debit card so you can use the money in the investing account as spending money. I don’t have it, but it’s another step in between a scammer and your actual bank account.

It does charge fees, I think it was a couple bucks a month under $5000 in the account, then it goes to 0.25% yearly after that. It’s always outperformed the charge by a lot so that that was not a factor to me.

[ketzer7]

Also using it and would recommend it. My girlfriend had been using it for a long time already and really liked it and got me to sign up for it too. Seemed like a pretty simple thing to save extra money.

[Riot]

Interesting. I managed to catch two YouTube videos today.. one broke down some numbers and basically said if you’re using just the spare change, than you’d need to put in $3000 just to break even at the end of the year with the $1/month plan. I may be saying it wrong now, but it made sense when I watched the video a work shift ago… zzzz.
Oh, he also said you could do an index fund through Fidelity, for just about all the same benefits, without the monthly fee.. you’d just lose the rounding up gimmick.

The second video was just some cantankerous old
guy laughing at a woman for asking about it. Basically saying, if you invest pennies, you’ll never make anything substantial.


Appreciate the input and if anyone has more, I’d love to hear it. As of now, I have not downloaded the app.

[BLachance75]

Oh, he also said you could do an index fund through Fidelity, for just about all the same benefits, without the monthly fee.. you’d just lose the rounding up gimmick.

I use Fidelity and so far I like it. No fees and it is easy to move money in and out of the account with a checking account linked. I've been buying CDs and market index funds.