Founded by Bill Harris – who is the former CEO of Intuit and PayPal – Personal Capital is a Registered Investment Advisor (RIA) through the Securities Exchange Commission (SEC). It’s designed to help you track your financial accounts so you can monitor your overall net worth, and most of their employees are Certified Financial Planners (CFP’s). In this Personal Capital review, you will find out the features and services that make this app really stand out from the rest.
Personal Capital’s edge is that it provides you the ability to link all of your financial accounts through a simple online interface, and it’s free to sign up. Setting up your accounts is easy, and once you do you will have a visual representation of all of your finances through a series of charts and graphs.
Through these reports, you will be able to see your:
- Net worth
- Cash Flow
- Account balances
- Income and expense reports
- Asset allocation
- ROI reports
- Projection of investment fees
In addition to that, you will be able to see reports of all of your spending and savings. You get to see how often you use your cash and credit cards, and where you spent them on. However, unlike Quicken, Personal Capital is not a budgeting software.
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Investments
Personal Capital also offers a variety of investments – from mutual funds to stocks to IRAs. And you will be able to see a list of your fees for each investment in your portfolio. They are based on the amount of money you have invested in that particular asset, but they will automatically rebalance your entire portfolio.
If you already have existing investments – such as IRAs, trusts, and other taxable accounts – you will be able to link them to Personal Capital as well. And the Mutual Fund Analyzer can help you manage all of your mutual fund fees so you can maximize your return. Personal Capital will also help you reduce your taxes through automatic
Getting Financial Advice
Personal Capital has a team of financial advisors for certain customers, but it’s not available for everyone. If your total net worth is $100,000 or more, you will be able to get personal financial advice from Personal Capital. Therefore, it seems as if they are targeting people with a higher net worth. **Update: They have recently increased the minimum to $25,000.
Still, this could be a good platform for someone who is new to investing, and it will be especially useful for the do-it-yourself investor. It will not, however, be a benefit to the short-term investor (such as a “day trader”). Instead, this platform is better suited for someone who wants to build a long-term portfolio, and it will help people to develop a solid investment strategy through the good financial analysis that they offer. These strategies will aid investors to perform well in the market.
Short-Term Investing
Personal Capital will not be useful for an individual who likes to rely on Mutual Fund Managers, and it will not be good for someone who likes to have complete control over their investments. This is why short-term investors and day traders will not get any benefit from using this platform.
Still, I feel that this company has a lot to offer for both the new and experienced investor, especially if he or she is looking to build a long-term portfolio that will produce sustained growth. And while not everyone will be able to get access their financial advisors, Personal Capital makes tracking and managing your holdings easier so you can see your entire financial history all in one place.
Conclusion
While this company is not for everyone, there are many people who will find use in what Personal Capital has to offer. Not only does it make portfolio management easier, it also offers a wealth of information that will help you increase and rev up your financial performance so that you can prepare for retirement. People who have solid six figures in their wallet will find their team of financial advisors to be extremely useful, as it could help them to manage and even expand on their assets and personal finance.
