Betterment Investing

Betterment Reviews – Investing Yay or Nay?

Thanks for checking out my review of the reviews!  Today I’m checking out the Betterment Reviews out there.

The way I found these Betterment Reviews was by looking for a couple different terms, all of them involving Betterment Investing.

Betterment Investing caught my eye while I was checkout a sight for my mlm reviews.  Personally, I have to start investing better, so taking a look at the Betterment Investing Review sites is probably not a bad idea as far as my own financial resources go.

My background:  I currently have some monies with an Ameriprise Financial Advisor but it’s very little and it’s about time I start to look into better investing options.

So..let’s get to this Betterment Review.

What is Betterment? 

Betterment is an automatic investing service.  (I like automatic!)

It is possibly a way for you to invest at a lower rate than with a Financial Advisor or Investment firm because of the lower monthly/annual fees required.

It promises to help you build wealth through smarty pants computer automated algorithms.  Basically you take a question about how much risk you are willing to accept, what your goals are and then the system pretty much takes over the rest.

Asking you about your investment risk willingness isn’t anything new in the world of investment portfolio’s so that’s not really too new with Betterment.

I suppose the only way you could really tell if Betterment Investing was better than the automated systems that your current financial advisor uses is by trying it…. or obsessively checking out other Betterment Investment Reviews (like I’m doing) to get a better understanding.

That all being said, there is not better understanding than actually immersion in that of which you want to understand.

Basically, Betterment Investing is a robo advisor.  Point Blank.

 

Betterment Reviews -How Does Betterment Work?

Betterment uses a robot.  You input what your goals are and what your purpose for investing is.

Betterment Investing works you through what is needed in order to obtain the goals and keeps you posted on how far you’ve come to reach your goal.  It’s an investment tracker and lets you know options to invest to get to that goal.

Betterment Investing is best for beginners because it doesn’t require you to research your investments before putting your money in.  It’s all automated.

The main goal of the Betterment Investing program is to maximize your return with the amount of risk that you are comfortable. (I have seen a similar program on the Ameriprise website but honestly, it was confusing.  It sounds like Betterment Investing is Better.)

When you invest with the Betterment program, they make sure you have a diverse pool of assets and in essence “spread the wealth” so there is a less likelihood of the entire investment getting hit which results in a lower risk and more stability over the long term.

The nice thing about Betterment is that it’s easy to open but it is not FDIC insured. So you still have a risk (as with any investing option that is not FDIC insured).

You do NOT own individual stocks with the Betterment Investing program.  Instead you own exchange-traded funds (ETFs).  This helps to keep your money spread out and not to concentrated in one area in any asset. It basically means you will get slow steady returns.

After you input your risks, you can even change up how many stocks vs. bonds you input via a neat slider bar.

Once you specify what king of Betterment Portfolio you want, the money you input is then automatically allocated, via the Betterment Investing program, to purchase the ETFs.

If you want to change your mind and sell your investments, it’s a fairly easy process because the investments within the Betterment Portfolio are mostly liquid. Betterment will even perform the trading and sales for you!

Some of the great Features that Betterment Investing offers are:

• No Deposit (at first). – You can open a Betterment Account with no initial deposit but you do have to invest a minimum of $100/month which is really not much at all. If you are serious about beginning to invest, you need to consider a lot more than $100/month. The whole idea in investing is to save/grow money.
• Variety – Many Betterment Account available such as:
  • Betterment IRA
    • Traditional IRA
    • Roth IRA
    • Rollover IRA
    • SEP IRA
    • Trust
    • Individual
    • Joint
    • Non-Profit
  • Auto Balancing – If the robo advisor senses the portfolio is off balance to your intended goals, it will automatically buy and sell your ETFs to rebalance it. (AWESOME!)
  • Low Fees – The fees depend on your level within the Betterment Investing app.
    • Builder – 0.35% of balance w/ $100-month direct deposit
    • Better – 25% of balance but you must have a $10,000 balance
    • Best – 15% of balance but you must have a $100,000 balance
  • Lower Taxes – With the Tax-Loss Harvesting they help offset your gains with the losses to minimize taxable investments.
  • Automation – Schedule direct deposits into your Betterment Investment account with an almost hand off investment opportunity.
  • SmartDeposit – This is a great program that automatically takes the overflow from your bank account (that you specify) and puts it into the Betterment Investing program.
  • Retirement Planning – With the Retirement Calculator, you can put your investment goals into the program to get the best in Betterment Returns!
  • Customization –  If you can’t see how Betterment is customized from all that I’ve written, I’m not sure how else to tell you.   It’s pretty good!

 

Betterment Reviews

I found some really great Betterment Reviews out there. What was most interesting is that most of the top Betterment Reviews were from websites that were actually affiliates of the Betterment Investment Firm.

The majority of the ones I found even with the affiliate link, were pretty unbias.  They gave solid advise and even suggested other alternatives if you thought that Betterment wasn’t for you.

In fact, one particular review advised against using Betterment if you had less than $100,000 to invest to avoid management fees and then offered alternatives.

One of my favorite Betterment Reviews cam from Nerdwallet. (love the name)

They had a great comparison chart

From Nerdwallet.com

Feature	Pros	Cons
Account Options	Betterment offers individual and joint non-retirement accounts, as well as trusts The site also offers traditional, Roth, SEP and rollover IRAs	Betterment does not manage assets in 401(k), 529 or UGMA accounts.
Investments	Betterment invests in a diversified portfolio of exchange-traded funds, with expense ratios that range from 0.09% to 0.17%.	You can’t invest in individual stocks, mutual funds (including index funds) or bonds within a Betterment account. Before you transfer an account to Betterment, current holdings in that account must be sold.
Fees	The more you invest, the lower the rate: For accounts under $10,000: annual fee of 0.35% of the account balance with a minimum of $100 a month in auto deposits, or $3 a month without auto deposit For accounts of $10,000 to $100,000: annual fee of 0.25% For accounts over $100,000: annual fee of 0.15%	On accounts with balances less than $10,000, you can end up paying more in management fees than you would with competitors like Wealthfront and SigFig (which both manage the first $10,000 for free).
Account Minimum	$0	Clients with balances of less than $10,000 must set up automatic contributions of at least $100 a month to avoid a $3 monthly fee.

 

In addition, I used the following Betterment Reviews along with http://www.betterment.com/ to complete this review. (Not an affiliate link)

Other Betterment Reviews:

• https://investorjunkie.com/8745/betterment-review/ (They have a great model Portfolio)
• http://cashcowcouple.com/service-reviews/betterment-review/ (Oldest one I found who did an experiment with $100,000 in 2014 and gives results one year later here: http://www.mrmoneymustache.com/betterment-vs-vanguard/
• http://www.thesimpledollar.com/betterment-review/

 

Final Thoughts:

No, it’s not the Jerry Springer type final thoughts.

Why would something like Betterment be good for you?

If you’re like me, you’re bringing in more money and you’re realizing that you need to start investing and taking care of that income.

With the JobKilling Coaching Program I’m in (see Job Killing Testimonials for more), I learn new ways every day to bring in money.

I have more cash flow now than I did in the past and it’s time to tame some of it and put it in a safe place.

I may try Betterment Investing just to give a better review, but at this point, I’m not ready to open yet another account.  Frankly, I have too many other things to do and I already have an Ameriprise Adviser who is taking some of my cash and auto investing it.

I might be paying a little more than Betterment, but the truth is that I like my adviser. (He sends me Christmas Cards).

I’m too busy trying to dominate and get an even larger amount of cash flowing in and out of my life.  Once I get things rolling as big as I want, I’ll stop to protect it a little more and maybe play around with a Betterment App.

I have always been interested in investing, however, I need to continue to learn and pull the reigns in on multiple streams of income before I start worrying about where to put it.

Maybe that’s dumb, but I’m too busy making money right now to worry about switching over  to a new investing firm to save a few bucks.

If you are in a place where you have no place to invest at all, then I’d say Betterment is easy enough that you can get started now and let it fly on auto pilot.

Keep in mind, this is not a get rich quick investing scheme so you have t invest with the long term in mind, and by all means, don’t invest at a level of risk that you’re not completely comfortable.

If you’ve been hanging out on my site for a while and are interested in joining Job Killing for massive income opportunities while working at home, why not schedule a strategy call and figure out if you’re a good fit?

Click the “Schedule a Call” banner and it will take you to my calendar.

 

I hope to see you!

 

-Charissa

 

 

If you are in a mlm or business opportunity and looking for something new, you can check out Brad’s video here.  He explains why he is not longer promoting multi – level marketing.  He’s a millionaire mentor and kind of knows how to make cash from home, so please consider what he says!  Cheers!