Orphan: personal finance and budgeting

Sean Park is so excited about Betterment that he bought a stake in the company:

Betterment allows anyone to quickly, easily and without mystery manage asset allocation and risk budgeting using a simple, multi-asset class portfolio. No hassle, no time wasted, no blizzard of trade confirmations. The first time I saw it, I immediately wanted to be able to manage all my cash balances using their platform.

Except Sean Park is a sophisticated venture capitalist, and Betterment doesn’t manage cash balances. Instead, it manages investments. Basically, it provides an easy way of sweeping money out of your checking account and into your Betterment account, where it’s then invested across eight different ETFs. Betterment does most of the asset allocation; you just tell the company how much you want invested in Treasuries and how much in stocks, and they will do the rest.

This is a handy little service — but the amount that Betterment charges — 0.9% per year — is way too much, especially since it comes on top of the expense ratios of the underlying ETFs, which net out at 18.2bp for stocks and 17.5bp for bonds. In these days of ultra-low interest rates, buying a bond fund and then paying out 107.5bp per year in expenses is likely to leave you with a negative real return, and quite possibly could leave you with a negative nominal return as well. Or, to put it another way, right now it makes very little sense to have Betterment manage your bond funds and charge you a 90bp fee for the privilege: you might well be better off just keeping your money in a savings account, where there’s no risk of a nominal decline.

The idea behind Betterment — that investing should be very easy and simple at the front end, even if there’s lots of complicated stuff going on at the back end — is a good one. And I look forward to the time when banks offer Betterment-style services to their depositors, making it easy and painless to save money. I’m sure those banks could learn a lot from what Betterment is doing, and even maybe license some of their technology. But it only really becomes attractive when it’s free. And when, at the very least, it gives some kind of an option to invest internationally and in credit — two enormous asset classes that Betterment completely ignores. I’m pretty sure that Sean Park, for one, would never find it genuinely attractive in its current incarnation.

Update: Betterment’s CEO, Jon Stein, responds in the comments, and he sure knows the way to a blogger’s heart — by referencing an old blog entry which even I’d forgotten about:

I agree with you that we should offer our customers exposure to international stocks. Our users are all US-based, and so are naturally overweight US. We plan to add international exposure soon, and perhaps a real-estate component or credit component, as well. All of these asset classes are components of the “market portfolio” – and would be represented in the “everything bagel” that you talked about in a previous post. It’s that everything bagel that we’re working toward – it takes time to make it just right.

The theory is simple: "If you don't have the money, don't charge it. Try to leave your credit card at home and only use it to pay bills," advises April Lewis, director of education for Consolidated Credit Counseling Services. Then immediately pay off your credit-card balance. As for old credit-card debt, sit down and commit to paper a plan for paying them off. Go for a quick hit, like paying off the smallest balance first, or decide to take on the highest rate card first. Get the job done.

Here's a second tip: Be proactive about managing your credit. Call up your lender and ask it to lower your interest rate. Usually, lenders will lower callers' rates by 2% to 3%, says Scott Gamm, founder of HelpSaveMyDollars.com. Also check your credit report. You can check your credit for free at annualcreditreport.com, for example. If you see mistakes, contact the credit agencies and get those mistakes corrected. If errors are dragging down your score, eliminating them can boost it to where it belongs and make you eligible for better rates.

2. Think automation

Free online banking tools can make it easier to manage your finances with less work. To help grow your savings, for example, you can schedule regular transfers from your checking account. Manisha Thakor, author of Get Financially Naked: How to Talk Money With Your Honey, suggests setting up the transfer of a set amount of money into your savings account every pay day.

Also automate recurring bill payments so you never miss a due date or pay a late fee, which sends money down the drain. Even without late fees, timely payments are key: 35% of your credit score is based on your ability to make payments on time. If you sign up for automatic payments, however, make sure to check your monthly bills for errors. One other caveat: "Make sure you have enough cushion in your checking account to avoid any overdrafts" before setting up auto-payments, money coach Lora Sasiela says.
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Thursday, January 13, 2011

personal finance and budgeting

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