Category: 5. Acorns review

One of Acorns’ unique features is Acorns Earn. With this feature, every time you use an Acorns-linked credit or debit card at a partner retailer, that retailer will contribute an extra amount to your Acorns account.

When you shop with Acorns Earn partner brands — which currently include Airbnb, Blue Apron, Macy’s, and Warby Parker, among others — the extra money will be added to your Acorns account. You can also download the Acorns Chrome extension to earn from your online purchases.

There are over 12,000 partnered brands and 350 Top Brands to earn rewards from.

This service lets parents, guardians, and family members set up a custodial account for a child. To provide support for parents during the COVID-19 pandemic, Acorns is giving a free account for babies born in 2020 (expires March 1, 2021).

If you invest $5 a day when your child is born and if that investment makes the average stock market return of 7%, then you could give your kids around $60,000 when they turn 18.

With Acorns Early accounts, it’s easy to set up a custodial account. All you need is your child’s name and social security number. It’s a UTMA/UGMA account, which means it can be used for anything that benefits your kids.

Invest your spare change in your children’s future or set up reoccurring payments, and Acorns does the rest. You can potentially get tax advantages for investing for your children.

Early accounts are included in all Acorns Family accounts. For only $5 a month, you can get Acorns Early for all your kids, plus all-in-one investing, retirement, and checking accounts, Smart Deposit, personalized insurance options, and other tools to save money.

Acorns has a checking account called Spend with a debit card that applies Acorns and Acorns Later investing functionality to every purchase you make. Spend lets you instantly do real-time Round-Ups, as well as automatic retirement savings and extra savings via Acorns Earn.

You can also invest up to 10% of your everyday purchases from local retailers that are not enrolled with Acorns Earn. The debit card is offered through Visa, and you can use it at over 55,000 fee-free  Allpoint ATMs across the country. Spend accounts are FDIC insured up to $250,000. Spend accounts are included with the Family account.

Other perks of Acorns Spend include:

• Smart Deposit — With Acorns Spend, you can automatically allocate a portion of your paycheck into your Invest, Later, or both accounts.
• Acorns Later — Acorns users can invest in a specially designed individual retirement account (IRA). Acorns Later is included in the Personal and Family account.
• Scheduled Deposits — Set recurring daily, weekly or monthly investments.
• “Learn” — Acorns features an education section that includes investing basics, FAQs, and a glossary.
• “Grow” — Interviews, news, and how-tos are available on the website or within the app.
• “Potential” — This tool allows users to see the impact that a theoretical additional investment (daily, weekly, or monthly) would have on their account.

• Acorns Round-Up
• Acorns Spend
• Acorns Early
• Acorns Earn

Acorns Round-Up Feature

For each credit card transaction, Acorns rounds up to the nearest dollar and invests it into an Acorns account.

The Round-Up transfers come from monitoring your linked account and rounding up the purchases to the nearest dollar.

For example, I spent $22.43 at the gas station this week. That amount was rounded up to $23, and the extra 57 cents were added to my Acorns Round-Up balance. Once the Round-Up balance reaches $5, the money will be withdrawn from my bank account and added to my Acorns investment.

You can choose which transactions you want to include in your Round-Up amount or set it to “automatic,” in which case Acorns will apply the feature to all eligible purchases.

However, you can also use Round-Up Multipliers to boost your extra investment by two, three, or 10 times. So instead of pitching in just those 57 cents from my gas station purchase, I can elect to invest as much as $5.70 for that transaction automatically. The potential to magnify the savings is enormous.

Additionally, you can deposit cash reward bonuses from your bank or other rewards programs you currently have. Or you can choose to invest lump-sum amounts in addition to your Round-Up deposits. You can set up recurring deposits on a daily, weekly, or monthly schedule if you prefer.

While microsavings is still Acorns’ main driver, Acorns does more than just invest your spare change. You can invest for retirement, set up a checking account, and set up a custodial investment account for your children, among many other services.

By linking your credit card and checking account, Acorns reads your spending habits on your credit card and rounds each transaction up to the nearest whole number. It pulls the difference from your checking account and invests it in an Acorns account that you set up.

Acorns is a great starting point for anyone who hasn’t invested yet or needs a bit of guidance in the beginning, and you can actually make money using it for investing.

Acorns Features

Minimum Investment	$0
Fees	$3 a month for the Personal Plan; $5 a month for the Family plan.
Mobile Access	iPhone App, Android App, Blackberry App
Website Access	True
Accounts	Traditional IRARoth IRARollover IRACheckingSavingsMoney Market

Acorns is a smartphone app that “rounds up” your spending to the nearest dollar and invests that difference. You link a credit card and checking account, and Acorns does the rest. This microsavings app makes investing almost painless because you’re spending only pennies at a time.

The Acorns app is targeted at a much younger, more tech-savvy generation (Millennials) since the entire investment experience can be created and managed from a smartphone. However, Acorns recently unveiled a web-based version for desktop and portable users, as well.

Essentially, this app is a great starting point for anyone who hasn’t invested yet or needs a bit of guidance in the beginning.

For many of us, investing can seem overly complicated and somewhat intimidating if you don’t know the ins and outs. Acorns intend to simplify and demystify this process through a revolutionary mobile app. The Acorns app was created to remove any mental roadblocks or anxiety about becoming a regular investor. Using Modern Portfolio Theory, it recommends optimized portfolios and keeps them on track with automatic rebalancing and dividend reinvestment. Here’s our Acorns review.

 Pros

• Painless Way to Save —Since the amounts taken out of your account are small, you won’t notice them missing from your checking account.
• Hides the Complexities of Investing — You don’t need to understand Modern Portfolio Theory to use Acorns.
• Start Investing With No Money — Acorns doesn’t require a minimum deposit to start using the service.
• Easy to Set Up Custodial Accounts — Acorns Early makes it easy to set up a custodial investment account for your children and start investing in their future.

 Cons

• Only for “Boosting” Your Savings — Acorns’ savings amounts aren’t really suited to save the 5% to 20% annually you need to put toward retirement or larger goals.
• Can Lose Principal—It’s possible to lose money with Acorns, although the recommended investments are pretty conservative.
• Expensive for Small Accounts – Monthly Acorns fees can be high for very small investment portfolios.