I’m nuts for Acorns! The app, not the food. If you ask me, I’m not too crazy about the food,
but give me cashews any day. Anyhoo, the app!
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| Two acorns in love |
Okay, a little background. I love money. Call me Scrooge! I love seeing money accumulate, if only little by little. I have a savings account that draws paltry interest. It used to be better before the recession in 2008 started, but hey, a little is better than nothing. I have a battery-operated bank that I bought a few months ago. And a few weeks ago, I discovered Acorns. I was writing an article on financial apps, and Acorns was one.
Right away, it intrigued me. Say you use your credit card or debit card to pay $3.83 for coffee. Acorns rounds up to the dollar, and in this case, the round up is 17 cents. It does this for your various purchases until you hit $5, in which case it transfers $5 from your bank account to your Acorns portfolio. (No long list of tiny itty bitty 5-cent transfers!)
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| What $17.59 looks like |
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| No caption here. Move on. ;) |
You choose an investing portfolio based on your needs and risk tolerance. Are you conservative? Assertive? Don’t have much time to play with? Have a lot of time? Acorns covers your bases.
I love checking my portfolio and seeing how it has grown. The first few days I had Acorns, I “lost” five cents in the stock market. The horrors! ;) Now, I have $2.17 I would not otherwise. In the long term, it’s more than I would get from interest in a savings account. (In case you're wondering, I used to do CDs but need more in savings before I am comfortable laddering again.)
Sure, there are risks. The stock market could crash—and has. You have the ability to withdraw your money and change your portfolio at any time, so that helps.
Oh yeah, fees. Aren’t they fun? I pay $1 per month as long as my balance stays under $5,000. After that, fees increase a little depending on the amount of money in your portfolio.
As of now, I’m really enjoying Acorns. It makes saving and investing fun. If you want to save without having to think about it, Acorns seems just the trick. If you don’t have a smartphone or tablet, just sign up for Acorns online. In fact, that’s what I did.
Okay, just because I can and my cat is really cute, who needs boxes when you have bags?
