Kaye's Days

A friend introduced me to investing last year, and I started in March. Not exactly consistently, but curious me did some searching. There are a ton of investing apps out there: WeBull, Robinhood, Betterment, SoFi. I don’t need a dozen brokerage accounts, though.

My friend uses Acorns and Stash, so I went with those too. I downloaded M1 Finance because I wanted to check that out too, but that requires a minimum of a $25 deposit, so that needs to wait. Acorns and Stash require only $5, and Cash App (of all apps!) requires only a minimum of $1. I had too much fun with that.

From what I read, Acorns’s biggest feature is its round-up, which lets you invest tiny amounts of money. Ultimately, a “set it and forget it” concept. You invest without thinking about it. This is great if you like automatic transfers…

…which I don’t. I’ve never used this feature. In fact, I disabled it after it would’ve invested money I needed at that moment. I don’t like anything that automatically deducts payments unless I choose to set it. “Set it and forget it” is a great way to overdraft. No.

Acorns is strictly a robo-investor, which I like, but not when it’s the only option. Recently, I discovered it takes a week for money deposited into their retirement account to be invested. That is patience I don’t possess. I also dislike there seems to be no option to turn off automatic re-investing. Not that my dividends are anything to brag about, but I’d still like the option.

In short, Acorns is becoming uninteresting to me. Then again, maybe it isn’t supposed to be interesting.

I came to prefer Stash solely for the fact it has more options than Acorns. Stash allows manual and robo-investing. I use both just because. Automatic re-investing can’t be disabled for the robot portfolios, but it’s optional for the personal one, so I keep it off. I get a little too much enjoyment out of reading ETFs and picking one. I’m weird.

I want to move out of Acorns, but unfortunately, taxes must be paid on anything withdrawn from a brokerage account. I hate taxes, so really, that money may just stay in Acorns, and I stop bothering with it. I’ll play around with M1 Finance, but I think I may settle on Stash and stick with it. It’s the one that’s working for me.

Fidelity, Vanguard, and Schwab are the most renowned investment tools. I already have Fidelity for my job’s 401K, so that’s covered.