Founded in 2009, Personal Capital is ane of the first digital investment managers and our all-time robo-advisor for portfolio management. Caused by Empower Retirement in 2020, the firm distinguishes itself with a comprehensive array of free coin direction tools for investment management, retirement planning, and cash flow. Personal Uppercase Cash enables any U.S. resident to admission a high involvement rate savings account with a lineup of gratuitous banking services.

Personal Capital letter Advisors is a full service investment manager and requires a $100,000 minimum with fees starting time at 0.89% AUM. While the complimentary tools are suitable for anyone interested in tracking their finances, higher net worth individuals and families will appreciate the personalized investment management services along with holistic wealth direction and Certified Financial Planner admission Personal Upper-case letter offers. Nosotros'll take an in-depth look at Personal Uppercase'south features to assistance you lot make up one's mind whether it is a fit for your financial needs.

Fundamental Takeaways

  • Personal Capital is our best robo-advisor for portfolio direction.
  • Personal Uppercase offers free net worth tracking and retirement planning software for anyone.
  • Every paying Advisory client can access a financial advisor.
  • Personal Capital provides comprehensive tax-minimization strategies including taxation-loss harvesting.
  • Stocks and private equity investments are bachelor for some Advisor clients.

Pros

  • Gratis coin management tools

  • Comprehensive and customized financial planning with CFP(R) advisors

  • Accessible live telephone customer service

  • User friendly, easy to navigate website

Cons

  • Very high account minimum of $100,000

  • Investment management fee of 0.89% AUM is higher than well-nigh robo-advisors

  • Some might find the required telephone call from the firm a nuisance

Visitor Overview
Account Minimum $100,000
Fees $100,000 - $ane million: 0.89% AUM
Kickoff $3 million: 0.79% AUM
Next $two million: 0.69% AUM
Next $5 one thousand thousand: 0.59% AUM
Over $x million: 0.49% AUM
Goal Setting Work with a financial advisor to customize goals
Available Assets ETFs, stocks, bonds, individual equity for accounts greater than $500,000
Interest Paid on Greenbacks Balances 0.x%
Customizable Portfolio Yeah
View Portfolio earlier Funding Yes
Customer Service Phone support and electronic mail
Financial Advisor Available Aye. $100,000 to $200,000: team of advisors.
$200,000+: ii defended financial advisors.
Cash Management Yes: Personal Capital Greenbacks
Tax Loss Harvesting Yeah
External Business relationship Sync/Consolidation Yes
Mobile App Android and iOS

Business relationship Setup

To sign up with Personal Uppercase you'll provide an electronic mail, cull a password, list your phone number, and date of nascency. You lot're required to schedule a telephone call with a financial advisor whether you lot are interested in only the free tools or the advisory service. Yous'll receive a brief biography of your prospective fiscal advisor.

The next step enables you to link your accounts. This procedure is fast and secure. You can add most financial accounts including:

  • Banking company
  • Investment
  • Debt
  • Credit Card
  • Manually entered categories
  • Home Mortgage

After syncing your accounts, you lot'll have access to the gratuitous fiscal tools and reports described in item below. Anyone can access the complimentary tools, although only those with a minimum of $100,000 qualify to apply the Personal Capital letter Advisors investment management with financial planners.

To sign up for Personal Uppercase Advisors, you answer intake questions which cover your fiscal state of affairs, goals, and chance appetite. Your advisor then reviews your current investments and then presents you with a personal financial strategy. Next, you'll open your account at custodian Pershing and fund it with cash or transfer securities.

Even if y'all're using the free tools, you lot can await a call from the house. This may exist considered an annoyance by some, but it's a small price to pay for admission to the robust fiscal analytical software.

Goal Planning

Goal planning is unique at Personal Uppercase Advisors and goes across mark a box entitled retirement, college planning, or vacation. The goal setting process is customized and begins with a conversation with your financial advisor after you've responded to the cursory questionnaire. Although most investors include retirement as a goal, any goal tin exist considered such as saving for higher tuition or cash for a second dwelling.

The customizable Personal Capital Retirement Planner is bachelor for both paid clients and costless tools users. This simulator projects your income and spending during both accumulation and distribution phases of life to come upwardly with a reasonable expectation of meeting your long term retirement needs.

As your goals and situation evolve, your financial advisor is there to guide yous and adapt your portfolio as needed.

Account Services

Personal Capital offers banking with no minimum amount and Personal Capital Advisors provides all the services available at a full-service financial planning firm. Automatic deposits are available and encouraged. While margin is not available, two revolving lines of credit can be accessed. These loans have no setup or closing costs, and they offer competitive interest rates.

The Fiscal Roadmap is unique to Personal Capital Advisors and takes your account and loan information to create a customized "to do" list of financial tasks. Topics might include items like insurance analysis, retirement cash flow planning, employer programme assay, debt management review, and more than. The list evolves forth with your individual situation.

Personal Upper-case letter's financial planning software is available to anyone who signs up for the platform, whether they use the Informational services or not. At that place is no minimum required to sync your accounts and use all of the tools.

Calculators and tools include:

  • Net Worth Tracker
  • Savings Planner
  • Budgeting
  • Cash Flow
  • Retirement Planner
  • Investment Check upwardly
  • Fee Analyzer
  • Teaching Planner

The fee analyzer assesses whether you lot could be saving coin on investment fees, while the investment check upward analyzes your asset allocation and suggests ways to increment returns and lower risks. The retirement planner allows y'all to accommodate inputs and investigate the success of diverse retirement scenarios. We found the calculators and tools to be incredibly helpful and, thanks to account syncing, they provided very individualized and actionable insights.

Cash Management

Personal Upper-case letter Greenbacks is a complimentary savings product with no minimums. The program is administered through UMB Bank. Subsequently opening an account, your coin is placed in participating member banks. The account is FDIC insured upwardly to an amass of $1.v 1000000, well above the standard $250,000 a single bank offers.

Available features include:

  • Loftier yield interest bearing savings business relationship
  • Private and articulation accounts
  • Bill pay by linking to your checking business relationship
  • Direct deposit
  • Unlimited deposits and withdrawals

Portfolio Structure

The Personal Capital Advisors Personal Strategy is their customized investment procedure, individualized for each client. The portfolio is driven by the client'due south responses to the initial questionnaire and interview with the financial advisor.

The algorithm creates the portfolio past integrating the post-obit factors into its calculation:

  • Avails
  • Adventure tolerance
  • Time horizon and goals
  • Wellness status
  • Tax laws
  • Legacy goals
  • Net worth and income
  • Retirement historic period
  • Marital status
  • Expected withdrawal rate, and more

So Personal Capital takes a very thorough and deep expect at your finances and individual information when information technology makes the recommendation. The data synced to Personal Capital and drawn out through the call with the financial counselor gives Personal Capital more to piece of work with than most robo-advisors take, and the model this feeds into looks to provide more actual diversification than other robo-advisors with an algorithm based off Modern Portfolio Theory (MPT) alone. The asset resource allotment employed in the Personal strategy includes varying allotments to the following nugget classes:

  • US Stocks, including varying styles, size, and sectors
  • International Stocks, including adult and emerging markets
  • US Bonds, including diverse government and corporate of varying credit quality
  • International Bonds of varying credit quality
  • Alternatives, including real manor and commodities
  • Cash

The Smart Weighting nugget allocation differs from other automated advisors' market place capitalization asset grade weighting, where portfolio sectors replicate those in market place-cap weighted indexes like the S&P 500. The house's smart weighting equally weights assets based on size, sector, and way. This portfolio construction strives to provide a higher gamble-adjusted return than the market cap-weighted allocation.

Investors can choose the cadre portfolio or a socially responsible investing (SRI) option where companies and ETFs that correspond strong Environmental, social, and governance (ESG) factors replace comparable funds and equities.

Available Assets
Individual Stocks Yep
Mutual Funds No
Fixed Income Yes
REITs Yes
Socially Responsible or ESG Options Yes
ETFs Yes
Non-Proprietary ETFs Yes
Crypto, Forex No

Portfolio Customization

Customization is an area where Personal Capital excels. Driven by the client and financial advisor, the customization accommodates your revenue enhancement situation and unique preferences. Clients tin can request distinct asset allocations, the socially responsible option, ETFs but in lieu of individual stocks, restricted buy or sell lists, replacement ETFs or stocks, special taxation-influenced strategies, and more.

Portfolio Management

With the father of Modernistic Portfolio Theory, Harry Markowitz, on the advisory lath, it's no surprise that portfolio'southward are created forth the efficient borderland. Only put, each investor portfolio is crafted to provide the highest returns for the given risk level.

The portfolio management is designed to fit the users goals and preferences. Funds and stocks are evaluated to ensure that they maximize returns, minimize adventure, and add to the portfolio'south diversification. The portfolio is as well measured for sector and country concentrations, which adds to the portfolio'south goal of maximizing returns for any given risk level. The tax optimization strategy includes appropriate asset location in the most tax-efficient accounts, tax loss harvesting, and choosing taxation-efficient funds. Municipal bond funds and individual securities can aid in tax minimization.

Rebalancing is aided by technology alerts which notifies managers to conform the client'southward asset mix. Rebalancing is triggered when a customer's financial state of affairs changes, avails migrate also far from goal, or a tactical shift in the economic system.

The progress towards goals is reviewed regularly between the client and financial counselor and adjustments are made when needed.

Automatic Rebalancing Aye, As needed
Reporting Features Dashboard, monthly statements, tax documents, and custom reports
Tax Loss Harvesting Aye
External Account Syncing/Consolidation Yes-all external accounts including investment, bank, debt, and custom are available

User Experience

Desktop Experience:

Personal Uppercase'due south platform is amid the most user friendly nosotros've reviewed. The navigation is intuitive with the major categories listed on the bill of fare including Banking, Investing, Planning, and Wealth Direction. The Wealth Management vertical is the client'south link to the paid Personal Capital Advisors features with quick access to your advisor and the educational web log.

The overview tab leads to a comprehensive dashboard view with net worth, accounts, spending, and transactions. The investing and planning categories include all of the gratis money direction tools. Banking, every bit ane would expect, is the door to Personal Majuscule Cash.

Mobile Experience:

The mobile app is available for iOs and Android and offers business relationship direction, Personal Capital letter Cash, and many of the portfolio assay tools. It's even accessible on your habiliment device. Like the desktop version, users can runway cash flow, investments, and use the retirement planning features. The app likewise provides personalized insights such as how much yous've saved this yr.

A few desktop features are lacking on the app. For instance, the Investment Checkup isn't available on mobile, and users who desire to open an business relationship need to do then using the desktop version. In add-on, at that place are some problems with account sync and lack of accurate current data reporting, particularly on the android app.

Client Service

Customer service is above average at Personal Capital letter. Users tin contact the company by phone Monday through Friday during normal concern hours and also via email. Advisory clients can email and phone their investment representatives to schedule either virtual or in person meetings. Additionally, the company has offices in California, Denver, Dallas, and Atlanta for in-person financial counselor meetings. The FAQs are comprehensive and well-categorized. Conversation is not bachelor.

  • Telephone One thousand-F during business organization hours
  • E-mail
  • In-person and virtual meetings with advisors
  • Physical offices in California, Denver, Dallas, and Atlanta
  • Comprehensive FAQs
  • No live chat

Security

The platform employs the highest security protocols. Client login information is encrypted and unavailable to company employees.

Security protocols include:

  • Two cistron authentication
  • Firewalls and perimeter security comparable with banks and payment cards
  • 256-bit AES data encryption
  • Daily transaction emails so users can verify their own activity
  • Personal Majuscule carries Securities Investor Protection Corporation (SIPC) insurance up to $500,000 which includes $250,000 for cash. Many other firms offer excess insurance to cover visitor malfeasance and/or bankruptcy. Equally is standard beyond the manufacture, at that place is no type of insurance that can protect your account from losses due to the investment markets.

Education

The educational portal blog is called Daily Upper-case letter and includes hundreds of well-written educational articles and guides.

The topic categories include:

  • Personal Finance
  • Investing and Markets
  • Financial Planning
  • News
  • Client Stories
  • Guides and Reports

Many of the articles are of the actionable variety, answering common questions similar "how to reduce taxable income" or taking marketplace events and dovetailing them into a favorite topic of diversification or concentration risk. They do, of course, usually end the analysis with a plug for the service. The robo-counselor also publishes analysis of the 401K plans offered past some large employers like Amazon and Walmart that are very interesting. Amongst this lighter content, however, are white paper posts that become deeper into the reasoning behind Personal Capital's approach. Sophisticated investors will appreciate the Personal Uppercase research and deeper coverage of investment topics.

Commissions & Fees

Personal Capital'southward money direction software is available for free and is well worth checking out.

Personal Capital Advisors charges a declining fee schedule, based on avails under management. There are no commissions or transaction fees.

$100,000 to $i million 0.89%
Showtime $3 million 0.79%
Next $2 one thousand thousand 0.69%
Next $v 1000000 0.59%
Over $10 million 0.49%

The AUM fees are higher than nearly competitors with fiscal advisors like Betterment, Schwab Intelligent Advisors Premium, and Vanguard Personal Advisors.

Category Fee
Management fees for $5,000 business relationship Due north/A
Management fees for $25,000 account N/A
Management fees for $100,000 business relationship $890.00 AUM per year
Termination fees Unknown
Expense ratios 0.08% average ETF expense ratio
Mutual funds Northward/A

Last Verdict

Personal Capital is best for loftier-net-worth investors seeking a well-researched investment approach, qualified fiscal advisors, and comprehensive financial planning. Investors who might otherwise hire a total-service traditional financial counselor tin interview a Personal Capital financial advisor to acquire about their strategies to minimize taxes and outperform a traditional market cap weight investment portfolio.

Unfortunately, the big business relationship minimum puts Personal Capital out of reach for many every bit a robo-advisor. That said, the costless portfolio management tools are the best we've found and suitable for whatsoever investor who seeks to analyze and manage their own investments.

Everything Y'all Need to Know About Robo-Advisor

Methodology

Our mission at Investopedia is to provide investors with reviews and ratings of robo-advisors that are comprehensive and unbiased. Our squad of researchers and expert writers, led by Michael Sacchitello, spent months evaluating all aspects of a robo-counselor's platform, including the business relationship setup process, goal planning tools, account service options, portfolio construction offerings, portfolio management, mobile and desktop user feel, educational content, fees, and security. As part of this evaluation, we extract disquisitional data points that are weighted by our quantitative model that produces a powerful star-scoring arrangement.

With the individual investor in listen, we've designed a comprehensive ranking methodology to notice the best overall robo-advisors and the all-time robo-advisors across nine key categories. Each advisor is and so scored beyond multiple variables to rate functioning in every applicable category. The score for the overall accolade is a weighted boilerplate of the categories.