Setting and reaching your financial goals shouldn’t be difficult. The trouble is that most of the advice you find online might not apply to your situation. With SAVVI Financial, you finally get custom financial advice with a step-by-step action plan.
Every “how to” personal finance article tells you to spend less and save more. “You must have a budget,” they say, “and live a frugal life.”
Budgeting and being frugal are important, but they aren’t enough to get you where you want to be. To open up your financial future, you need a financial plan to make your assets work for you. This is where SAVVI Financial shines.
It’s like having a personal financial planner in your pocket.
Let’s dive into SAVVI to see if it’s right for you.
SAVVI Financial Review: What is SAVVI?
SAVVI Financial isn’t just another budgeting tool. It’s a complete financial wellness platform. With SAVVI, you get a personalized action plan for:
- Spending
- Saving
- Investing
- Protecting your financial goals
Usually, you’d pay hundreds or thousands of dollars to get your hands on a personalized plan.
SAVVI uses an advanced algorithm created by MIT-trained experts to process your data. The team is made up of Ph.D. mathematicians, engineers, and data scientists with 20+ years of experience in quantitative finance.
Sounds impressive, right?
It really is. But there are a few downsides that we’ll get to in a minute.
Overall, Savvi Financial is an excellent tool to help you make personal finance decisions.
Best Features of SAVVI Financial
A lot of personal finance programs you find have the same benefits. Think about it: There are a lot of great budgeting apps out there, but how many give you financial advice?
The ability to dive into your finances and tell you precisely what you need to do to get yourself in a better position sets SAVVI apart from other applications.
Your Finances All In One Place
SAVVI Financial can connect to your account and import balances and other data automatically. This is a huge time saver. You also have the option to add your accounts manually if your bank isn’t supported or you want a more hands-on approach.
SAVVI Financial lets you connect:
- Checking and savings accounts
- Credit cards
- Retirement and investment accounts
- Mortgages and other loans
- Life insurance
- Health savings accounts
- Real estate
To get the most out of the program, add more than just your banking and investment accounts. The more data that Savvi can analyze, the more accurate your financial action plan will be.
When you have all of your accounts in one place, you get a bird’s-eye view of your finances with the option to dive deeper into your cash, investments, and behaviors.
See Your Net Worth
With your accounts in one place, calculating your net worth is a breeze. Net worth is an excellent indicator of your overall financial health. It’s also an easy way to measure your journey.
Because you connect all of your financial accounts in the SAVVI platform, you can see your net worth at a glance.
The dashboard breaks down your total assets and debts and will update your linked accounts automatically so you can see the changes. For accounts you add manually, updating the balance is simple.
Watching your debt numbers fall and your net worth climb is exciting! When you track your net worth, you see that getting out of debt and building savings isn’t as hard as you thought.
Understand Your Money
Understanding your money is the key to making your finances work for you. It’s also an area where other personal finance apps fall short. SAVVI is packed full of resources to help you get the most out of your situation.
Inside the platform, there’s a section called “The Big Picture” that breaks down your income and spending by year, month, and week. It’s like what a typical budget might look like. A graph shows you how much income you have from different sources and where your money is going.
The real value in this section is the detail you get about where your money goes. Even I spend without thinking sometimes. But SAVVI lays it all out for you.
It shows how much you’re putting toward big expenses like debt, taxes, healthcare, and savings, so you know what you have available to spend on everything else, like groceries, clothing, utilities, and entertainment.
Money Insights
If you’ve ever wondered how your finances measure up to the average person, you’ll love the insights feature.
The platform analyzes your savings, housing costs, debt load, and your ability to weather a job loss or other financial emergency. Then, you get insight into where you stand and how to improve your situation.
When I set up SAVVI with my financial information, the program warned me I’m not saving enough money. Since I’m paying down debt right now and not putting much into savings, that makes sense.
But instead of saying, “you need to save more money,” which isn’t very helpful, the app has actionable steps to increase your savings rate slowly. It suggests you increase the amount you save by 0.5% to 1% a week until you hit your target.
The wake-up call here is how much cushion you have. Your cushion is the same thing as your emergency fund. It measures the number of months you can survive if your income dries up.
Financial experts recommend having at least three to six months of living expenses as a cushion. If you don’t have that much saved, it’s okay. With SAVVI, you can set a goal to build up your emergency fund. Your personal action plan will show you step-by-step how to make it a reality.
Set Goals
Most people are working toward a monetary goal, whether it’s saving for a home, planning for retirement, paying for college, or paying down debt. The goals you set form the foundation of the custom action plan that SAVVI Financial creates for you.
If you want to buy a house, the program will analyze your income and savings to help you decide how much you can afford. For retirement planning, it uses strategies to help you navigate tax savings and build your nest egg.
If your goals change, that’s okay. Any time you add or change a goal, SAVVI will create a new action plan. That way, you’re not trying to figure out how to achieve your goals with outdated information and advice.
Personal Action Plan
The creators of SAVVI use artificial intelligence to run your data through millions of scenarios to create an action plan. Behind the scenes, the program will analyze how the tax code, Social Security elections, inflation, investment performance, and more will impact your financial future.
The downside is your personal action plan isn’t instant. Once you enter your accounts and goals, the system takes about five to ten minutes to process. It could take up to 24 hours, but I tried several options to compare action plans, and it never took more than ten minutes.
You’ll get an email when it’s ready. Your action plan includes:
- Projected value of investments
- How long it will take to reach each of your goals
- What to include when planning for retirement
- Steps to take to reach your goals
The platform shows you at a glance how much you can save and spend. It includes details about which accounts to use for savings and how to create a budget to monitor your spending.
If you need another type of account to make reaching your goals easier, SAVVI Financial will suggest it. The app might suggest opening a savings account, Roth IRA, brokerage account, 529 college savings plan, or a health savings account (HSA).
Personal Financial Coaching
Upgrade to the Personal paid plan, and you’ll get personal financial coaching from the very start. Your coach will help you get SAVVI set up with your accounts, investments, and goals.
The SAVVI Financial program takes some time to gather your data. Having someone you can reach out to during the process is an enormous benefit.
For instance, I ran into a snag when setting up my account. I couldn’t figure out how to add an employer to my profile, so I reached out for help. Turns out, it was a silly mistake (I overlooked the button that said “add an employer”), and they resolved my question in less than five minutes.
After you’re set up, your coach will check in with you once every three months throughout the year. Your paid account also comes with 30 minutes of phone consultation every month to answer questions and help you get on track with your plan and goals.
Where SAVVI Financial Falls Short
The personal finance advice from SAVVI is exceptional. I enjoyed the comprehensive view the program displayed and the detailed action steps to take. But the program isn’t perfect.
There are a few areas where SAVVI Financial falls short.
Most notably is the lack of budgeting features. You get a lot of personalized advice on how to manage your money, but SAVVI doesn’t include a tool to create a budget or track your spending.
The program doesn’t have a smartphone app, either. When I asked about whether an app was available, the company said, “Not yet, but very soon.” They also said the app will focus on bringing budgeting tools to the platform.
Adding budgeting as a feature to SAVVI will make this program even more powerful.
The platform connects with several well-known institutions, so linking your accounts is quick and painless. However, if you bank with a small local bank or credit union (like I do), you may not be able to link your account.
If that’s the case, you can add accounts manually and update the accounts on your own. Luckily, that’s easy to do.
Setting up the program took longer than I expected. Most budget apps are ready to go in about five minutes. It took about 20 minutes to enter my data, add my bank accounts, sync my investment accounts, and get an action plan.
Once I entered all the information, I could see how valuable it is to have all of my accounts in one place. You get a better understanding of your money, and your personal action plan is more accurate, too.
Is SAVVI Right for You?
SAVVI is an excellent personal finance tool. It’s a great option for individuals, or couples who need some guidance to get their finances in order.
If you’re married or in a long-term relationship and don’t share your finances or accounts, this might not be the right program for you. But if you’ve been wanting to combine your finances, SAVVI is an excellent first step.
It walks you through everything you need to create a financial plan.
The level of advice you get from this program is unmatched. I’m a “money nerd” and enjoy diving into my finances in detail. But I can also see where the average person looking to get control of their money would enjoy this app, too.
The platform is packed with knowledge. It covers basic questions like “how does a savings account work” and “where do I find my property taxes.”
You’ll also find answers to more complex financial questions and tips on investment strategies.
Depending on your goals, you may see information on how to invest your money. It explains asset allocation and includes a strategy on the percentage of stocks and bonds the program recommends based on your financial picture.
How to Get Started with SAVVI
Getting started with SAVVI Financial is easy. Visit SAVVI to sign up for an account.
You can pick between three plan options:
- Basic: Track your accounts and net worth, select up to 2 goals, and get a personal action plan for $5 a month.
- Premium: For $9 per month, you can select up to 6 goals, and get investment advice based on your risk tolerance.
- Personal: If you want a personal financial coach to help you set up the program, the $29 per month plan is best. It also comes with up to 30 minutes of phone-based coaching every month.
After picking your plan, you must agree to an investment advisory agreement. This is a legal document that explains the terms and conditions of the account.
Then you’ll enter your name, email address, state of residence, and create a password to set up your account. From there, you link your accounts. Add your checking and savings, credit cards, investments, loans, life insurance, and HSA accounts if you have them.
SAVVI also needs to know how you earn your income to create your action plan. If you’re an employee, your personal financial advice will differ from if you were self-employed or aren’t working.
The next step is to select the goals you want to achieve. This is where you decide if you want to save for an emergency fund, home purchase, or work toward another financial milestone.
The final question before creating your action plan is about risk tolerance. By knowing how much risk you’re willing to take with your finances, the program can suggest opportunities that better align with your goals.
Finally, you get to the step where you create an action plan.
Your action plan isn’t available instantly. SAVVI needs a little time to analyze your data to create a personalized plan. In my experience, this only took five or ten minutes, but it could take a few hours.
You’ll get an email when your plan is ready, and that’s when the magic happens.
Your action plan will review your goals and create step-by-step processes to make them a reality. It also includes specific actions to take to save, spend, and invest your money to help you reach your goals faster.
SAVVI Financial Review: Final Thoughts
SAVVI Financial is unlike any personal finance app I’ve seen. The platform does an excellent job of helping you gather your account information so you can see your entire financial picture in one spot.
The best part is you can edit your goals at any time and create a new action plan. If you want to get married, have kids, save for a house, or retire early, SAVVI can create an action plan based on your personal goals.
If you’re ready to take control of your personal finances, create an account with SAVVI today.
Have you used SAVVI Financial? What do you think of it?
Please let us know in the comments below.
