Managing a relationship is stressful enough without introducing unnecessary miscommunications about day-to-day spending. This is one reason why many couples maintain separate spending accounts with pre-defined responsibilities (e.g. you pay the rent, I’ll pay the utilities, etc.). But that doesn’t alleviate the need to communicate, especially when one person has more “discretionary” funds. And separate accounts can lead to more trouble if one person is more of a free spender than the other, or if one has more trouble avoiding overdrafts and/or tapping out accounts well in advance of payday.
Joint accounts have the advantage of keeping funds in a single bucket which is statistically easier to keep above zero compared to stretching funds across two or more accounts. And joint accounts by definition require the couple to work together as a team to manage spending. But many couples, especially early on, aren’t entirely ready to cede “control” over their paychecks. Overall, it’s an area ripe for disagreements and resentment.
That’s why we love Simple’s best-of-both-worlds solution, the Simple Shared plan which offers 3 accounts: an individual spending account for each person, along with a joint account for the pair. While that’s a great foundation, it still doesn’t address the day-to-day communications necessary to keep both partners on the same page.
Enter the newest PFM player, HoneyDue (formerly WalletIQ), currently toiling away in Y Combinator’s summer class (S17). After a stint as one of Apple’s favorite apps in May, the company already has 20,000 registered users, 60% of which are female. The app debuted on Product Hunt two days ago, and was the most popular product of the day (currently 820 upvotes) and so far is fifth highest of the week. You’ll be hearing more about them in two weeks when they officially debut at the incubator’s demo days (Aug 21-23).
HoneyDue uses Yodlee (probably) to aggregate transaction accounts across multiple FIs into one mobile app. Then it provides tools to make it easy to annotate expenses and communicate with each other about what they were.
Bottom line: Collaborative spending tools are an attractive account management option that absolutely should be offered by every bank, credit union, card issuer and PFM provider. HoneyDue is a good example of how the UI can work. And banks, consider joining the company’s seed round, if only as an R&D effort (strategic seed investing).
While the term PFM is dead, the concept, employing software to watch over your finances, is more widespread than ever. It’s just called AI, spending management, or nothing at all since it’s now baked into many digital banking offerings.
ed it a “new app we love” that pushed the app from nowhere to #16 (USA app store, free Finance apps). Today it is number 56 (see above).
Consumer value prop
That still leaves the problem of what to call it on a menu, or in a tab, if you offer a stand-alone service. Outside of banking, I think the most common term today is Advanced as in Google’s Advanced Search. Or, if you are potentially going to charge a fee, Pro is commonly used. If that seems too specific, it could be Premium or Select. Even the old credit card standbys, Gold, Platinum or Black, could be used.
Editor’s note: We are starting a new series showcasing very early-stage
HomeSlice
Why it’s a good strategic bet for financial institutions: Students and young adults are an attractive, albeit difficult, segment to win over. Yet, they are the future, and could be customers for 70+ years. So helping them with early money-management problems could pay huge dividends over time, assuming you are able to upsell profitable financial products. Furthermore, if a “parent view” could be added to the functionality, the app could be appealing to the income-producing part of the family.
I’ve always been a “wanna be” tracker. I like watching the stats closely, but I also lose interest if the process, either capturing the data or compiling it, becomes tedious. But thanks to mobile (including wearables), the drudgery is disappearing and that has big implications for banking and financial services.
1. Make it easy to use: While Fitibit requires zero maintenance once you get it activated, you do have to remember to keep it on you. The same goes double for a bank’s credit or debit card. You not only have to remember it, but also must choose to use it at the point of sale.
