Betterment is a 1 stop shop for investing. How good is it really? Let’s break down the many aspects of Betterment, what I use it for and what I do NOT use it for.

Over the next few articles we will cover the good, the bad and the ugly of Betterment

• App / Website
• Investing
• Retirement
• Savings
• Checking account

My Accounts

I have the following accounts / buckets setup in Betterment.

• Checking Account
• Savings Buckets
• Roth IRA
• Emergency fund
• Brokerage account

My partner also has a Traditional IRA and a Roth IRA under a different account.

I use the following accounts outside of Betterment

• Vanguard Brokerage account –
• Coinbase – For purchasing Crypto
• HBTC – For purchasing crypto not on Coinbase (Such as WOZX)
• Capital one checking account

My Setup

Whilst i use the betterment checking account as my primary source for bill payments it doesn’t support Apple pay or join accounts yet. Which is why I have a Capital one checking account. Betterment have promised both are coming. I have 90% of my salary deposited to Betterment checking account and then the other 10% split between Capital One and Vanguard.

Whilst I can choose some of my index funds in Betterment I cannot choose individual stocks, so for this I have a Vanguard account. I could choose Robinhood or others, the reason I choose Vanguard was that they have a Money Market account linked to it allowing me to automatically have part of my paycheck sent to Vanguard, this allows me to invest so I am not tempted to spend the money.

Below is how I have my Betterment account set up. As you will see I have created multiple savings “Buckets”. You can add / delete as many as you need and choose if you want the Savings APY or put them into investments (NOTE: If you put them into investments there might be tax implications when you remove them). You can move funds between any of these.

My Flow

I have my salary paid into 4 different places , Betterment checking, Capital one, Vanguard and my 401k.

Then within Betterment I have auto deposits to my Roth IRA (until it’s maxed for the year) more details on this on this post. My savings buckets and my brokerage account are as follows;

• My emergency fund is set to 30% stocks and 70% bonds
• Betterment brokerage account 83% stocks
• Savings buckets are not invested and pay 0.4% APY.