Inside Wealthfront with CEO Adam Nash

What features do novice and experienced investors get from Wealthfront? How does Wealthfront stack up against the other Robo-Advisors and what sets them apart? We’ll be answering these questions and more in our Wealthfront Review.

 Luckily (or skillfully) we got an interview with the Wealthfront CEO Adam Nash. After doing our research, chatting with him for nearly two hours and then doing a metric ton more research we’ve got a pretty good idea of where they stand in the Robo-Advisor space. Wealthfront has more than earned their spot at the table.

Remember the epic rap battles with the East Side vs the West Side? Sharks vs Jets? In the Robo-Advisor space that’s Wealthfront vs Betterment. Wealthfront is a San Francisco startup with a boatload of funding and Betterment is an NYC startup with an equally large boat filled will funding.

If you’re on the east cost you probably know more about Betterment, if you’re on the west cost, the same is probably true for Wealthfront. We’re based out of NYC (ok, fine, Hoboken) so you’ve heard us talk more about Betterment. Now it’s time for you to learn about what’s been happening on the other side of the country.

Robo-Advisor’s are competing for my money?

If you’re as excited as I am that there is another serious competitor on the scene, this review is for you. In this review we’re going to break down the good and the bad sides of Wealthfront as well as suggest where it might be able to fit into your portfolio. Hint: It might have something to do with the free part.

A Quick Look

Wealthfront’s pricing and feature set is very straight forward.

* Everything below $15,000 (for LMM fans) is managed for free. Ideal for the beginning investor.

* Minimum balance is $500. Instead of charging a rather high percentage fee for beginning investors, they set the low bar at $500 and once you’re in it’s free as per point #1.

* Tax Loss Harvesting for everyone. Not only will they capture your losses to offset taxes on your gains, everyone has the potential to benefit here. Even the $500 investor.

* Advanced features for accounts above $100,000. With features like Direct Indexing you stand to make quite a lot more through economies of scale than you would below that price threshold.

* Portfolio Review is the optimization tool you’ve been dreaming of. Want to avoid some capital gains on your existing investments while slickly transferring that money over to Wealthfront for better management/diversification? That’s what Portfolio Review is – more on that later.

* Path – Financial Planning Experience. Path connects to all of your outside bank and brokerage accounts to give you an accurate and real-time view of your finances. Their PhDs handled complex calculations on the backend to show you how saving and spending impacts what you will have in retirement.

* Wealthfront’s Portfolio Line of Credit. Portfolio Line of Credit is available for any Wealthfront client with an Individual or Joint Wealthfront account valued at $100,000 or more. You can request cash up to 30% of the current value of your Wealthfront account and they you’ll receive it as quickly as 1 business day.

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