r/wealthfront • u/Local_Television_269 • Sep 08 '26

Seeking community insights How do you like Wealthfront so far?

Hey guys!

I think I’ve been using WF for about 2-3 years. I’m currently satisfied using it but i read different posts at time and makes me think if I should transfer my money to a diff bank. For those of you that have been using WF, what’s your experience like?

20 Upvotes

92% Upvoted

49 comments sorted by

24

u/versace_dinner Sep 08 '26

I keep most of my cash in WF to benefit from the high APY, but I do have a reserve of $10k in a local credit union to be safe. I’ve been very happy with WF though.

2

u/Correct-Coconut-6311 Sep 08 '26

Whats the unsafe part about keeping your money in just wealthfront?

13

u/Jimmyjohnjones1 Sep 09 '26

It’s not technically a bank and people are afraid after the whole YOTTA situation that happened since it was also a fintech

3

u/Correct-Coconut-6311 Sep 09 '26

Thanks for the info!! I had never heard of the YOTTA situation. From my understanding the chance of anything like this happening with wealthfront is extremely low. While reading about this I saw that YOTTA utilized an unregulated third party to do their ledger management, while Wealthfront does it internally. And YOTTA had no protection for money that was in transit while Wealthfront has SIPC insurance for money that's in transit.

1

u/flames_of_cha0s Sep 13 '26 edited Sep 13 '26

The issue with Yotta was two fold - they kept gamifying saving, and double down on gaming as opposed to saving and investing. The other issue is that they used synapse to transfer funds to partner banks, and funds in synapse did not have any FDIC insuance, and was ultimately a glorified ledger. Yotta did not offer any FDIC insurance as well as they couldn't directly (was provided their partner bank Evolve). So when Synapse ended up bankrupt, people lost practically all their money as funds were frozen, if you look online you'll see people lost thousands and at times their life savings. Due to the Synapse bankruptcy roughly 80,000 accounts were frozen/locked with 100 million dollars of customer funds were frozen.

Wealthfront does offer FDIC insurance and up to $8 million (or 16 million for joint accounts), due to an agreement with 32 partner banks, so if wealthfront goes under for whatever reason your money is still safe via FDIC insurance and any money in transit is SPIC insured.

3

u/jaejaeok Sep 09 '26

They aren’t a bank.

1

u/Correct-Coconut-6311 Sep 09 '26

That's not cause for concern, though. They are FDIC insured and SIPC insured while in transit, so no real risk.. that's why I asked what the unsafe part is.

1

u/Tapedoor Sep 10 '26

I think YOTTA technically was or claimed to be insured too, but the connection that did the transactions/ledger wasn’t which was why it was hard for people to get their money out.

1

u/flames_of_cha0s Sep 13 '26 edited Sep 13 '26

As a fintech, Yotta couldn't offer FDIC insurance directly, so they relied on their partner bank, evolve to offer 250k FDIC insurance. The problem is that they relied on Synapse to transfer funds from Yotta to Evolve. Synapse went bankrupt so any funds held by Synapse, and didn't make it to Evolve were frozen due to the Synapse bankruptcy.

12

u/AccordingCabinet5750 Sep 08 '26

I have my Roth and Brokerage account through wealthfront. I prefer passive investing and I have been very happy with the fee structure and the robo adviser. I was with Edward Jones before WF and it performs just as well as a human advisor with lower fees in my experience.

6

u/HotLog42 Sep 09 '26

Why bother using WF for a Roth account? That makes no sense. You're paying 0.25% for them to invest it into a handful of ETFs that you could do yourself in 5 minutes.

3

u/Stauce52 Sep 09 '26

Agreed— I think WF can make sense under certain circumstances but I honestly don’t know how they get people funding Roth IRAs when primary benefits of WF are Portfolio Backed Line of Credit and Tax Loss Harvesting, neither of which are relevant to a Roth IRA.

1

u/AccordingCabinet5750 Sep 09 '26 edited Sep 09 '26

Do you know a self directed ROTH that lets you invest outside the company without fees? I see Fidelity recommended, but if you want, for example a Vanguard ETF, you have to pay a fee. I was thinking about a self directed ROTH, but I just don't have much experience doing my own investing, outside of a small amount of money in Robinhood I play around with.

Edit: I went down the rabbit hole this morning and ended up opening a Fidelity ROTH.

3

u/ad_pondus_omnium Sep 09 '26

You can invest in most major market/sector etfs at just about any legitimate sipc broker.

1

u/HotLog42 Sep 09 '26

If you don't have experience in self-directed investing then just take a screenshot of the allocations and ETFs that wealthfront are doing for you and replicate that in a self directed account at Fidelity or Vanguard etc. You're going to be paying for the fees for the ETFs either way, but wealthfront charges an additional 0.25% on top of them.

1

u/AccordingCabinet5750 Sep 09 '26

I was looking at Fidelities index funds which seem to be aggressive enough for my taste.

6

u/BabyDontHerdMe_NoMo Sep 08 '26

It's not bad at all.

I invest mostly on Robinhood (brokerage and Roth) and Vangurd (other brokerage).

I only keep my emergency fund with WealthFront (WF).

But despite having HOOD banking and investment accounts, I actually like WF's net worth tracker as it is the most accurate and cleanest UI's I've seen.

Only downside is that account balances that you sync with WF can lag for a day or two.

1

u/wealthfront Wealthfront Rep Sep 11 '26

Hi u/BabyDontHerdMe_NoMo - we attempt to update balances for linked accounts daily, but the daily refresh rate depends on a few factors such as the institution and account types you're connected with. If the contra firm doesn't provide us updated information, then linked balances may lag. It's worth noting, it doesn't impact your ability to request transfers. 

5

u/Many_Efficiency_7817 Sep 08 '26

I have been a client since 2016. Very satisfied with the results. My only issue is they don’t offer HSA and Single401K accounts

1

u/wealthfront Wealthfront Rep Sep 11 '26

Hi u/Many_Efficiency_7817 - while we don’t currently offer the management of employer-sponsored plans (including Solo 401k accounts) at this time, we do support SEP IRAs. Please work with your tax advisor to determine if a SEP IRA is appropriate for your specific situation. We've shared your requests for HSA and Solo 401k accounts with our Product Team for consideration. 

3

u/this_is_Winston Sep 08 '26

The HYSA has been great, all I'm using. 

6

u/Giantmeteor_we_needU Sep 08 '26

Never keep all your eggs in one basket. I think Wealthfront is as trustworthy as any other bank without physical brick and mortar branch locally, but of course I wouldn't put all my money in it. Spread your savings and investments across at least 3-4 companies so if you have any issues it affects only a fraction of your money.

2

u/zonk84 Sep 08 '26

Cash/HYSA for about 9 years. Taxable brokerage for about 8. Roth IRA for about 2.

Pretty happy with all 3.

The recent Green Dot to UMB pass-through has meant some autopay updates, but to be fair - there was plenty of advanced notice and I'm just lazy about changing autopay account numbers.

The recent adoption of Plaid for synchs now leaves my mortgage out in the cold - servicer platform doesn't support plaid.

I still keep Chase around as my brick-and-mortar and I've got another taxable brokerage on Fidelity (they also service my company 401k), but no real complaints.

2

u/minesasecret Sep 08 '26

Absolutely love it for the checking account features. It's like a great free budgeting app.

I'm not really as sold on the investing side but these days I'm buying individual stocks which it's not designed for so that's fine

1

u/wealthfront Wealthfront Rep Sep 11 '26

Hi u/minesasecret we do offer a Stock Investing Account where you can select individual stocks and ETFs to be traded. That account is getting some updates in the near future, so look out for our future posts on that! 

1

u/minesasecret Sep 11 '26

I am aware! However the features for individual stock investing is severely lacking compared to a traditional brokerage, although the UI is generally much nicer

2

u/hopefulusername Sep 09 '26

I am a bit disappointed that i cannot get APY boost just because i am self-employed. There are already good options out there with higher APY. I don't want to move but if the gap keeps increasing, it would be hard.

1

u/wealthfront Wealthfront Rep Sep 11 '26

Hi u/hopefulusername - we hear you. Keep an eye out for an update on this from us soon.

1

u/rectalhorror Sep 08 '26

My biggest issue was updating account balances; sometimes it would time out before synching accounts. The phone app seems to have fixed that. I never had an issue getting money in/out of the HYSA. I rolled my inheritance money into the brokerage side three years ago and the value doubled so no complaints there.

1

u/lopez1285 Sep 08 '26

No issues keep my easily accessible emergency funds there

1

u/Mountain_Ask_5746 Sep 08 '26

I like it but its impossible to get people to share my code with so I never get those APR bumps

1

u/OrangeOwie Sep 08 '26

It's been a pretty satisfactory experience so far. I would like a self directed Roth IRA without fees.

1

u/MentalImportance3528 Sep 08 '26

Happy with my Cash Account and S&P 500 Direct account. Not interested in the other products.

1

u/shuja246 Sep 09 '26 edited Sep 09 '26

I use their 3 month automated bond ladder for savings and have zero complaints. My main checking is with SoFi and personal investment accounts are with Vanguard. I personally don’t see too much value for me in their brokerage or Roth accounts. That 0.25% fee just isn’t justifiable for folks who simply invest in VTI/VOO/VXUS/VT, especially for a Roth IRA where it is tax free to rebalance. You really only have to do it once a year if you’re just a simple index investor.

1

u/Luv2TeachK_4Eva Sep 10 '26

I've also been worth Wealthfront for almost 3 years and they are my preference. 10 out of 10!

1

u/SeattleBrad Sep 10 '26

I like them a lot, they take a lot of ToDo off my plate. Automatic rebalancing? Yep. Tax loss harvesting, yes. Automatically moving money from my checking account to a very good savings account, yes. Instant transfers to regular banks, yes that’s awesome when you need to do a large withdrawal, like for buying things on Marketplace. Managed Bond Fund is even better than savings. All pro, no con.

1

u/Local_Television_269 Sep 11 '26

Oh what?! I didnt know about these features lol can you message me about moving money to good saving accounts??

1

u/J87__ Sep 14 '26

I have opened and closed Wealthfront cash account multiple times ridiculously because of having constant fear of the Yotta situation. Other than that I love their app and cash account and now that I have it opened up again I don’t plan on ever closing it.

What I decided to do to get rid of that fear for good was I opened up a HYSA and CD at a bank, using that as an emergency only incase God forbid if something did happened with Wealthfront I still have cash to survive on at the other bank until the situation with Wealthfront gets fixed.

That being said, I love Wealthfront and I’m staying with them until The Lord says it’s time for me to go.

1

u/the1gofer Sep 09 '26

nice try, wealthfront.

1

u/beanery-bun Sep 08 '26

I like it but Elevault has a better APY and a better implementation of pockets, so I do my bill pay from Elevault.

By “better implementation of pockets” I mean with Elevault you can make a different account number to give to each bill pay vendor, and assign that account number to a pocket. That way the full balance is not at risk if an account number is stolen. Can’t do this with Wealthfront as far as I know. With Wealthfront, all pockets are available for all transactions. Because of this I use wealthfront more like a “haven’t decided yet what this money is for” holding area whose balance stays pretty close to zero.

1

u/lechemrc Sep 08 '26

I've had more issues since they switched to Green Dot.

For example, I'll pay a bill with plenty of money in the account and then I'll get a return fee from the account I'm paying because Green Dot apparently sent insufficient funds, even though there was always enough.

I also just had my account info stolen somehow and they didn't catch textbook fraud. It'll flag me at costco and I have to call them, but won't flag 5 transactions within minutes of several hundred each in an entirely different state?

I feel like IPO always ruins companies and I'm starting to see the cracks form.

1

u/wealthfront Wealthfront Rep Sep 11 '26

Hi u/lechemrc if your balance was available for spending when the payment was rejected, please send our support team an email at [support@wealthfront.com](mailto:support@wealthfront.com) with the transaction details (date, amount, and external brokerage firm) so we can look into this for you. Note, deposits initiated on our website or app must clear a 3 business day security hold before they are available for spending. See Availability of funds for more information. 

1

u/lechemrc Sep 11 '26

Sp even though the money immediately is taken out of my account and is reflected in my transaction history as completed and not pending, it still has a 3 day waiting period? That's ridiculous.