Empower vs Boldin: Comparing features and DIY retirement planning capabilities of two popular tools.

Today, I'll be doing a side-by-side comparison of Empower versus Bolden.

These are two popular personal finance and DIY retirement planning tools that are often talked about as equals or similar, and there's some overlap, but these tools serve different purposes, and some users might prefer one over the

other. If you're thinking about trying

other. If you're thinking about trying Empower or Balden, this video will help you decide which one is best for you.

Hi, I'm Craig from retired.com, and I've been using Empower since 2015 and Bolden since 2017. Both of these tools have

since 2017. Both of these tools have gone through rebrandings. Empower used

to be known as Personal Capital and Bolden was known as New Retirement.

First, I'm going to share the functionality of both of these tools, what they do, then we'll talk about the pricing and the various extras that are available and then I'll lay out which tool is best for different users.

Empower is primarily a net worth tracking tool. I've been tracking my net

tracking tool. I've been tracking my net worth with Empower or Personal Capital since 2015 and I have all the data dating back to then. And this is the way I've always used the tool. It does a lot

of things, but for me, it's always been primarily a net worth tracker. It does

it automatically by importing your data through Plaid or Yodi, one of those fintexs that imports your data securely.

So, a lot of people use empower just for that reason, just for net worth tracking. It's also a very powerful

tracking. It's also a very powerful investment analysis tool. Since it's

already importing your data, it can pick apart your portfolios or multiple portfolios from multiple accounts and aggregate them into views that are easy to understand to understand what your

portfolio looks like. It looks at your returns over time and your performance and your different holdings. And it does this for both stocks and bonds and mutual funds and ETFs and some alternative assets. So, as far as an

alternative assets. So, as far as an investment analysis tool, it's probably not the best out there, but still very powerful. Retirement planning. I I put

powerful. Retirement planning. I I put this third on the list for a reason.

It's not primarily a retirement planning tool. It does have a a pretty good

tool. It does have a a pretty good retirement planning functionality and actually some people might prefer it because it's not as complex as Bolden and I'll show you both. So, it's already importing all your data. It knows your

net worth and then it can take that and it looks into the future at your spending at your investment returns at your goals and and items that you plan to buy in the future or spend money on like college education. So, it's pretty

good retirement planner. It's not as comprehensive as Balden, but again, it's just part of a suite of tools that can help you manage your money. And for

people that are more casual with their retirement planning, they may like this version a little bit better. Empower has

a a cash flow and a budgeting tool, but it's more of a budgeting tracker. It's

not like a traditional budget tool like a wab or Quicken or Lunch Money. Those

are pure budgeting tools. Empower is

more of a spending tracker tool rather than a budgeting tool, but it does give you good insights into your spending, your habits, and your recurring expenses. Bolden is primarily a

expenses. Bolden is primarily a retirement planning platform. If you are serious about being a DIY financial planner, doing your own retirement plan,

Bolden is for you. It gives you the power to import your data like Empower does. You put in a lot of assumptions.

does. You put in a lot of assumptions.

There's a lot of data points that you need to input and that can be overwhelming when you're trying to build a plan. But as you practice building a

a plan. But as you practice building a retirement plan and you refine it over time, you find that Bolden does the things that you really want it to do. It

does them very, very well. It has

excellent visualizations and tools like the Roth conversion calculator that many users find to be very helpful. Bolden

does not have a net worth tracker that'll tell you what your current net worth is, but it's not a net worth tracking tool. In another video I did

tracking tool. In another video I did comparing Bolden to Projection Lab, Projection Lab does have a net worth tracker, it's more of a manual tracker and Empower has one, but Bolden does not. And I wouldn't call that a

not. And I wouldn't call that a drawback. It's just that's what's

drawback. It's just that's what's available at this time. It also doesn't have investment analysis. It's not going to import your specific holdings and break those apart and give you your

asset allocation or dig deeper into different holdings within holdings like your holdings within funds or your stock holdings. It's just not meant for that.

holdings. It's just not meant for that.

It's possible they could build an investment analysis tool into Balden.

I'd even prefer that it would stay separate because I like my tools to do one thing really, really well. And right

now, Bolden does retirement planning very, very well. I wouldn't want any other tools mixed in to mess up or complicate what it does. And then

budgeting. Bolden doesn't really have a budgeting tool either. When you input your data, you can be pretty specific about the items that you spend your money on. And then you can project into

money on. And then you can project into the future how much you spend money on certain things. But it also has a very

certain things. But it also has a very basic budget tool where you just say, "Hey, I spend say $5,000 a month." And

the budgeting itself is all meant to support the tool and the plan and not so much to track budgeting. So both of these tools, I wouldn't say they are for budgeting. They might give you some

budgeting. They might give you some insight into your budget and they might help you plan for the future on your spending, but they're not budgeting tools. Here's a side byside comparison

tools. Here's a side byside comparison of Empower and Bolden. Empower is on the left, Bolton is on the right. And this

initial view, this is the retirement planner view on Empower side. And for

Bolden, this is the main overview of a financial plan. These two looks are are

financial plan. These two looks are are very similar. The tools are essentially

very similar. The tools are essentially looking at your current assets and your current investment portfolios and then projecting out over a lifetime. In this

case, it's to age 90. the chances of retirement success or the chances of not running out of money. This is how these plans work. They're looking at today and

plans work. They're looking at today and into the future. On the left here, you can see these little circles in the chart. Those are events that are going

chart. Those are events that are going to happen like a retirement date or a kid going to college date. That's how I have this set up. The retirement age in this plan is 62. Different kids are

going to college at a couple different years, 2030, 2032, 2034. And the chart is depicting assets over time. Plan is

projecting the median outcome in the dark blue and then the 10th percentile outcome which I interpret that as worst case scenario 10% is in that light blue.

So based on the inputs I've put in here, this is showing a 98% chance of success for this plan. On the other side, this is the basic view, the overview retirement chances of success. I have

this at 94% and neither of these is really aligned to my plan right now.

I've tweaked them a bit for this purpose, but this one on the right is showing a, you know, a similar view. The

main difference you'll see though is that Balden gets a lot deeper and a lot more granular into this retirement plan.

And Empower is more of a what you see is what you get. It doesn't get too much more complicated from this unless you add a bunch more events. If you add more events, it will line up to this chart

and those events will show on the chart.

But in terms of the visualization, this is really the most advanced one, except I think if you upgrade, there might be a more advanced view. Let's dig into the empower version here. First, the main

thing is that it's giving you these different income events and different spending goals. So, income events, you

spending goals. So, income events, you might have annuity income that you can add or the sale of a property, other income, rental income, pension income.

So, there are items in here that you can add that would increase your income. And

then there's also spending goals where you can add these different spending events like a renovation of a house or a wedding or education, a vehicle purchase. So anytime you click into one

purchase. So anytime you click into one of these, you can add the amount per year and the frequency or for education you can put a student in here for higher education. And then you can lay out the

education. And then you can lay out the estimated cost. I have some projected

estimated cost. I have some projected costs here. Just kind of throwing them

costs here. Just kind of throwing them in there for the plan. So right now I just have savings and I have the social security and the primary and the spouse.

So you can edit the profile to change how much the primary earns each year, how much the spouse earns each year. You

can edit assumptions. There's an

inflation, effective tax rate, life expectancy. Those are three pretty basic

expectancy. Those are three pretty basic assumptions. Bolton's going to do a lot

assumptions. Bolton's going to do a lot more than that, but this is really all you need if you're a casual planner. And

so I have it set at 90 for life expectancy, effective tax rate 20 just to keep this pretty simple. There's

another view here where you can look at asset allocation. And this breaks it

asset allocation. And this breaks it down by education savings, taxable investments, tax deferred and tax free.

Traditional IRA would be the tax deferred, a Roth IRA would be the taxfree, and a taxable account would just be a regular brokerage account. And

so it's it's a nice second view here, but fairly elementary, but that's not all Empower does. Empower has planning and investing tools. So there's a a

savings planner, a retirement fee analyzer, which is pretty cool. It'll

look at your investments, your current breakdown of investments, and tell you your annual fees. Mine are only here at about 0.09%. So, I'm in pretty good shape. But

0.09%. So, I'm in pretty good shape. But

this is a tool that was pretty unique when it came out several years ago and still works very well, especially if you have a lot of mutual funds with a lot of fees. It'll tell you the lifetime cost

fees. It'll tell you the lifetime cost of those fees. The other one I want to show you here is the investment checkup.

So, it runs a checkup on your portfolio and it helps you figure out what your asset allocation is. So, if you have multiple brokerages accounts and your brokerage doesn't combine them all to tell you what your asset allocation is,

this tool gives you asset allocation, this portfolio that I'm demonstrating here is showing international bonds, US bonds, cash, international stocks, US stocks. And so, this is helpful when you

stocks. And so, this is helpful when you do your annual rebalance. It's all here for you. It's just importing the data

for you. It's just importing the data and telling you what it is. You don't

have to dump it into a spreadsheet from all your different accounts. You just

run the investment checkup and it's there for you. There's another way to look at it as well, and I'll show you that in a second. There's a couple other views here. The view I like here is

views here. The view I like here is where you stand on the efficient frontier. The efficient frontier is a

frontier. The efficient frontier is a financial planning tool or risk management and asset allocation tool.

And mine's actually in pretty good shape here right now in terms of riskreward.

This is going to tell you if you're taking the appropriate risk for the reward that you are trying to aim. This

is essentially telling you that your portfolio is aligned with the right risk to achieve your investment objectives.

It's also giving some advice on current allocation versus an alternative allocation. So, that's the investment

allocation. So, that's the investment checkup. It's it's helpful. It's not

checkup. It's it's helpful. It's not

super comprehensive, but it's a nice way to look at things, especially the asset allocation. There's also a a stock

allocation. There's also a a stock checkup and a fee analyzer cost checkup there. So, if you go to the investing

there. So, if you go to the investing tab, it's got a a balances chart here that shows you where your assets are and what type of accounts. This is a

portfolio view for where your balances are. It has a holdings view for your

are. It has a holdings view for your performance and all of your different holdings. And then the tool that I use

holdings. And then the tool that I use is this portfolio allocation tool that breaks down your US stocks, international stocks versus US bonds, cash. So a standard I don't know what

cash. So a standard I don't know what kind of chart this is, but you can see it in the investment checkup and they have it here that breaks down all of your assets into a very simple view. I

prefer pie charts, but this does a pretty good job as well. There's also a sector view that you can see where your holdings kind of line up with the different sectors. Mine are pretty

different sectors. Mine are pretty heavily weighted toward technology. No

surprise there. Just going to highlight banking. There's a cash flow view, that

banking. There's a cash flow view, that budgeting view. I'm not going to go into

budgeting view. I'm not going to go into it, but just some some basic banking and budgeting tools, but like I said, this is not a budgeting tool. It's just sort of a tracker. And then the overview dashboard, that's where all of your

assets are kind of lined up on the side.

Now, if you click this button here, it's going to open up and show you all your assets. I'm not going to share that

assets. I'm not going to share that today because that has pretty much all of my financial information, but just you click that, it pops out and you can see all of your assets in one place. I

tell my wife, if I ever die, just log into my Empower account and it'll show you where all of our assets are. I have

it written down in other places, too, but there's a very simple way to look at it. Over on the Bolden side, like I

it. Over on the Bolden side, like I said, this is a retirement planning tool. It doesn't do a lot of the things

tool. It doesn't do a lot of the things that Empower does, and I'm okay with that because this does retirement planning very, very well. I describe

Bolden as a very linear experience. When

you're inputting your data, you just kind of go down this left side and there's a summary and then you can connect your accounts. There's your

accounts and assets. This is where you can put in your data, your home, your debts, and your income. Expenses. So,

expenses is a big part of of this. There

are recurring expenses and one-time expenses, medical expenses. So, it

breaks down all of your costs very independently and in a way that you can tweak the long-term plan. You can say, "Okay, I'm paying X amount for medical

and that will increase by this much per year." Or you can say, "I'm earning this

year." Or you can say, "I'm earning this much today and over the next 5 years I expect to earn 10% more each year." And

then at age 62 or whatever it is, you decide to retire. And when you update these going down this lefth hand side, the charts and the visualizations update as well. I've got a full review and

as well. I've got a full review and tutorial on Bolton on another video I've already done. The two main distinctions

already done. The two main distinctions between Bolton and the Empower retirement planning tool is that Bolton has a lot more inputs and a lot more visualizations. And so there's something

visualizations. And so there's something like 250 plus inputs for the paid version. I think the the free version

version. I think the the free version there's maybe 100 inputs, but 250ome inputs that you can put in here. So we

have future real estate purchase. If I

wanted to buy a new home in 10 years, I can model that in here. I can model a future real estate sale. I can add passive incomes. I can add pension

passive incomes. I can add pension annuities and windfalls, which we saw in empower, but there's a little more detail and a little more tweaking that you can do. Actually, quite a lot more.

That's all going to feed into this monstrous chart right here called the lifetime income projection, which is a a much more robust visualization and tool compared to what empower offers.

Remember, empower is more for the casual user. Balden is more for the advanced

user. Balden is more for the advanced user. Balden also supports scenarios. So

user. Balden also supports scenarios. So

if you wanted to create a baseline plan and an alternate plan where you're planning out different assumptions or different purchases or different college costs, it allows you to do multiple

scenarios, whereas empower does not. So

there is a net worth page that's going to tell you what your net worth is at any given time, but this does not update over time. It's not a chart that

over time. It's not a chart that continuously updates every day that the data is input. So, it does tell you current net worth, but not continuously, which I suppose they could add the current net worth and just track it by

day every time you log in. They haven't

done that. I don't know if that's in the pipeline or not, but if you're looking to track net worth, empower is definitely a better tool. But as you work down this left hand side, there are

several different visualizations that are just more powerful than what you're going to get in Empower. For example, we have a required distributions. We have a retirement withdrawals page. It's far

more robust with identifying taxes and predicting taxes. And this is dummy

predicting taxes. And this is dummy data. This is not my data. I I've put

data. This is not my data. I I've put this in here for just demonstration purposes. There's that retirement chance

purposes. There's that retirement chance of success chart that we saw at the top.

There's projected net worth. There's

income and expenses over time. So,

income and expenses charts where you can get a similar visualization with different data. So, there are

different data. So, there are similarities with these tools. Empower

does retirement planning pretty well.

I'd say it's more for a casual user.

Balden does it extremely well with incredible attention to detail and comprehensive planning. I mean, this is

comprehensive planning. I mean, this is a tool that professionals use. A DIY

investor, a planner can use Bolden and essentially do as well as a professional even though they're not trained. So, a

very powerful retirement planning tool.

Whereas, Empower is more of a all-inclusive. It's got it's got some

all-inclusive. It's got it's got some banking stuff. It's got some investing

banking stuff. It's got some investing stuff. It's got retirement planning. And

stuff. It's got retirement planning. And

there's always this wealth management where you can schedule a call with an adviser. And if you are interested in

adviser. And if you are interested in financial advisory services, then empower may be a good option for you or it's one option for you. Balden offers

financial advisory services as well. But

it also offers coaching which is a little lighter help. It's like putting a second pair of eyes on your plan. Balden

is a little less reliant on getting new clients from its tool because it's a paid tool whereas empower is a free tool but essentially a lead magnet. So, let's

talk a little bit about pricing and extras. And this is a big differentiator

extras. And this is a big differentiator between these two tools. So, it's

important to talk about empower is free.

It has always been free. Put a little asterisk here because it it's a lead generation tool. This company sells

generation tool. This company sells financial services. There is no

financial services. There is no pressure. You don't have to use their

pressure. You don't have to use their financial services. I've used this tool

financial services. I've used this tool for 10 years and they've called me several times. I've scheduled one-on-one

several times. I've scheduled one-on-one calls with adviserss just to understand what they're offering. But, it's

essentially it's free. It's very

powerful free software that is available to anyone at least in the United States probably elsewhere. So if you like free

probably elsewhere. So if you like free then empower is a great tool. A lot of people want all their stuff online to be free and empower is one of those things that allows you to do that. Just

recognize that they may offer additional services at a cost even though the tool is free. Again you can kindly decline

is free. Again you can kindly decline and they'll stop calling you. Some

people might want the advisory services and maybe they don't know where to start. And so when you start using this

start. And so when you start using this tool and you input all your data and you start playing with it, an adviser can log in and look at your assets pretty quickly and get to know you instead of

asking you to bring a bunch of statements to a meeting in a coffee shop. And so Power does that really well

shop. And so Power does that really well where it's got your data already and you can sit down with advisor even if it's just an introductory conversation. They

can look at your data and help you out.

Power doesn't have a casual help like a coaching service. As far as I've always

coaching service. As far as I've always understood, it's not a coaching. It's an

advisory service where you would be charged an assets under management fee and they would help you with your financial planning and your retirement and your investing. So, it is a a

fullervice product if you decide to do that. Again, it you don't have to. The

that. Again, it you don't have to. The

software is free to use. Bolton has a basic free service as well. It is

limited. I think there's about a 100 inputs and I'm not sure about the outputs. Whereas when you pay, you do

outputs. Whereas when you pay, you do get 250 plus inputs. You get the full software package for the paid version.

And you can quickly tell the difference between the paid version and the free version when you do a 14-day trial and that expires. You'll see what disappears

that expires. You'll see what disappears whenever that trial expires. Bolton is

$120 per year. And you know, when you consider the size of your portfolio and the complexity of your portfolio, a free tool like Empower may be just fine. When

you're getting into older age where you're maybe thinking about hiring advisor, but you want to go as far as you can on your own, you're going to hit limits with your spreadsheet. Even if

you're really good at making spreadsheets, this tool is going to blow your spreadsheet away. So, for $120 per year, it's extremely powerful. You're

getting essentially the same tools that a professional would get access to, but you're doing it on your own. Balden also

offers advisory services, but a few more levels, I think, than Empower. Balden

charges a flat fee for services. It also

offers these coaching sessions where you can sit down with an adviser or a coach one-on-one, probably online, and go through your plan to get help. So, DIY

is not do it yourself and do it alone.

In this case, if you're willing to shell out a little bit more money, you can get a coach to help you work through your plan and tweak it and maybe if you're new to it, they'll help you get used to

the tool and find places where you can tweak it to match your investment objectives, your long-term retirement plan objectives. So, Bolton has a bit

plan objectives. So, Bolton has a bit more options for help if you need help.

And I feel like the help is a little more casual than having your assets under management which can be a little more expensive and might be overkill for

a lot of users. So who is empower for?

Who is Bolden for? Empower is for people who want free. There are a lot of us who don't want to pay for content on the internet. We don't want to pay for

internet. We don't want to pay for newspapers or any subscriptions. And if

you're someone that doesn't pay for stuff online or doesn't like to pay for stuff, you're super cheap, then empower is free and it's a very good product for

free. Just know that you're going to be

free. Just know that you're going to be marketed to just like uh you know, Facebook or Instagram or whatever or Google. When something is free to use,

Google. When something is free to use, you become the product. So Facebook's

going to sell you ads. Empower is going to advertise to you and they're going to try to bring you on as a client. They

probably have a very low onboarding percentage of people. Most people just want to use the tool for free. And as

far as I know, they're fine with that.

Just be honest and be straightforward if they reach out to you with services. If

you like free, empower is for you. It's

also allin-one. It's got more features.

It's got the spending tracker. It's got

the investment analysis. It's got the retirement planner and the fee analysis, the investment checkup. So, all these tools are built into it. Asset

allocation is really good. So, it does more than Balden. And that's fine for people who want the tool for investment tracking and net worth tracking. It's

it's a great tool. It does a lot of things really, really well. Like I said, I've been using this since 2015 and tracking my net worth. Empower is an all-in-one tool. It does a whole lot.

all-in-one tool. It does a whole lot.

It's casual retirement planning versus serious retirement planning over on the Bolden side. It's also for people who

Bolden side. It's also for people who don't mind a sales call. They're going

to call you. it's going to show up as Empower and you're going to answer the phone. They're going to say, "Hey, I'm

phone. They're going to say, "Hey, I'm so and so from Empower. Let's chat." And

sometimes you can just do a one-on-one with them and then they'll help you out for free. They want to gain your trust

for free. They want to gain your trust and show you they know what they're talking about and that they can help you. And if you decide to go with those

you. And if you decide to go with those services, then make sure you understand what the services include and the pricing. Some people want that and some

pricing. Some people want that and some people get to know the person who's assigned to them, their adviser, and like them and and decide to move forward. I have not been one of those

forward. I have not been one of those people and a lot of my readers have said they have not done it. Balden is for people who pay for value. If you value your local newspaper and you pay them

money to read it all year long, you might be someone that would value Balden. It's $120 per year. And that is

Balden. It's $120 per year. And that is not a high fee compared to what you're going to pay for advisory services if you went and hired a full-time financial adviser or even a fee only financial

planner. They're going to run a plan for

planner. They're going to run a plan for you. They're essentially going to put

you. They're essentially going to put your data into a tool like Balden or something else that's going to spit out a report. You can do it yourself and

a report. You can do it yourself and update it over time instead of just paying that onetime fee. So, compared to what you would pay for that service, it's a lot cheaper and it's next level

retirement planning. Empower is pretty

retirement planning. Empower is pretty basic and casual. Bolton is next level.

It's really a top echelon tool. It's the

best I've used. It's up there in the top two with Projection Lab. They're both

very good, but they just have a very different user experience. Bold is

planning only. Empower gives you a little bit more, but boldness is for retirement planning. And it offers light

retirement planning. And it offers light help. You can get a coach for a smaller

help. You can get a coach for a smaller fee for one hour of help. Or you can get a check-in every so many months with a coach or a financial planner who can

help you with your plan without a long-term commitment. So, which one of

long-term commitment. So, which one of these is my favorite? Like I said, they have different uses for different people. Well, I've been using them both

people. Well, I've been using them both for several years, but I use a lot of tools. I use Stock Rover for investment

tools. I use Stock Rover for investment tracking. I use Morning Star for that

tracking. I use Morning Star for that purpose. Morning Star Investor for

purpose. Morning Star Investor for investment analysis. I think those two

investment analysis. I think those two tools do a better job than Empower for investment analysis. Stock Rover is more

investment analysis. Stock Rover is more for stocks, but it's really good at aggregating your different accounts and it's very good for dividend income if you want to project your dividend income. Morning Star Investor is a

income. Morning Star Investor is a little better for mutual funds and ETFs.

If you're strictly investing in mutual fund or ETFs or if you want to double check what your advisor is putting you in, I think Morning Star Investor is an excellent tool for that. It's also good

for asset allocation and monitoring your investment portfolios. Another DIY

investment portfolios. Another DIY planning tool I use is Projection Lab. I

mentioned it a few times in this video.

I also think that Projection Lab is worth the cost. It's a similar cost to Balden. Both of them, I think for

Balden. Both of them, I think for $100,$120 bucks, they're well worth the value. Especially if you have high

value. Especially if you have high income, high net worth over $500,000, you're talking about a very small fraction of your net worth and your income that would be going toward a tool that's going to help you tremendously,

giving you a ton of value and a ton of insight into your finances today and into the future. Empower is free and can't beat that. But you do get what you pay for. You become the product. To me,

pay for. You become the product. To me,

that has never been a problem. I've

actually had some good conversations with adviserss. Even though I'm not

with adviserss. Even though I'm not someone who is going to hire advisor, I'm a DIY personal finance guy. I'm a

DIY investor. I plan to always be. And

so, that service isn't for me. An

important note is that I am an affiliate partner with all of these companies.

That means if you use any of my links to sign up for an account with these companies, I may be compensated. And

that's how online creators make money through advertising and affiliate partnerships. So, if you use those

partnerships. So, if you use those links, I thank you for supporting independent publishing and for supporting this channel. That's all for this video. Let me know what tool you

this video. Let me know what tool you like or if I'm not covering a tool that you like, put that in the comments and let me know which one you're using. A

lot of readers have chimed in about Projection Lab and Bold about how they like it or the things they don't like about it they wish they would add. And I

know that the creators of those tools read the comments and they want to see what people want so they can build it.

There's also online communities for these tools to offer suggestions and to learn from power users like how to use these tools. So, a lot of resources at

these tools. So, a lot of resources at your fingertips. So, if you have any

your fingertips. So, if you have any comments about this video or these tools, let me know in the comments below and I read them all and I'll reply to most of them. And while you're at it,

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Thanks for watching.