MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif.–The recent closure of the high-profile budgeting app Mint reflects a bigger truth many credit union leaders may not recognize, according to one recent analysis: the problem with budgeting apps is that few people really want help with their budgets and even fewer are willing to pay for it.
As CUToday.info reported here, one of the earliest and most popular personal finance apps and fintechs embraced by consumers is shutting down with its users being encouraged to shift to another popular platform.
Mint, which is owned by Intuit, is being shuttered and the parent company is urging users of the app to switch to Credit Karma, which is also owned by Intuit.
It is not alone. As the Wall Street Journal noted, other recent headstones in the digital budgeting app graveyard include:
- Simple, (2009-21), a digital budgeting app, was acquired by Spanish banking group BBVA for $114 million and which closed six years later.
- Clarity Money (2016-21) closed three years after selling to Goldman Sachs Group
- Finn (2017-19), JPMorgan Chase’s homegrown app, which sought to help millennials track their spending with emojis.
Lowered Expectations
“The fallout means Mint customers searching for a new place to track their spending for free, or anyone who wants to turn to budgeting apps to better manage their money should lower their expectations,” the Wall Street Journal reported. “If they want an app that will survive, they will either need to pay to subscribe to a competing service or manage money themselves with a spreadsheet or pen and paper.”
As an example, the Journal reminded that Mint launched with a “lofty vision” of using technology to help people make better financial decisions.
“There is little evidence such services move the needle much for people who aren’t already engaged with their finances,” the Journal analysis continued. “Despite developers’ best efforts, no app or service has figured out a way to make managing your day-to-day finances as engaging as trading meme stocks on Robinhood or learning a new language on Duolingo.
A Dashboard for Finances
As the report explained, Mint was designed to be a dashboard of an individual’s financial life, linking all your bank and credit-card accounts and automating much of the analysis of your spending. It was also free.
Mint made money from referral fees when users signed up for new bank accounts or credit cards that appeared in ads on the site, the Journal said, before noting, “But the people most likely to log into the app and see the ads were among the least likely to need the products that were advertised.”