Taking the Friction out of Finances

Excerpted from an article by Meg Seitz

Money has been ranked as the biggest point of friction in relationships. In a 2015 Ally Bank study, over half of participants shared that they were attracted to those who had strong budgeting and long-term saving strategies. But discussing your finances with your significant other can still be tricky, even if you’re on the same page.

Sometimes you simply avoid the conversation, as Ramy Serageldin and his wife did. “We never really had an open and honest conversation with ourselves about monthly and household expenses, but also in the long-term, talking about college savings for the kids and wills,” Serageldin says.

They started splitting expenses as they got more serious, got married and had a child, then another, and a third. Eventually, the need to have the conversation came to a head — it was time.

“We were wholly unprepared for our financial future together and when we started to look for solutions, we didn’t really find anything [that could help us],” says Serageldin.

With over 15 years of experience in financial services at Ernst & Young, Bank of America, and lastly mobile-centric bank Moven, Serageldin realized that millennials would soon be asking the same questions he was asking himself.

He wanted a solution that would trigger honest money conversations earlier, at important relationship milestones like moving in together, planning a wedding, and having kids.

Seralgeldin brought in business partners Sam Schultz and Joe Stanish to co-found a couples finances platform, Honeyfi, to empower couples to make better financial decisions together.

Honeyfi is the world’s first financial management app designed for couples to understand, organize, and learn more together about not only their finances right here and now, but also in the future for short-term and long-term financial goals. It’s designed to link multiple bank accounts and credit cards securely; and then allows users to see how their respective household manages finances – all in one place.

A keen bonus – the app is built to be flexible and smart with the power to review how users spend; identifying trends, providing financial insight and/or making recommendations as to a shared budget. As we all know in relationships, communication is key; and it’s a key feature on the app, as well– couples can comment on transactions, share insights and send messages to each other.

“Each of us had our own reasons for wanting to start it because it was a pain we felt,” Serageldin noted. “We landed on the Honeyfi idea because it really meant something to all of us.”

Some game-changing features: the app is bank-level secure, so your information is safe; the app is a fresh take on modern, financial inclusion, providing options for a lot of different types of couples, partners, or families, however much you share or don’t share with your spouse or partner money-wise – share all money and all accounts all the time, cool; share one family account, but keep separate, personal accounts, Honeyfi has your back; combine absolutely no money, and you can still use Honeyfi.

Serageldin says that during their customer discovery, they found that the most significant hurdle that couples experienced when talking about money was setting up a budget. The app takes that pain point away immediately and then continues to encourage users to stay on the path of good finances.

Within the app, users can see spending per person, tips on how to stay within the budget, alerts on upcoming bills, and incoming transactions. It allows users to tag their significant other on expenses and leave comments (a more intimate version of a Venmo-Like feature). It even helps users catch any fraud within accounts quicker.

The Charlotte-based startup has taken in some capital from family and friends, and received an investment through the Barclays Accelerator powered by Techstars. They have kicked off fundraising for a full seed round to finance customer acquisition. So far, they’ve managed to grow their customer base without spending any money on marketing.