How does StashAway work?

Your emergency funds should not be with StashAway. The purpose of emergency funds is to help you temporarily tide through an unforseen circumstance (retrenchment, hospitalisation, etc). A rough guide would be about 6 month's worth of expenditure. It can be placed in a high interest bearing account (2.0% for Standard Chartered Bonus Saver). You can use Seedly's Savings Account calculator to compare the various accounts out there to see which is most suitable for you.

StashAway Simple offers a projected return of 1.9% with lesser fees. The underlying funds are LionGlobal SGD Money Market Fund and LionGlobal SGD Enhanced Liquidity Fund SGD Class I Acc which invests in high liquidity instruments. Personally would not consider this since I am eligible for Bonus Saver (apply before 26yo) which gives guaranteed 2.0% interest. If you spend quite a bit monthly, you can apply for multiplier account where eligible transactions can award bonus interest and potentially bringing interest to more than 2.0%.

You can plan for your portfolio by knowing your objective, growth or dividend investing. Personally, I prefer the former. Knowing what you want allows you to target the potential instruments that you can use. For example, if you are more risk tolerant and looking for 'growth', low cap stock index or reverse cap weighted index could be a potential option. A person with 'dividends' in mind may look at Sfye, a roboadvisor, and/or a portfolio with high weightage in REITS/bonds/high dividend yield blue chip stocks.