Mint.com is making its personal finance advice portal a bit more social today with the launch of Answers, a new Q&A segment of the site that pools expert advice and community insight.
A subset of MintLife, the site’s blog, Answers crowdsources answers to community member questions from both professional advisors and from other Mint.com users. Questions are grouped by topic, Budgeting, Debt Management, Future Goals,
and Savings. The forum is open to anyone, with answers screened by the MintLife editorial staff and ranked by other users based on the usefulness of the response. Sample questions range from “Should I buy or lease a new car?” to “How should married couples divide their money and expenses?” to “How much should I spend on an engagement ring?”.
The most helpful answers, as ranked by users, rise to the top of the page. Initially, MintAnswers will feature expert advice from the Alliance of Cambridge Advisors. The Answers platform is powered by Sponge, a white-label question and answer technology.
It makes total sense for Mint to launch an establish portal for financial advice; especially considering the success of current social Q&A sites like Quora. And the fact that most Americans may not be able to afford to pay a financial advisor to receive personalized advice makes the platform a compelling resource.
Mint.com is a TechCrunch40 company that was acquired by Intuit for $170 million last fall. The company also recently launched an Android app.