Privacy Policy

Budget Before Broke ("we," "us," or "our") operates a household budgeting and cash-flow planning application. This Privacy Policy explains what information we collect, how we use it, who we share it with, and the choices you have.

By creating an account or using Budget Before Broke, you agree to this Privacy Policy. If you do not agree, please do not use the service.

We collect information in the following categories:

• Account information — name, email address, profile image (if you sign in with Google), email verification status, and account creation date.
• Session information — authentication cookies, session tokens, and optional IP address and browser user-agent recorded with active sessions.
• Household information — household name, member roles (owner, admin, or read-only member), and invitation email addresses you send or receive.
• Financial and budgeting data you enter or sync — accounts (manual and bank-linked), balances, transactions, categories, category rules, budget plans, pay schedules, bills, debt obligations, dashboard layout preferences, and related metadata needed to run the app.
• Plaid connection data — institution name, encrypted Plaid access tokens, sync cursors, connection status, and transaction data Plaid provides (including merchant names, amounts, dates, pending status, and Plaid personal finance category fields). We do not receive or store your bank login credentials.
• Subscription and billing metadata — Stripe customer and subscription identifiers, plan status, trial end dates, billing period dates, and cancellation flags. Payment card details are collected and stored by Stripe, not by us.
• Trial eligibility — one free-trial window per user account (`trialEndsAt` and timezone), which persists even if you delete a household and create another.

We use the information above to:

• Authenticate you and keep your account secure.
• Provide budgeting, reporting, monthly cash planning, debt payoff tools, and bank sync features.
• Enforce household roles, trial limits (including the one synced Plaid account on trial), and subscription access (including read-only mode when a trial expires or payment fails).
• Process subscriptions and send billing-related updates through Stripe.
• Connect and maintain bank links through Plaid, including sync, reconnect, and disconnect flows.
• Send transactional emails (such as sign-in magic links and invitation-related messages) through our email provider.
• Operate, maintain, and improve the service; diagnose errors; and comply with law.

Where privacy laws require a legal basis, we rely on: performance of our contract with you (providing the service you signed up for); legitimate interests (security, fraud prevention, and product improvement); and consent where required (such as connecting a bank account through Plaid or starting a paid subscription).

We do not sell your personal information. We do not share your data for cross-context behavioral advertising. We share information only with service providers that help us run the app, under contracts that limit their use of your data:

• Plaid — bank connection, account and transaction sync. Plaid’s privacy policy is available at plaid.com/legal.
• Stripe — subscription checkout, billing portal, and payment processing.
• Resend — delivery of authentication and invitation emails.
• Vercel — application hosting and, when enabled, privacy-oriented Web Analytics (page views without intentional collection of financial data).
• Neon — managed PostgreSQL database hosting for application data.
• Better Auth — authentication session management integrated with our application.

When you join or create a household, other members with access to that household can view shared financial and budgeting data according to their role. Owners and admins can edit household data; members with the read-only role can view but not change most household content. Invitations are sent to the email address you provide.

We use essential cookies and local storage required for sign-in sessions and core app functionality. We do not use third-party advertising cookies. If we enable optional privacy-oriented analytics (such as Vercel Web Analytics), those tools are configured to avoid collecting your financial data.

We also use a cookie and local storage to remember your sidebar layout preference (expanded or collapsed) so the app loads in the state you last chose.

We retain your account information while your user account exists. Household financial data is retained while the household exists and you have access.

If your trial ends without an active subscription, your data remains stored but the app may switch to read-only access until you subscribe or your household is deleted.

When a household owner permanently deletes a household, all data scoped to that household is removed from our database, including budgets, transactions, accounts, and the household subscription record.

Household owners can permanently delete a household from Settings. Deletion requires typing the household name to confirm. This action cannot be undone.

When a household is deleted, we cancel the household’s Stripe subscription (if any) and revoke Plaid bank connections for that household through Plaid’s item removal process before removing organization data.

You can disconnect individual bank connections from Accounts or Settings → Connected institutions without deleting the entire household.

Leaving a household (if you are not the sole owner) removes your membership but does not delete the household’s data.

There is no self-serve “delete my user account” button today. To request deletion of your user account and associated authentication data, email us at the contact address below. We will process verified requests within a reasonable timeframe, subject to legal retention obligations.

We use industry-standard measures to protect data in transit (HTTPS) and at rest. Plaid access tokens are encrypted in our database. Bank login credentials are entered only in Plaid Link and are not stored by us.

No method of transmission or storage is completely secure. Please use a strong, unique sign-in method and notify us if you suspect unauthorized access.

Depending on where you live, you may have rights to access, correct, delete, or export personal information, or to object to certain processing. To exercise these rights, contact us using the email below. We may need to verify your identity before responding.

You can update your household data, disconnect banks, cancel subscriptions through the Stripe billing portal, and delete households as described above.

Budget Before Broke is not directed to children under 13 (or the minimum age required in your jurisdiction). We do not knowingly collect personal information from children.

We may update this Privacy Policy when our practices or legal requirements change. We will post the revised policy on this page and update the “Last updated” date. Material changes may also be communicated in the app or by email where appropriate.

Questions about this Privacy Policy or our data practices? Email privacy@budgetbeforebroke.com.