Empower vs Owned Map: an honest comparison

The short answer

• Pick Empower if you want a free place to see your accounts together, plan retirement, watch your cash flow and analyze your investments.^[1]
• Pick Owned Map if you own physical assets (rental property, land, vehicles, boats, aircraft) and want the value, performance, documents and dates of each one, on a map.
• Use both if you have investment accounts and real assets. Empower is free, so there is no cost to starting there.

Where we describe Empower, we rely on its own website, and we link each claim so you can check it. We have not used an Empower account to write this page, and several of its pages did not load for us, so we say so wherever it limits what we can claim.

At a glance

“Not listed” and “not advertised” mean we did not find it on the Empower pages we read in November 2026. Features can exist without being listed, so check in the app before you rule one out.

How a free tool pays for itself

Empower’s FAQ answers the question of cost with one word: nothing. Its financial tools (a retirement planner, net worth, budgeting and cash flow, portfolio analysis, a savings planner, debt paydown and an emergency fund tool) are listed as completely free.^[1] That is real value, and it is a good reason to try it.

It is worth knowing what pays for it, because it tells you what the product is for. The same pages promote Empower’s wealth management services: a Private Client service described as premium financial planning and portfolio management for $1 million or more in investments, and a Personal Strategy service that puts you with a financial advisor, available, according to its footnote, when you invest more than $250,000 with the company. Its disclosures say advisory fees are calculated on the amount of assets being managed.^[1] Tax filing is offered through a third party and is not described as free.

None of this is a criticism. A free tool that leads some users to paid advice is a normal business model, and the tools can be useful whether or not you ever speak to an advisor. It does mean the dashboard is shaped around investable accounts, and physical assets are not what a fee on managed assets is calculated from. Owned Map exists for the part that sits outside that.

Accounts or assets

Empower answers “am I on track?” It aims to show where you stand and where you want to get to: your accounts together, a retirement planner to test what retirement could look like, and tools to spend, save and pay down debt with more foresight.^[1] Its raw material is accounts that report balances.

Owned Map answers “what do I own and how is it doing?” Its raw material is assets that do not report anything: a cabin, a share in an aircraft, a truck, a plot of land. For each, you enter the value, the cost, the income and expenses and any loan, and Owned Map calculates appreciation, net operating income, yield, monthly cash flow and net worth after debt. It then keeps the documents and dates with the asset.

If your wealth is mostly in accounts, an account dashboard gets you most of the way. If a large part of it is in things, the dashboard needs a partner. And for the retirement question, the part of your net worth that sits in a house or a business is worth knowing precisely, not as a rough guess.

Feature by feature

Planning and analysis

Retirement planning, budgeting, cash flow and portfolio analysis are Empower’s ground, and Owned Map does not compete there.^[1] If you want to test when you can retire, use a planner built for it.

Account connections

Empower says its net worth tool shows all your accounts in one place.^[2] The page we could read does not say which account types, how many institutions or how values refresh, so check the app. Owned Map connects to no accounts at all. You enter values yourself, which for physical assets usually means a few minutes when something changes, or once a quarter.

Physical assets

On the Empower pages we read, we did not find real estate, vehicles or manually added assets. They may well be supported in the app, so it is worth a look. What we can say is what Owned Map does with them: each is an asset with a value, cost, income, expenses, loan, ownership share, documents and dates, shown on a map.

Reading a document for you

Upload a deed, an invoice or a contract to Owned Map and the details are read for you to review before anything is saved. It saves the typing when you add an asset; always check the result.

Reports and exports

Owned Map exports PDF, Excel and CSV reports and imports a CSV. Our free inventory template uses the exact columns the app reads, and it works as a checklist even if you never sign up.

A worked example: cabin, aircraft share and truck

Imagine someone with three physical assets that no bank would ever report on: a lake cabin they rent out some weeks of the year, a quarter share in a small aircraft, and a pickup truck.

The cabin

• Estimated value: $395,000. Purchase cost: $330,000
• Rent collected in a year: $23,500. Yearly expenses: $9,100
• Loan balance: $150,000, with payments of $1,050 a month

• Net operating income: $23,500 − $9,100 = $14,400 a year
• Yield on what was paid: $14,400 ÷ $330,000 = 4.4%
• Yield on what it is worth now: $14,400 ÷ $395,000 = 3.6%
• Equity: $395,000 − $150,000 = $245,000
• Appreciation: ($395,000 − $330,000) ÷ $330,000 = 19.7%
• Cash flow after the loan: $14,400 − ($1,050 × 12) = $1,800 a year, $150 a month

The aircraft share and the truck

• Aircraft: the whole plane is worth $120,000 and you own 25%, so your share is worth $30,000. The plane costs $18,000 a year to hold, which is 15.0% of its value, and your share of that is $4,500.
• Truck: worth $27,500, bought for $41,000, so it has lost 32.9%.

The total

Assets: $395,000 + $30,000 + $27,500 = $452,500. Debt: $150,000. Net worth: $302,500.

The total tells you what you are worth, and the asset-by-asset view tells you what to do. The cabin returns 4.4% on what you paid but only 3.6% on its current value, and the 3.6% is the standard capitalization rate, net operating income divided by current value rather than the original price.^[3] Its cash flow after the loan is $150 a month, which is thin once you remember that the loan payment is deliberately outside NOI: the IRS tells US rental owners that mortgage principal payments cannot simply be deducted, and that they should keep accurate records and separate repairs from improvements.^[4] The aircraft costs 15.0% of its value every year just to hold, and the truck has lost a third of its price. Each of those is a decision waiting to be made, and none of them appears in an account feed.

Whose number is it

In an account dashboard, a balance is a fact: the bank says so. For a physical asset, the value is an opinion, and the question is whose.

In Owned Map, it is yours: an appraisal, a broker’s opinion, a recent comparable sale, or your own judgment, dated and kept in a history that grows each time you update. That takes a minute of thought. In return it is a number you chose and can defend, and it stays put until you change it. For something like an aircraft share, where no automatic feed could know the market, a number you chose and dated is worth more than a blank.

The discipline that makes this work is a calendar one: update the values once a quarter, or when something changes (a renovation, a sale nearby, a new valuation for insurance). A few minutes, four times a year.

Documents and dates

Ownership produces paperwork and deadlines: a deed, a title, an insurance policy that renews, a registration, an annual inspection, a loan agreement, a property tax bill. The expensive surprises usually come from a date nobody wrote down.

Owned Map keeps documents on the asset they belong to and holds the dates (insurance, tax, registration, inspections) with reminders, so the policy and its renewal sit next to the thing they cover. On the Empower pages we read, we found no mention of attaching documents to an asset or tracking renewal dates, so if that matters to you, ask before relying on it.

The habit is worth having with or without a tool. For every physical asset keep four things together: proof of ownership, the insurance policy, the loan agreement if there is one, and the next date that needs action.

If something happens to you

Accounts are easy to find, because statements arrive in the post or the inbox. Physical assets are not: nobody gets a statement for a boat, an aircraft share or a plot of land. In Caring.com’s 2025 survey of more than 2,500 US adults, only 24% said they have a will, down from 33% in 2022.^[5] An executor cannot settle what nobody knows exists.

Owned Map lets you share a read-only link, give household members access, and set a private emergency sheet for one trusted person. The discipline applies to everything you own: the Nebraska Department of Insurance advises recording brand, price, purchase date, model, serial number and receipts, with photos.^[6] Add the registration or title number for vehicles and aircraft and the deed reference for property.

Price

Empower says its financial tools are free.^[1] Prices and terms can change, so check empower.com/tools.

Owned Map’s pricing is public and simple. $47 a month includes 3 assets. $15 each for assets 4 to 10, $10 each for assets 11 to 25 and $5 each from the 26th, up to 100 assets. Paying yearly is 30% less. There is a 7-day free trial, and a card is required.

The honest comparison is that free beats paid on price, always. Owned Map is worth paying for only if you need what a free account dashboard does not describe: a map of what you own, the performance of each asset, and the documents and dates attached. If you would otherwise keep that in a spreadsheet and a folder, it replaces both. If you have no physical assets to speak of, you do not need Owned Map. Start with Empower.

Who should choose which

Choose Empower if

• Most of your wealth is in accounts and retirement savings.
• You want free planning, budgeting and portfolio tools.
• You may want advice on your investments one day.

Choose Owned Map if

• You own property, land, vehicles, boats or aircraft and want the performance of each.
• You hold some of them in shares with others.
• You want everything on a map, with documents and renewal dates attached.
• You prefer a tool that does not connect to your accounts.

A five-question test

1. Is your biggest question whether you are on track for retirement? If yes, Empower.
2. Is more than a third of what you own physical? If yes, Owned Map.
3. Do you ask whether a property or a vehicle is still worth keeping? If yes, Owned Map.
4. Is free essential and are your assets mostly accounts? If yes, Empower.
5. Could someone find your documents if something happened to you? If not, fix that first, with either tool.

Using both

A sensible setup for someone with investments and real assets is Empower for the accounts and retirement, and Owned Map for what you own. The only thing to manage is the overlap: if both show the same house, pick one as the source of truth for its value so the total is not counted twice.

To start Owned Map from a spreadsheet, download the inventory template, paste your list in and import the CSV. Then add loans, shares and documents asset by asset. If it is not for you, you can cancel from your profile menu and export your data first.

How we checked

We wrote this page on November 4, 2026. What we say about Empower comes from its public tools page and its net worth page; one of its support articles did not load for us, so we do not rely on it. We have not used an Empower account, so where we found nothing we say “not listed”, not “not available”. What we say about Owned Map is what the product does today.

Every outside claim is numbered and listed under Sources below. Both products change. If you spot something out of date, email support@ownedmap.com and we will correct it.

Sources

1. Empower: financial tools, Empower. The tools are described as completely free: retirement planner, net worth, budgeting and cash flow, portfolio analysis; wealth management for $1M+ and advisory above $250,000, with fees based on assets managed. Read November 3, 2026.
2. Empower: net worth, Empower. It shows all your accounts in one place; the page does not list account types. Read November 3, 2026.
3. Capitalization rate, Wikipedia. The cap rate is net operating income divided by current value, not the original price. Read November 3, 2026.
4. Publication 527, Residential Rental Property (2025), Internal Revenue Service. You cannot simply deduct mortgage principal payments; keep accurate records and separate repairs from improvements. Read November 3, 2026.
5. Wills Survey 2025, Caring.com, with YouGov. 24% of respondents have a will, down from 33% in 2022 (more than 2,500 US adults). Read November 3, 2026.
6. Before the Storm: Don’t Wait Until It’s Too Late, Nebraska Department of Insurance. An inventory should record brand, price, purchase date, model, serial number and receipts, with photos. Read November 3, 2026.