Benji: AI Financial Assistant (BudgetBuddie)

An in-app assistant that reads real bank data and tells users exactly where to save.

The problem

Most personal-finance apps show users their data but never tell them what to actually do with it. The goal was an assistant that understands a user's real finances and gives specific, personalized, actionable advice in plain language.

What I built

Integrate Akahu to auto-pull income and spending from 25+ NZ banks and KiwiSaver providers
Analyze and categorize the user's real transactions, with financial context stored in PostgreSQL and a Qdrant vector database
Use an LLM to turn that analysis into natural-language, actionable advice (for example, 'cut $150 from dining to hit your goal 3 weeks early')
Build it into the live BudgetBuddie app as lead developer

Outcome

Users ask in plain language and get specific, personalized money advice
Every recommendation is grounded in the user's real financial data
Shipped inside a live New Zealand fintech app