Tool UI

FORTUNA'S COMPASS: AI-Powered Debt Repayment Planner

🌟 Inspiration

The inspiration for this project came from the realization that managing multiple debts can be stressful and confusing for many individuals. People often struggle to prioritize which debt to pay off first, leading to prolonged repayment periods and high interest payments. We wanted to create a tool that simplifies this process and empowers users to make informed financial decisions, leveraging AI to provide personalized insights.

🎓 What We Learned

Throughout this project, we learned how to:

Implement multiple debt repayment strategies like Debt Snowball, Debt Avalanche, and Interest-Amount Avalanche.
Integrate advanced AI models, such as Google Gemini, to generate meaningful financial advice.
Build secure and scalable backend systems using Node.js and protect sensitive API keys.
Create an intuitive and user-friendly frontend using React, with seamless integration of tables and visualizations.
Handle edge cases like insufficient budgets and provide clear error handling for users.

🛠️ How We Built It

Frontend: Built with React.js, featuring a clean UI that allows users to input debts, expenses, and income. It dynamically displays repayment plans and AI-generated explanations in a structured table format.
Backend: Developed using Node.js and Express, the backend calculates three repayment plans and interacts with the AI API for generating advice.
AI Integration: We used the Google Generative AI (Gemini) API to provide personalized and actionable advice for each repayment plan.
Security: Environment variables were used to secure API keys, ensuring the system remains safe and robust.

⚡ Challenges Faced

Handling Insufficient Budgets: We encountered issues when users had insufficient income to cover minimum payments. Resolving this required clear error messages and validations.
API Key Management: Ensuring the Gemini API key was securely stored and accessed across different environments.
AI Integration: Fine-tuning prompts to ensure concise and valuable AI-generated explanations for users.
Combining Payments: Aggregating payments by debt type across months was a technical challenge that required restructuring data dynamically.
Balancing Simplicity and Detail: Striking a balance between presenting detailed repayment plans and maintaining a user-friendly interface.

🚀 Final Thoughts

This project taught us the importance of addressing real-world problems with accessible technology. By integrating AI into financial planning, we created a tool that not only simplifies debt management but also educates users on making better financial decisions. We look forward to expanding its capabilities and making it even more impactful in the future!

What's next for Fortuna’s Compass

🔮 Future Work

Advanced AI Recommendations: Incorporate more advanced AI features like real-time financial projections and comparisons between different strategies.
Customizable Plans: Allow users to customize repayment strategies based on personal preferences, such as focusing on specific debts or setting their own priorities.
Integration with Banking APIs: Automatically fetch financial data from user accounts, ensuring accurate calculations and reducing manual input.
Mobile App Development: Expand the platform to mobile apps for better accessibility and convenience.