Mobile App / Private Wealth & AI Planning

Set the goal.
Then divert the money to reach it.

Most finance apps are rear-view mirrors - they tell you, in increasingly beautiful charts, what you already spent. Sahara inverts that. You name a goal, and every surface in the app reorganises to answer one question: how much sooner can I get there, and what would I have to change?

RoleProduct Design & Build
Timeline2026
CategoryFintech / Personal Wealth
TypeReact · Capacitor · Gemini
View All 9 Screens Read Case Study
Sahara Financial Ledger interface
9
Screens Designed
3
AI Touchpoints
32px
Corner Radius
2
Typefaces
The problem
Every finance app is a rear-view mirror. It tells you what you already spent, never whether the thing you actually want is getting closer.
The approach
Make the goal the organising idea. Lead with direction of travel, anchor every AI touchpoint to a real figure, and demote the transaction list.
The outcome
A private-wealth app where each surface answers one question: how much sooner do I get there, and what would I have to change?
9
Screens built
3
AI touchpoints
32px
One radius
2
Typefaces

01 — The Problem

Every finance app reports.
Almost none of them plan.

Open any banking or budgeting app and you get the same thing: a balance, a spend breakdown, and a chart of the past. All of it accurate, none of it actionable. The user already knows they spent too much on coffee. What they cannot see is whether the thing they actually want is getting closer or further away.

01
The rear-view mirror
Categorised spend tells you what happened. It never tells you what to do next, so the insight dies at the moment of reading.
02
Goals as a side feature
Savings goals are usually a secondary tab with a progress bar - decorative, and disconnected from the money actually moving.
03
Guilt as a mechanic
Budgeting apps default to reprimand. Red overspend warnings make people close the app rather than change behaviour.
04
AI as a chat box
Bolting a general assistant onto a finance app produces a blank prompt that nobody knows what to type into.

05 — Solution Exploration

Three decisions that
set the direction.

Each had a conventional option that would have looked more like the category, and would have made Sahara another rear-view mirror.

Decision 01
What does the home screen lead with?
Problem
Every finance app opens on a balance, because it is the obvious number.
Option A
Open on total balance and a spend breakdown, as the category does.
Option B
Open on direction of travel, then the goal it feeds. (Chosen)
Chosen
A greeting stating movement - net liquidity up 4.2% - above the wealth card.
A balance is a fact; a direction is a decision. Leading with movement makes the first thing a user reads something they can act on, rather than something they already knew.
Decision 02
Where does the AI live?
Problem
A general assistant is the expected shape, and the cheapest to build.
Option A
Ship a chat window and let people ask whatever they like.
Option B
Attach AI to three specific figures with three specific jobs. (Chosen)
Chosen
Affordability insight, portfolio synthesis, and a scoped assistant.
An empty prompt is a blank-page problem - users do not know what a finance model can answer. Anchoring each touchpoint to a number means the useful question has already been asked for them.
Decision 03
How prominent is spending?
Problem
The transaction list is the most-used screen in most banking apps.
Option A
Give recent spend the home screen, as every competitor does.
Option B
Demote it below goal, insight and growth planner. (Chosen)
Chosen
Recent ledger present, but deliberately the quietest surface.
Prominence is a statement about what the product is for. Putting spend first would have made Sahara a budgeting app with a goal feature, rather than a goal app that happens to track spend.

06 — Final Solution

Five surfaces,
one question.

Every capability answers the same thing - how much sooner do I get there - from a different angle.

🏦
Total wealth card
Portfolio, savings and invested split on a near-black card, with allocation one tap away.
Problem
Balances are usually presented flat, with no sense of what is working.
Approach
The single dark surface in a warm interface, so the eye lands there first.
User Benefit
She sees the whole position without opening three separate accounts.
Business Benefit
Establishes the app as the primary view of net worth rather than a companion.
✨
Affordability insight
AI reads burn rate against a named goal and states how many months could be saved.
Problem
Spend analysis tells people what happened, never what to change.
Approach
A recommendation tied to one goal and one lever, phrased without reprimand.
User Benefit
She learns what a specific cut actually buys her.
Business Benefit
Turns a generic model into the feature people describe to a friend.
📈
Active growth planner
Term selector, annual index APY, and the maturity figure charted from start to target.
Problem
Compounding is the strongest argument for patience and the least felt.
Approach
The projected return set in display serif, large enough to register emotionally.
User Benefit
She can feel the difference between a one-year and a five-year horizon.
Business Benefit
Encourages longer commitments, which is the more profitable behaviour.
🧮
AI asset allocator
Conservative, balanced and aggressive splits, with a one-tap synthesis request.
Problem
Allocation advice is either gatekept behind advisers or buried in jargon.
Approach
Three legible presets with plain-language notes under every holding.
User Benefit
She can act on a portfolio decision without booking a meeting.
Business Benefit
Moves users from saving into investing, the higher-value behaviour.
💳
Cards & safety hub
Chip locking, spend limiters and live ledger diagnostics on a metal-card visual.
Problem
Card controls are usually buried several levels inside settings.
Approach
Security surfaced as a first-class destination in the main navigation.
User Benefit
She can freeze or limit a card in one tap, straight from the tab bar.
Business Benefit
Reduces support contact and builds the trust a wealth product depends on.

07 — Design System & Scalability

Warm sand,
and one serif with a job.

The system is deliberately narrow: two typefaces, one accent, one dark surface, and a 32px radius applied without exception. Restraint is what keeps a money app from feeling either clinical or gaudy.

Palette
Background#FDFBF9
Surface Alt#F9F7F2
Tertiary#F2EDE4
Primary#C68E5A
Secondary#7A746E
Ink#2D2926
Typography
Playfair Display
Figures and section titles - reserved, never body copy
Manrope
Everything functional - labels, navigation, body
One radius, no exceptions
A single 32px radius token runs across cards, chips, inputs and buttons. Uniform softness is what produces the calm; varying it would introduce a hierarchy the layout already handles.
The serif is a signal
Playfair appears only where a number matters - maturity returns, wealth totals, section titles. Because it is never used for body copy, its presence marks importance by itself.
One dark surface
Near-black cards are reserved for the total wealth panel and the asset allocator. In an otherwise warm, light interface, darkness is the strongest emphasis available.

08 — Outcomes & Impact

A goal-first ledger,
running end to end.

Sahara is a working React build that wraps to Android through Capacitor - the same bundle serves the web and the mobile package, which is why every layout is designed at phone width first.

9
Screens Built
Wealth through settings, all rendering from the running build.
3
AI Touchpoints
Each anchored to a specific figure rather than an open chat.
2
Typefaces
Playfair for figures, Manrope for everything else.
1
Question
How much sooner do I reach the goal?

09 — Key Learnings

What This Project Taught Me

Learning 01
Prominence is a product statement
Where a screen sits in the navigation says what the product is for. Demoting the transaction list was the single decision that stopped Sahara becoming another budgeting app.
Learning 02
AI needs somewhere to stand
The same model is useless behind an empty prompt and genuinely valuable attached to one number with one job. Scoping the assistant made it more capable, not less.
Learning 03
Warmth is a functional choice
Money interfaces default to cold blues or gold luxury. Warm sand made a wealth app feel like somewhere you plan rather than somewhere you are audited, and that changes how long people stay.
Learning 04
Show the reward, not the breach
Framing a spending cut as months saved rather than a budget exceeded is the same arithmetic and the opposite emotional response. People act on the first and avoid the second.
The long version Research, personas, flows
& the thinking underneath 3 sections · the reasoning behind every decision above

Reflection

"The brief I set myself was to build a finance app that plans instead of reports. That sounds like a feature difference and it is actually an information-architecture one. Once the goal becomes the organising idea, the transaction list - the most-used screen in every banking app I have ever designed for - becomes the least important surface in the product. Moving it to the bottom of the dashboard felt wrong for about a day, and then it felt obviously right."
— Rupesh Chavan, Lead Product Designer
"Attaching the AI to specific numbers is the decision I would defend hardest. A chat box would have demoed better and been used twice. An insight that says you reach this four months earlier if you change this one thing is the whole product in a sentence, and it only works because it is anchored to something the user already cares about."
On why the transaction list ended up last

Explore the Project

See the whole thing

Every screen below is captured from the running React build at 390×844 - step through with the arrow keys, or click any screen to open it full size.

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