Frec Alternatives With No Account and No Minimum
Frec is a strong product if what you actually want is to own a direct-indexing portfolio with tax-loss harvesting. It is a real brokerage account: you fund it, Frec buys the underlying stocks on your behalf, and it harvests losses automatically to help with your tax bill.
Last updated July 2026
Educational only · Never places a trade
In short
Frec is a direct-indexing brokerage: you fund a real account, Frec buys the underlying stocks for you, and it harvests tax losses automatically. Its published pricing runs 0.09% to 0.35% a year with a minimum in the $20,000 to $50,000 range depending on the strategy, which makes it one of the cheapest ways to actually own a direct-indexed portfolio. It is US equities only. Indexes is not a brokerage and does not replace that: it never holds money, never places a trade, and never harvests a loss. It is the design step in front of the decision, where you author a weighted index of stocks and crypto, backtest it against real market history, and track it, with no account and no minimum.
Side by side
Indexes vs Frec
| Capability | Indexes | Frec |
|---|---|---|
| Requires funding a brokerage account | ||
| No account minimum | Around $20K | |
| Stocks and crypto in one index | Equities only | |
| Backtest and track a custom index | Partial | |
| Automated tax-loss harvesting | ||
| Analyze-only, never places trades | ||
| Globally accessible, not US-gated |
Comparison reflects general product positioning and is provided in good faith. Verify current capabilities with each vendor.
Where each one fits
Indexes and Frec, without the sales pitch
Frec is a strong product if what you actually want is to own a direct-indexing portfolio with tax-loss harvesting. It is a real brokerage account: you fund it, Frec buys the underlying stocks on your behalf, and it harvests losses automatically to help with your tax bill. It is genuinely good at that job.
It is also US-gated, focused on equities, and typically expects a funding minimum around twenty thousand dollars. Indexes is not a brokerage and does not compete on ownership. It is informational and educational, track-and-analyze not trade.
You build a custom index from stocks and crypto, backtest it against real market history, and track it versus benchmarks like the S&P 500 and BTC, with no account to fund, no minimum, no trades, and global access.
Questions
Frec direct indexing, answered
What is Frec?
Frec is a direct-indexing brokerage. You fund an account, Frec buys the individual stocks that make up an index on your behalf, and it scans for tax-loss harvesting opportunities automatically. It is a genuine alternative to the direct-indexing programs at Fidelity, Schwab and Wealthfront, built by a company that does only this.
How much does Frec cost?
Frec's published pricing runs from 0.09% to 0.35% a year depending on the index strategy you choose, with minimums in the $20,000 to $50,000 range. At the bottom of that range it is among the cheapest direct-indexing options available without an advisor. Frec also runs a portfolio line of credit against the account, lending up to 70% of portfolio value, published at 4.64% when we checked. Figures re-verified against frec.com in August 2026, so confirm them with Frec before you fund anything.
Is Frec cheaper than Wealthfront or Fidelity?
At its 0.09% tier Frec matches Wealthfront S&P 500 Direct and undercuts both Fidelity Managed FidFolios and Schwab Personalized Indexing at 0.40%. The tradeoff is the minimum: Frec starts around $20,000 while Fidelity and Wealthfront S&P 500 Direct start at $5,000. Which is cheaper depends entirely on your balance and the strategy you pick.
Can I direct index crypto with Frec?
No. Frec covers US equities, as does every managed direct-indexing product on the market. If you want a single weighted index holding tokens next to stocks, no managed provider offers it, and you would need to build and hold that basket yourself. Indexes models that mixed case on the analysis side.
Is there a Frec alternative with no minimum?
If you want to own the shares and have losses harvested for you, the lower-minimum options are Fidelity Managed FidFolios and Wealthfront S&P 500 Direct, both at $5,000. If you want to design, backtest and track an index without funding an account at all, Indexes does that with no minimum, because it is an analysis tool rather than a brokerage.
Is Frec really 0.09%, or is that just the headline?
It is the headline, and it applies to one strategy out of 25. Frec Classic runs 0.09% to 0.35% depending on which index you pick, and 14 of the 25 strategies cost 0.15% or more. The 0.09% is the S&P 500 specifically. CRSP US Large Cap is 0.10%, CRSP US Total Market is 0.13%, Russell 2000 is 0.26%, and S&P 500 Shariah and MVIS US Listed Semiconductor 25 are both 0.35%, close to four times the advertised rate. Minimums also vary by strategy, at $20,000 on most and $50,000 on the small cap, total market, Russell and EAFE ones. Ask which strategy you will actually hold before you treat 0.09% as your fee.
Which Frec strategy harvests the most tax losses?
Frec publishes a historical harvest rate for every strategy and the spread is large: 55% for Russell 2000, 48% for CRSP US Small Cap Growth, 44% for CRSP US Small Cap, down to 16% for the semiconductor strategy. The famous 0.09% S&P 500 strategy is listed at 25%. The driver is volatility, since small cap constituents move more and therefore spend more time below their purchase price, which is what a harvesting engine needs. The practical consequence is that Frec's cheapest strategy and its highest-harvesting strategy are not the same product, and most of the high-harvest ones carry the $50,000 minimum rather than the $20,000 one.
How does Frec make money charging only 0.09%?
Four disclosed ways. It lends out the shares held in your index through a stock lending program. It sells a portfolio line of credit against your holdings, letting you borrow up to 70% of portfolio value, quoted at 4.64% when we checked. It sells much more expensive products alongside Classic: Long Short at 0.50% to 1.30% plus 0.23% to 0.86% in financing costs, and Diversify at 0.60% to 1.10% plus financing, both from $100,000. And within Classic itself the average client pays well above 0.09%, since most strategies cost more. None of this is hidden, but it does mean 0.09% is a front door rather than a price list.
What is Frec Diversify and how is it different from Frec Classic?
Classic is plain direct indexing: you fund an account and Frec buys an index as individual stocks from $20,000 at 0.09% to 0.35%. Diversify is a different product aimed at people who already hold a large concentrated position, and Classic cannot help with that at all, because getting money into Classic means selling first. Diversify builds long and short overlays around the concentrated stock, harvests losses from the overlays, and uses them to offset the gains as the position is sold down. It starts at $100,000 and costs 0.60% to 1.10% plus a financing cost, quoted at 0.23% post-tax on the 140/40 strategies. Frec estimates one to five years at a 50% cost basis.
Should I use Frec Diversify or an exchange fund for concentrated stock?
They work in opposite directions. An exchange fund defers the entire capital gain immediately under IRC 721, but locks you up for seven years and must hold at least 20% of the fund in illiquid private real estate. Frec Diversify defers nothing upfront and pays the tax down gradually, but has no lock-up and leaves you owning real shares you can customize. The lower your cost basis, the more the exchange fund immediate deferral is worth. If you might need the money before seven years, the lock-up decides it and the fee comparison is beside the point.
New to the strategy? Start with our guide to direct indexing, what it costs and who it suits, or see direct indexing fees compared across providers. If you are still deciding which category of tool you need, the portfolio analyzer comparison sets out the difference between account aggregators, modeling tools and construction tools. To see every provider's published minimum and annual fee in one table, including the advisor-only firms, compare direct indexing platforms on fees and minimums.
Going deeper on Frec: the full Frec fee, minimum and harvest rate table for all 25 strategies, Frec Diversify vs the Cache exchange fund, exchange funds, fees and the seven-year lock-up, Frec vs Wealthfront direct indexing, Frec vs Schwab Personalized Indexing, Frec vs Wealthfront vs Betterment on lowest bps .
Other comparisons
Build your index and see how it backtests
Bundle stocks or crypto into your own weighted index, backtest it against real market history, and track it against the S&P 500 or BTC. Prosumer pricing, no brokerage account. Indexes is educational and informational only, and it never places a trade. Decide for yourself.