Best Budgeting App/Program

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Topic Author
Need2BudgetandSave
Posts: 3
Joined: Tue Jan 15, 2019 7:23 am
Location: Texas

Best Budgeting App/Program

Post by Need2BudgetandSave »

Morning y'all,

Finally decided to bite the bullet and setup an account on the forum on Bogleheads.org. We currently use Mint but not to its full potential and I never really enjoyed it. I have a Personal Capital account setup and linked to my investments (Betterment and Charles Schwab) but have not linked CC or bank details yet.

Its a new year so I decided that I want to look for alternatives, the App Store is full of new apps to help with saving, budgeting, bill paying, etc. ! I would ideally like an app that can be used for a household budget, track and pay bills (and negotiate bills down which I have seen in a few apps), monitor investments (Betterment and several Charles Schwab for me and Vanguard for my wife), help with savings and track net worth. I know its asking for a lot but I think some of the below ones can help. I narrowed down the list to a few that I am considering closely so if you had any feedback or comments regarding them I would greatly appreciate it
  • PocketGuard - free but has a paid version as well and it has an Apple Watch app (which is cool and good since both of us have Apple Watches)
  • YNAB - first 30 days are free and it has an Apple Watch app
  • Clarity Money Manager - looks like it has everything but being able to monitor current investments.
  • Digit - looks like it has everything but being able to monitor current investments.
  • Acorns - I have heard so much about this and think I might sign up for this in addition to another program.
  • Albert - costs money but looks like it does a lot of useful things.
Thanks again in advanced and sorry for this poorly written post. Just trying to get it posted before work!
I look forward to starting out 2019 the right way by getting my families finances on track so we can have more money to invest the Boglehead way!
Tony
nix4me
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Joined: Sat Oct 13, 2018 9:32 am

Re: Best Budgeting App/Program

Post by nix4me »

After using YNAB, Everydollar and Mint - I like YNAB the best.
BUBear29
Posts: 396
Joined: Wed Aug 19, 2015 4:20 pm
Location: DFW

Re: Best Budgeting App/Program

Post by BUBear29 »

YNAB.
There is no dignity quite so impressive, and no one independence quite so important, as living within your means.
onourway
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Joined: Thu Dec 08, 2016 2:39 pm

Re: Best Budgeting App/Program

Post by onourway »

YNAB.

You will need an alternative for tracking investments though. I like my own Excel spreadsheet for this purpose.
tedgeorge
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Joined: Thu Oct 03, 2013 8:29 pm

Re: Best Budgeting App/Program

Post by tedgeorge »

We use a google spreadsheet for budgeting. Lowest barrier to entry for my spouse and she doesn't have to setup anything. I could never get her to spend the time to do YNAB correctly. We track the big expenses as well as credit cards and salaries and see whether we were ahead or behind for the month. It's more of a high level overview and if we're falling behind we will take action, otherwise we move on and review at the end of the year.

I have spreadsheets for investments and Net worth statements but I don't update those more than 1-2 times per year. It doesn't take a lot of time. My wife loves the net worth statement! It's a gateway drug to financial literacy. :happy

I also use Personal Capital but mainly to have a quick view in investments. I have my credit cards there too. They have a feature to email you a list of transactions for your accounts and I use that to make sure no one has run up a large credit card transaction.
Topic Author
Need2BudgetandSave
Posts: 3
Joined: Tue Jan 15, 2019 7:23 am
Location: Texas

Re: Best Budgeting App/Program

Post by Need2BudgetandSave »

onourway wrote: Tue Jan 15, 2019 11:53 am You will need an alternative for tracking investments though. I like my own Excel spreadsheet for this purpose.
Have you tried any alternatives that include investment tracking? Also would you be able to share a template for your spreadsheet?
Tony
onourway
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Re: Best Budgeting App/Program

Post by onourway »

Need2BudgetandSave wrote: Tue Jan 15, 2019 12:10 pm
onourway wrote: Tue Jan 15, 2019 11:53 am You will need an alternative for tracking investments though. I like my own Excel spreadsheet for this purpose.
Have you tried any alternatives that include investment tracking? Also would you be able to share a template for your spreadsheet?
I have used Personal Capital as well. Their fancy graphs are nice. The regular calls I get whenever I use their app are not (I only log in a couple of times per year, and tell them every time not to call me). In the end I realized that our investments were complicated enough (accounts at multiple brokerages for two people) that no automated system was going to be all that helpful. I don't have a template to share as ours is highly customized to our particular situation, although it started from something no simpler than a listing of all accounts and their balances, and grew organically from there based on the information I was interested in tracking. It's an excellent exercise for getting up to speed on your finances. :happy

YNAB is so good at budgeting/cash flow management that I'm happy to use it simply for that.
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steelerfan
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Location: near Pell City, AL

Re: Best Budgeting App/Program

Post by steelerfan »

I prefer everydollar for budgeting. I pay a little extra to link the accounts.

I use Personal Capital to track my networth and investments.

I also use a spreadsheet for earmarking my savings for emergencies, car, new roof, vacation, Christmas, etc...
"As your wealth grows do not set your heart on it." steelerfan
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Sandi_k
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Location: SF Bay Area

Re: Best Budgeting App/Program

Post by Sandi_k »

For retirement planning, I have a spreadsheet with lots of plans built in manually. I also like NewRetirement.

GetRichSlowly just reviewed it, and Personal Capital, and OnTrajectory:

https://www.getrichslowly.org/newretire ... ning-tool/

For budget planning, I am intrigued by Buxter and Money Dance. Reviews here:

https://www.moneyunder30.com/best-budgeting-tools
mighty72
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Location: Somewhere in the West

Re: Best Budgeting App/Program

Post by mighty72 »

I have used mint, personal capital and ynab. I prefer mint for tracking assets and liability. I prefer ynab for budgeting.

YNAB takes some time to get used to and requires some effort to file your expenses in the right category. I like this as it makes me think more about our spending and how to optimize it. After a year,ago you start getting a good sense of your expenses. You can't investments, only total of investment accounts.
Watts
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Joined: Sun Jan 05, 2014 9:04 am
Location: Texas

Re: Best Budgeting App/Program

Post by Watts »

I've been using YNAB for nearly 5 years, and it's an excellent budgeting app. It has nice mobile apps that allow you to keep up with entering transactions as you make purchases.

For overall net worth and investment tracking, I stick with Excel spreadsheets to take care of this.
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arcticpineapplecorp.
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Re: Best Budgeting App/Program

Post by arcticpineapplecorp. »

just saw this on npr and thought it was pretty good (open with pdf and it words like a spreadsheet):

https://www.consumer.gov/sites/www.cons ... t_form.pdf
It's hard to accept the truth when the lies were exactly what you wanted to hear. Investing is simple, but not easy. Buy, hold & rebalance low cost index funds & manage taxable events. Asking Portfolio Questions | Wiki
tony_roach
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Re: Best Budgeting App/Program

Post by tony_roach »

I use EveryDollar app for budgeting and use Personal Capital to track net worth
inves76
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Joined: Sun Jan 20, 2019 3:39 pm

Re: Best Budgeting App/Program

Post by inves76 »

I tested Tiller And YNAB at the same time. YNAB system does not work for me. Too complex. No interest in a zero budget system.
Tiller (cheaper than YNAB) offer several google sheets templates with a connection to yoodle. I am sure I can recreate the templates on my own but I prefer to pay to receive all the transactions and balance for 401k, brokers and checking account with no effort.
Yes, I know that mint has the same aggregator but I don't trust any free app where you and your information, in this case very valuable, are the product.
Give it a try
kimura king
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Re: Best Budgeting App/Program

Post by kimura king »

delete
Last edited by kimura king on Fri Oct 01, 2021 8:27 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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crinkles2
Posts: 244
Joined: Fri Nov 28, 2014 7:18 pm

Re: Best Budgeting App/Program

Post by crinkles2 »

YNAB for cash budgeting and spending plan. Just accounts I spend from to keep it simple.

Then moneydance for comprehensive tracking and investment record keeping. Moneydance’s budgeting is bad.
UpperNwGuy
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Re: Best Budgeting App/Program

Post by UpperNwGuy »

Another vote for Moneydance.
dukeblue219
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Re: Best Budgeting App/Program

Post by dukeblue219 »

We use YNAB and it works despite the price (granted we are grandfathered in at a discount). I love "envelope" budgeting even though I have no consumer debt or trouble staying within my total budget, which is really what YNAB is targeting.
DVMResident
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Re: Best Budgeting App/Program

Post by DVMResident »

Excel.

Two reasons:
(1) I don’t trust any app (Mint, YNBA) to exist/slowly become less usable over the next 50+ years that I need their services. If your don’t care about that, YNBA is the best IMO.

(2) I export my credit card statements every months as CSV and run them through a marco to format them to my excel. Then, copy them over the main budget sheet. Takes ~1 min per month now that everything is setup.
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