Saturday, January 10, 2009

FREE Online Personal Finance Software

I've been looking around for the past few months for a inexpensive online personal finance software to replace my desktop version of Quicken.  I found two FREE offers - Mint.com and Quicken Online . For me Mint.com is the best for my situation.  Mint.com immediately pulls in your balances, purchases, stock trades, etc. to give you a complete picture of your finances. Mint.com connects securely with more than 7,000 US financial institutions, saving you hours of tedious data entry.  Quicken Online also does the same thing.  Here are the major differences that I have seen: 

  • In Mint.com I can code a transaction to more than one category (split a transaction).  At this time Quicken Online does support splitting a transaction.  When I make a purchase at a grocery store, I generally buy more than just groceries.  There are usually 2 or more categories involved on a shopping trip.  I need to be able to split the transaction into multiple categories or it will completely throw off our family budget.
  • In Quicken Online, you can enter upcoming transactions which allows you to track a current balance rather than waiting for items to clear accounts.  Mint.com doesn't currently offer entering upcoming transactions.  I keep a separate check register so I always know my checking account balance so this isn't as critical for me.
So, if you are looking to set up a budget to track your spending habits, here are two FREE options.

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