Quicken Online has improved!

Quicken Online has improved their free online offering since I last wrote about it. In my earlier post I compared Mint.com, Quicken Online and Wesabe. I noticed this weekend that Quicken Online has made some changes. It seems to add a few new minor options but the biggest option is they do a calculation of how much money you have available until your next paycheck. They base this on the previous months payments and paydays. It's really pretty accurate. This is a nice feature, but I believe it just encourages spending. By knowing how much you have left to spend by the next paycheck, I look at that like okay I have $50 that I can spend. It should be looked at like I have $50 to save or invest but I don't. It looks ahead and takes into account future repeatable expenses that are coming up before your payday so it should help you not overspend. I think the service is nice but I just look at it wrong. The one thing I can't do that I really rely on is to compare my expense to my earnings for the month. I look at that every month and then determine how much, if any, I can move to savings. I looked all over the web page but couldn't figure out how to get a graph, chart or listing that shows how much I made versus how much I spent. Quicken Online is still the easiest site to get your data imported from your accounts automatically. I set it up the first time and now everytime I login it automatically updates all my accounts without me doing a thing. That is nice.

I am still using Wesabe for the time being. I really like the income versus expenses graph. Wesabe gives you that on the front page. Between that and a little more flexible tagging or categorizing is why I still like Wesabe better. I can get all my accounts updated fairly easily (still not as easy as Quicken). Mint.com still can't upload my credit union data. Until I can do that this site will not work.

Still the winner: Wesabe

Your Money or Your Life - book review

I just finished a book called "Your Money or Your Life" by Joe Dominguez (Author), Vicki Robin (Author). This book was published in 1993 so its a little out dated. The main concept is not, though. Instead of making budgets that you hate to do and don't follow. It tells you to track your expenses and see where the money is going. Then look at those expenses compared to your goals and needs. By looking at this each month, you start to adjust how you spend your money so that your spending starts lining up with your goals and desires. It gets you off that cycle of spending money on stupid stuff. It has you create tables and graphs to see where your money is going and how you are doing in spending less than you make. This tracking the results in crucial since things that are measured always improve. Then once you get your spending in order it then talks about setting up investments in US Treasury bonds to earn a guaranteed income. Through the marvel of compound interest you can eventually earn enough money through your bonds to quit working. I did a quick calculation based on the current Treasury rate, 4%, and I could maybe have enough money from my bonds to cover my expenses in 20 years. Pretty reasonable amount of time, but it seems like forever for a disciple of the immediate gratification generation. I recommend the book.

I think they are releasing a revised version in December of 2008. I would probably wait to get that version unless the library has a copy of the older version that you can read for free.

You can also see more about this book on my Squidoo page.

Online money management sites

I have been looking for a good site to manage my savings. I have tried Mint.com, Quicken Online, and Wesabe. Quicken online had the most connections with different financial institutions to make downloading your data very easy. The problem was that the reporting and the ability to analyze your data were very poor. Mint had the best web site and neatest graphs. They also have a unique idea of offering outside vendors products (like low interest credit cards or cash back offers) that could save you money. They recommended that I look at an American Express Blue card for cash back. I signed up for the American Express card since it looks like it will give me more cash back and there is no annual fee. The problem I had with Mint was that I couldn't get my data from my Credit union accounts. My checking accounts, along with Bill Payment, is all with Credit unions. I couldn't get that data input into Mint. Without that data it's useless. I'll keep monitoring it to see if they make a way to enter my data. The site I liked the best was Wesabe. I didn't at first. It seemed a little less flashy than the other sites, but don't let that fool you. They have a method to get the data from all your financial institutions either automatically, manually or through a slick little add-on for Firefox web browsers (although I question whether this is secure enough). The thing that didn't jump out at me at first was the use of tagging. Start tagging your expenses and income and things start to happen. It will automatically start tagging all transactions from that vendor. Then everytime this expense comes in it automatically gets tagged. Now use those tags to start seeing how you are spending your money. How much do I spend on Utilities? How about Electric Utilities. It's really powerful.

My Pick: Wesabe