Personal Budgeting Tools
As a follow up to last week’s blog about the importance of a personal budget, there are many applications out there that can help assist with tracking spending and monitor personal wealth. Two that I have personal experience with are below:
Personal Capital
https://www.personalcapital.com/
Mint
Both have phone applications that can be downloaded for instant updates on your cash, investments, loans, and spending habits. Most applications use bank-level security technology for those who worry about their information being compromised. Review the websites for assurances on encryption. Some of the benefits of these applications are below:
Track Your Spending
You can review transactions by category, vendor, or purchase date. This allows you to see where your money is going as well as get notifications about spending compared to the previous month. By seeing spending by category it allows you to track budget performance and see areas where cut backs can be made.
Track Your Investment Performance
Whether it is brokerage or retirement accounts you can track how investments are performing over time. This is especially helpful if you have investments with different companies and different financial management firms. This does not replace the importance of investment management, but can identify problem areas with certain investments.
Stay In The Know
At each login the application is automatically refreshed in real time. You can see an instant picture of your net wealth if all data is entered. By logging in daily, weekly, or monthly it keeps you thinking about your finances. The more you know, the better you can plan for your future.