At the beginning of April I caved and gave Mint.com a try. One month down and I am very happy with my decision.
I never felt deprived of the control over my budget that I am used to. Sound stupid, probably, but those of you who are OCD about money like me understand. Anytime I questioned my budget I just went on Mint.com’s website and checked out my progress.
I loved not having to worry about most receipts. As I have mentioned before, I pay with my credit card 99% of the time (but pay 100% of it off every month, might as well take advantage of free rewards!!!) Plus, without all those receipts, my wallet felt lighter and I feel like I am saving the environment (one receipt at a time). Please note I did have to keep receipts (or have a good memory) for cash purchases.
I also love not worrying about entering my own data. Mint.com reads your bank accounts. It is completely safe since it is a read-only service. See below!
And finally, the main reason I love Mint.com is the graphical data.
As the month progresses you can see bar graphs of where you stand in your budget. Normally, you see red (over budget), yellow (close to budget) and green (not near budget). The graphic above only shows green and red because this month (April) has already passed.
In April, I went way over budget for Auto: Service and Parts because I had some car maintenance done. I do not drive often and only get my oil changed 3 times a year, but it is a good practice to budget about $50 a month for your car just in case. Mint.com allows you to choose for budgets to roll over. While my car maintenance cost me about $250 this month, it is also the first time I have paid for maintenance (besides oil changes) in the 3 years I have owned the car. So in a few months, my car budget will start building up again.
Other areas where I have set up roll over budgets include Health, Dates with Jay, Running, Travel, Wedding Expenses and Running Expenses. These categories vary from month to month, but I still want the money there just in case I need it. Just think, if you budget about $100 a month an entire year, you can go on a pretty decent vacation!
Another great graphic is the pie chart. This image shows me what percentage of my budget goes to each category. Obviously Housing and Food take the largest percent. It is also nice to see that Uncategorized takes a decent chunk. For me uncategorized includes Dates with Jay, Wedding Expenses and Running Expenses.
