3 Alternatives to the “Mint” Budgeting App
Many of our clients have used Mint and it has been a favorite of MainStreet Financial Planning for many years. With the recent news of Mint shutting down, we wanted to share a few helpful alternatives for budgeting tools to help you stay on track with accomplishing your goals!
YNAB – YNAB stands for “You Need a Budget” and it is one that I have personally used and recommend to friends and clients. My husband and I were gifted a subscription to YNAB during our first year of marriage and it was incredibly helpful to us as we navigated how to merge our finances and keep track of everything. I enjoy their UX and their philosophy to “give every dollar a job”. If you are interested in checking it out, they offer a “34 Day Free Trial”. Cost: $14.99/mo or $80/year ($8.25/month).
Monarch – Monarch was started by Mint’s first product manager and has most of the same capabilities as well as a few additional benefits such as adding an additional user or allowing your financial advisor to have access to view your budget as well. Monarch makes it easy for you to import your Mint history into its platform and is even offering an extended free trial for new users who are transferring from Mint. It also tracks investment holdings/portfolio allocation which a lot of other budgeting tools do not track. Cost: $14.99/month or if you pay all at one time it is $99.99/year or $8.33/month.
Tiller – MainStreet Financial Advisor, Jennifer Bush, CFP® , has personally used Tiller for over 4 years and enjoys it, saying that she likes that it’s “fully customizable, and spreadsheet-based and I can run reports and filter my transactions any way I would like.” Jennifer also said that they have great customer service and that their online community is responsive and interactive – if you post a question it usually gets answered within a day or you can search questions other users have asked and find your answers that way as well. Tiller also posted a helpful article that walks Mint users through how to export their transactions for backup as well as to use when migrating them to a new money management tool. Cost: $79/year
Whether you enjoy using an app to track your spending or a plain old spreadsheet (or pen and paper for that matter) – we just want you to have a tool that works for YOU. As we approach the end of 2023 – now is a great time to review your budget and think through some of your financial goals for 2024 and a budgeting tool could help get back on track.
Anna Sergunina, CFP® delves deeper into this topic in our next
