Do the "youngs" use Quicken?

[Montecfo]

Most of us seem to use some sort of financial system, whether spreadsheets or personal finance software, to keep track of personal business and investments. Our 28 year old son's finances have become interesting enough that I think he would benefit from such a system, and he has expressed a desire to get more organized.

I have used Quicken for a few decades. It was not my first choice (my preferred software, MoneyCounts, was bought out years ago by Intuit or Microsoft Money or some competitor).

I am thinking of nudging our son toward some sort of financial system. Naturally I would lean toward Quicken because of its longevity and comprehensiveness. I know for some of us it is a love-hate thing.

It seems to me that one of our greatest legacies can be to help our kids learn good financial habits and stay organized. My mother, who was not a financial person, used an old school accounting system that her CPA helped her choose, in order to keep track of her rental properties. I remember helping her with it myself, sitting in front of her Leading Edge Model D.

Personal finance software has made this all so much more accessible and inexpensive.

What do your kids use, if anything, and how have you guided them?

 

[euro]

Depends on how committed they are to really stay on top of the data entry and maintenance that is required. I know MY youngsters are too undisciplined for that. They don’t want to spend the 10 minutes a week..... and if you are only willing to populate the fields once a year, it won’t be very helpful. But alas, maybe they’ll see the benefits of being better organized at some point.....
Anyway, I have used Quicken for three decades (mostly to keep track of cost basis of reinvested dividends, etc) and it has always done what I needed but I’d probably recommend something like MoneyDance in its place simply because of Quicken’s appalling CS history, especially of MacOS support.

 

[NgineER]

I think Mint and personal capital are more common due to the ease of use and app on phone. I'm interested to see what people say about other options

 

[MuirWannabe]

I’ve also used Quicken for decades. I encouraged my twin daughters to use it and got them started on it when they left the nest. One of them still uses it and works a budget. She’s been using it for around 6 years already. The other didn’t stick with it long at all. Time needed for data entry was the problem I think.

I never even tried with DS. I know he wouldn’t do it.

 

[bobandsherry]

When did you get really interested in tracking your finances? How old were you? And if so, why did you do it?

For me, it was when I had nothing and needed to live paycheck to paycheck. So had discipline then.

But then lost interest as we had sufficient income and had little extra time, but with experience of discipline learned earlier. I did though look and manage at a macro level for long term planning, with an idea of what gets measured gets accomplished. [emoji16]. We hit our goal, actually exceeded it a bit, retired early at 54/52. Also put both kids through college with no student loans for them or us.

And now I track it as we want to be disciplined to stay to our retirement plan and that I have the time to manage my finances as a "hobby". Not so much as we don't have the dough, but want to keep as much of it as possible. So navigating the ACA limits, minimize taxes and have enough should we hit a path of long term care.

So long way to answer your question. Really depends on how interested the"youngs" are with understanding their finances and long term planning. So probably not really interested guaging from my kids, despite seeing how it benefited me. [emoji39].

 

[MrsHaloFIRE]

Im the kid of this forum I think and I use spreadsheets my husband devised and then I criticized and improved them. I use Excel and it was a skill honed at home on my own and also helped me out at work.

 

[Ready]

Quicken missed a big opportunity when they failed to port their application to iOS and Android, or offering a web browser based option. Software that only runs in a Windows environment is losing popularity. And the Mac version is much weaker than the Windows version, and offers no integration with iOS or iCloud.

Mint and Personal Capital have become popular because they work in a standard web browser, but also have iOS and Android apps, making them accessible on any device.

If I had not already been a 20+ year Quicken user I doubt I would go out and purchase it now. I would probably go with Personal Capital and maybe use a spreadsheet to track certain things that Personal Capital can’t do on its own.

 

[bobandsherry]

Quicken missed a big opportunity when they failed to port their application to iOS and Android, or offering a web browser based option. Software that only runs in a Windows environment is losing popularity. And the Mac version is much weaker than the Windows version, and offers no integration with iOS or iCloud.

Mint and Personal Capital have become popular because they work in a standard web browser, but also have iOS and Android apps, making them accessible on any device.

If I had not already been a 20+ year Quicken user I doubt I would go out and purchase it now. I would probably go with Personal Capital and maybe use a spreadsheet to track certain things that Personal Capital can’t do on its own.

I get your point... but let's not suggest that Mint and Personal Capital is even remotely similar to the full functionality and features that Quicken provides.

Given the features that Quicken provides, and having tried the Personal Capital and Mint route -- and finding those fell well short of goal -- I would certainly buy Quicken today. I have tried every other option available to Quicken -- honestly I have as I kept looking for something that was "cheaper" and did the same thing. Never found it or anything that came close.

What Quicken seems to miss out on is actually selling the benefits of their software.

 

[Aerides]

For years I used a spreadsheet. Updated every paycheck. Now just use Fidelity full view. Never used quicken.

For the "youngs" if it's a free app, then maybe, but anything more than that is not going to be adopted.

 

[Ready]

I get your point... but let's not suggest that Mint and Personal Capital is even remotely similar to the full functionality and features that Quicken provides.

Agreed. But if you have never used Quicken you would not know this. And very few software applications that are used today are limited to just the Windows/Mac platforms. So it's not obvious to people who look to the App Store for their software that Quicken even exists.

Heck, if it were not for Quicken and Turbotax I probably would not own a Mac. Other than those 2 applications, everything I use runs on my iPad.

 

[cathy63]

Quicken missed a big opportunity when they failed to port their application to iOS and Android, or offering a web browser based option. Software that only runs in a Windows environment is losing popularity. And the Mac version is much weaker than the Windows version, and offers no integration with iOS or iCloud.

Mint and Personal Capital have become popular because they work in a standard web browser, but also have iOS and Android apps, making them accessible on any device.

If I had not already been a 20+ year Quicken user I doubt I would go out and purchase it now. I would probably go with Personal Capital and maybe use a spreadsheet to track certain things that Personal Capital can’t do on its own.

Quicken has had iOS, Android and Web based apps for years now. You can view all your data and enter transactions on your iPad or phone or browser and they sync to the desktop file. You just have to turn on the Mobile features in the desktop software to send all your data to the cloud. I prefer not to put my main data file out there, but I made a test file a couple of years ago and played with it for a couple of months to see if it might be worth turning on for when we are traveling without my laptop. The sync'ing worked fine, but I just didn't see enough benefits for my own situation so I haven't used it again.

I have also heard that since being spun-off from Intuit, Quicken has added a lot of features to bring the Mac version closer to the Windows version.

 

[Sunset]

When young I tried using various tools including quicken, but since I'm a natural born cheap person, there was no need as I always saved if possible.

I do now track my spending (thanks to this forum) via a phone app, which I monthly spend 5 minutes transferring to a spreadsheet, and a yearly net asset counting which takes 1 hour.

So my total time spent tracking expenses and money is less than 4 hours per year.

I took some basic accounting courses, and for my personal usage, that is just too heavy and unnecessary.

 

[Cobra9777]

DS uses Mint. It's basically an online version of Quicken, which seems to be geared toward young people with an emphasis on budgeting. I don't know how often he looks at it or updates anything. But he told me he likes it and it works well for him.

DD has a budget spreadsheet that I initially set up for her when she got out of college. She still uses it and has made a lot of changes to customize it over the years. She doesn't track balances though, just cash in and cash out, against a budget.

I used Quicken for 10+ years, but stopped around 2009-10. I remember constantly searching for workarounds and solutions to bugs that never got fixed in a timely manner. It just felt like it was more effort than it was worth. Plus, it wasn't really relevant to how my process had changed over the years, which included a lot more real-time tracking, automatic bill-pays, no check register to reconcile, push notifications, etc.

Today, I use Fidelity Full View to automatically accumulate transactions and balances. The only thing I do is check the spending category assignments from time to time. I transfer monthly summary data into Excel, which is where I do most long-term tracking and analysis. But even that has become more ad-hoc over the years since retirement.

 

[TDub]

Personal Capital is very popular with the young crowd because it's free, intuitive, and not nearly as labor intensive as other programs.

I started tracking expenses in a good old fashioned notebook about 10 years ago. Then I moved to excel, but the data entry was still time intensive. I've been on Personal Capital for the past 2 years and there's no looking back. I'm 34 and my peers and the younger bucks love either Mint or PC.

 

[Montecfo]

Personal Capital is very popular with the young crowd because it's free, intuitive, and not nearly as labor intensive as other programs.

I started tracking expenses in a good old fashioned notebook about 10 years ago. Then I moved to excel, but the data entry was still time intensive. I've been on Personal Capital for the past 2 years and there's no looking back. I'm 34 and my peers and the younger bucks love either Mint or PC.

Good to have your perspective. These days I feel like Quicken wants to do more than I want it to, but do not see an alternative (many threads on this topic).

I used SigFig for a while for investment tracking but did not find I enjoyed having my logins exposed potentially. Like Cathy, I use the desktop version of Quicken just for security.

It sounds like you (and perhaps others) see security concern as a fair tradeoff for convenience?

 

[TDub]

Good to have your perspective. These days I feel like Quicken wants to do more than I want it to, but do not see an alternative (many threads on this topic).

I used SigFig for a while for investment tracking but did not find I enjoyed having my logins exposed potentially. Like Cathy, I use the desktop version of Quicken just for security.

It sounds like you (and perhaps others) see security concern as a fair tradeoff for convenience?

At least for me, I trust Personal Capital's encryption capability (AES-256) as much as one can trust an encryption system. An online presence always comes with some risk, but in PC's case it is still pretty low. Broadly speaking, I believe many younger folks' have a decent level of trust when it comes to using these programs.

 

[JRon]

We use Banktivity for Mac and IOS. It’s pretty much a Quicken clone, but based on reviews much better in the Apple world.

 

[teej1985]

My dad has used Quicken since the 90s. He's inputting stuff all the time.

I have used Mint for a couple years. I check once at the end of the month and recategorize as needed....

 

[Zona]

15+ years of Quicken data here. I like the Lifetime Planner feature and ease of reporting. We use it to track all assets and spending, but I only link credit cards (track investment accounts transactions manually). We prefer to run it locally on the pc with periodic backups to local drive, not cloud storage. We will discontinue using it if it ever becomes a cloud-only platform. It may sound overly paranoid, but I do not want my entire financial snapshot with account data residing in one place in Intuit’s cloud.

 

[aaronc879]

I wouldn't even consider paying for Quicken. I just started using Personal Capital and like it and will continue using until I find a better free option.

 

[brett]

Never used Quicken or any other personal financial software for day to day. I did start using a retirement software package in my late forties.

 

[Markola]

I’ve been very happy with You Need A Budget (YNAB).

I also use Personal Capital for seeing all of my bank and investment accounts in one place, plus I like their very easy to use Retirement Planner. Serious retirement and investment management is done with our assigned Vanguard rep on their proprietary software.

 

[cathy63]

I’ve been very happy with You Need A Budget (YNAB).

I also use Personal Capital for seeing all of my bank and investment accounts in one place, plus I like their very easy to use Retirement Planner. Serious retirement and investment management is done with our assigned Vanguard rep on their proprietary software.

Just curious, do you pay for YNAB? I looked it up a while ago and was quite surprised to find that it costs more than Quicken.

 

[Markola]

Just curious, do you pay for YNAB? I looked it up a while ago and was quite surprised to find that it costs more than Quicken.

$45/year, which I am very happy to pay, because my use of that software and their process since about 2012 has saved me thousands and thousands of $ and allowed me a tremendous level of cashflow clarity and control.

 

[bobandsherry]

$45/year, which I am very happy to pay, because my use of that software and their process since about 2012 has saved me thousands and thousands of $ and allowed me a tremendous level of cashflow clarity and control.

They are now $84/yr or $11.99/mo.

https://www.youneedabudget.com/pricing/