Money management question....debate at home!

Elizabeth_C34

Thanks everyone for the responses! Looks like I should climb out of my cave and maybe give it up! I like the idea of an excel spreadsheet, but don't know if I could maintain it.

Thanks for the tips, my boyfriend will be glad to hear he won this debate! lol

If you are diligent enough to maintain a check register, you're diligent enough to maintain an excel spreadsheet. Honestly though, I don't know why you'd need to do either. Check with your bank and look into what online resources they have for budgeting and apps. There are some really good ones out there that will make money management much easier.

johnwhitent

I'm an accountant. And I don't keep a check register of any kind.

Ditto. I do go online almost every day to look at my accounts.

Same here. My wife maintains her own account and spends hours playing with it, reconciling it, and moving everything to Excel to budget. She is old school with pencil and paper. I use Quickbooks and check activity online daily. Reconciling takes me less than two minutes at the end of the month while my wife struggles with papers all over the place, calculators, pencils rolling around for the dogs to snatch; way to much work for me!

Jazzyjules71

I haven't used a check register in a long time - but I almost never write checks anymore. Used Quicken for many years, but finally decided its budgeting functions were too weak. Tried Mint, but don't like its budgeting any better. Now I use YNAB (You Need a Budget), which is the best budgeting software available, IMHO.

Yeah, we had been using YNAB also and love it. Just had a hard time keeping up with it. It was sort of tedious to input transactions and I've fallen away from it. Of course it might not be so tedious if I also give up my check register so I'm not double entering! I love the envelope system concept.....

flyingwrite

Thanks everyone for the responses! Looks like I should climb out of my cave and maybe give it up! I like the idea of an excel spreadsheet, but don't know if I could maintain it.

Thanks for the tips, my boyfriend will be glad to hear he won this debate! lol

If you are diligent enough to maintain a check register, you're diligent enough to maintain an excel spreadsheet. Honestly though, I don't know why you'd need to do either. Check with your bank and look into what online resources they have for budgeting and apps. There are some really good ones out there that will make money management much easier.

It's really not as difficult as it sounds. Once it's set up for the year (takes about an hour at most), then, it takes maybe 1-2 minutes a day to maintain, if that. No spending, no maintenance.

Elizabeth_C34

Thanks everyone for the responses! Looks like I should climb out of my cave and maybe give it up! I like the idea of an excel spreadsheet, but don't know if I could maintain it.

Thanks for the tips, my boyfriend will be glad to hear he won this debate! lol

If you are diligent enough to maintain a check register, you're diligent enough to maintain an excel spreadsheet. Honestly though, I don't know why you'd need to do either. Check with your bank and look into what online resources they have for budgeting and apps. There are some really good ones out there that will make money management much easier.

It's really not as difficult as it sounds. Once it's set up for the year (takes about an hour at most), then, it takes maybe 1-2 minutes a day to maintain, if that. No spending, no maintenance.

I use my debit card constantly, so I doubt it would be a small task for me to maintain a manual spreadsheet of expenses. Plus, everything I charge to my account, I keep track of on my phone app which links directly to my bank account so I can immediate see and review charges without manually entering anything. It even gives me a detailed expense report at the end of the month so I can look ensure that it went as budgeted. I can even dispute them if they come up erroneously right from the app. I've had issues with identity theft like you in the past, but my bank caught it before I did (I was at work at the time and couldn't check it) and resolved it within 24 hours. For my purposes, the idea of manual spreadsheet tracking of expenses seems like a huge waste of time and very inefficient. My husband and I track our investments and trading accounts this way too, and it's great.

There's some great technology out there that makes life easier than doing it all manually these days. It's good to at least know about it.

amymeenieminymo

I do, but not in the traditional sense. Up until about a year ago still used the check register but now I use a spreadsheet to keep track of our spending. I do it because we have combined finances and we have different things to spend money on. For example say we have $3000 in our checking account.....well $800 of that might be money I have set aside to pay my car payment each month, 100 might be my husband's overtime money that we try not to spend on bills if we can help it, 500 might be money we are saving for household fixes and 1000 might be money specifically to cover bills, etc.

I can't fathom just having one pot of money and haphazardly spending out of it and not knowing if there is enough money to pay bills. I've never really looked into budgeting software, it may do exactly what I do on the spreadsheet only easier.....I guess I should look into it. I'm lucky that my husband wants no part of handling the finances so I can be as anal and organized as I want.

cabaray

I'm an accountant. And I don't keep a check register of any kind.

Me too!

flyingwrite

Thanks everyone for the responses! Looks like I should climb out of my cave and maybe give it up! I like the idea of an excel spreadsheet, but don't know if I could maintain it.

Thanks for the tips, my boyfriend will be glad to hear he won this debate! lol

If you are diligent enough to maintain a check register, you're diligent enough to maintain an excel spreadsheet. Honestly though, I don't know why you'd need to do either. Check with your bank and look into what online resources they have for budgeting and apps. There are some really good ones out there that will make money management much easier.

It's really not as difficult as it sounds. Once it's set up for the year (takes about an hour at most), then, it takes maybe 1-2 minutes a day to maintain, if that. No spending, no maintenance.

I use my debit card constantly, so I doubt it would be a small task for me to maintain a manual spreadsheet of expenses. Plus, everything I charge to my account, I keep track of on my phone app which links directly to my bank account so I can immediate see and review charges without manually entering anything. It even gives me a detailed expense report at the end of the month so I can look ensure that it went as budgeted. I can even dispute them if they come up erroneously right from the app. I've had issues with identity theft like you in the past, but my bank caught it before I did (I was at work at the time and couldn't check it) and resolved it within 24 hours. For my purposes, the idea of manual spreadsheet tracking of expenses seems like a huge waste of time and very inefficient. My husband and I track our investments and trading accounts this way too, and it's great.

There's some great technology out there that makes life easier than doing it all manually these days. It's good to at least know about it.

My situation is just different. I don't even have a debit card. As I mentioned, I only make payments out of my actual bank account 3 or 4 times a month at the most. Sounds like the app works well for you!

cabaray

My online banking system updates immediately. On the rare occasion I do write a check, I just mentally deduct it until it clears. I pay all of my bills online on the same day. Some get paid early, but never late. I put the bill money into a savings account when I get paid, transfer it to checking at the time I pay the bill and then know that whatever is in checking outside that time frame is spending money. As far as my husband goes, he's screwed if anything happens to me. He doesn't even know the name of our electric company. Half of the bill money direct deposits into my account from his paycheck. He hasn't had to physically pay a bill in the 14 years we have been married.

cabaray

Yes, we do have separate accounts but they are in both of our names. It works for us.

So do we. My husband would take $20 here or $40 there and next thing I knew, there was nothing left. He is just the kind of person that can't use a debit card without going broke. His half of the bills deposits into my account, he gets a live check for the rest and handles cash.

Jazzyjules71

Great feed back everyone!

And I'm glad to know there are people out there happily married that don't agree on money all the time. Sometimes I forget that you can still "agree to diseagree" and either separate accounts, or one person do it all.

Elizabeth_C34

Great feed back everyone!

And I'm glad to know there are people out there happily married that don't agree on money all the time. Sometimes I forget that you can still "agree to diseagree" and either separate accounts, or one person do it all.

My husband and I have several accounts including personal accounts. Our joint account is exclusively for the mortgage and household bills. Our personal accounts are for our work-related or personal expenses. This works really well for us. We both like to have our independent purchases. For me, it's my Coach bags when I save up enough for them, and for him, it's his gaming stuff. I think it's healthy to have your own money in a marriage to do with what you want (within reason of course). We also have joint investment and savings accounts. We have our separate retirement accounts as well.

Elizabeth_C34

Thanks everyone for the responses! Looks like I should climb out of my cave and maybe give it up! I like the idea of an excel spreadsheet, but don't know if I could maintain it.

Thanks for the tips, my boyfriend will be glad to hear he won this debate! lol

If you are diligent enough to maintain a check register, you're diligent enough to maintain an excel spreadsheet. Honestly though, I don't know why you'd need to do either. Check with your bank and look into what online resources they have for budgeting and apps. There are some really good ones out there that will make money management much easier.

It's really not as difficult as it sounds. Once it's set up for the year (takes about an hour at most), then, it takes maybe 1-2 minutes a day to maintain, if that. No spending, no maintenance.

I use my debit card constantly, so I doubt it would be a small task for me to maintain a manual spreadsheet of expenses. Plus, everything I charge to my account, I keep track of on my phone app which links directly to my bank account so I can immediate see and review charges without manually entering anything. It even gives me a detailed expense report at the end of the month so I can look ensure that it went as budgeted. I can even dispute them if they come up erroneously right from the app. I've had issues with identity theft like you in the past, but my bank caught it before I did (I was at work at the time and couldn't check it) and resolved it within 24 hours. For my purposes, the idea of manual spreadsheet tracking of expenses seems like a huge waste of time and very inefficient. My husband and I track our investments and trading accounts this way too, and it's great.

There's some great technology out there that makes life easier than doing it all manually these days. It's good to at least know about it.

My situation is just different. I don't even have a debit card. As I mentioned, I only make payments out of my actual bank account 3 or 4 times a month at the most. Sounds like the app works well for you!

Ah okay. I missed the no-debit-card thing. Sounds like your system is good for you then too.

Hellbent_Heidi

Excel spreadsheet here, and I keep it on a USB so I can update it at work or at home.

Separate accounts is great if you have different systems for managing your money (and save you from a lot of arguments).

Another benefit to separate accounts is something I just found out a couple of months ago. It will save the day if your debit card or bank account information gets hacked. My card number was hacked, and at least we weren't BOTH financially paralyzed while waiting for it to be resolved and getting a new card issued.

amymeenieminymo

Excel spreadsheet here, and I keep it on a USB so I can update it at work or at home.

Separate accounts is great if you have different systems for managing your money (and save you from a lot of arguments).

Another benefit to separate accounts is something I just found out a couple of months ago. It will save the day if your debit card or bank account information gets hacked. My card number was hacked, and at least we weren't BOTH financially paralyzed while waiting for it to be resolved and getting a new card issued.

I thought this was my comment at first, I also keeo our finances on a spreadsheet and save it to a flash drive....I mostly do our finances at work since I don't have an adding machine at home, but this way I don't have to save personal financial info on my work computer and if I need the info at home I always have the flashdrive with me.

Krissy366

Now I use YNAB (You Need a Budget), which is the best budgeting software available, IMHO.

Completely agree.