{"id":206,"date":"2006-10-15T16:35:00","date_gmt":"2006-10-15T16:35:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/74.53.225.194\/~story1\/mdmproofing\/iym\/weblog\/?p=206"},"modified":"2010-10-12T23:00:26","modified_gmt":"2010-10-13T04:00:26","slug":"how-i-manage-my-money","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.mdmproofing.com\/iym\/weblog\/2006\/10\/how-i-manage-my-money\/","title":{"rendered":"How I Manage My Money"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"note\"><b>Note:<\/b>  There&#8217;s a newer version of this post <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mdmproofing.com\/iym\/weblog\/2009\/01\/how-we-manage-our-money\/\">here<\/a>.<\/div>\n<p>Getting (and keeping) a grip on your finances isn&#8217;t an easy task. Every so often (like yesterday) a frazzled reader will ask, &#8220;How do <b>you<\/b> do it?&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Well, I&#8217;ll tell you.  My system works like this:<\/p>\n<h3>The Grand Overview<\/h3>\n<div style=\"float:right; margin:0 0 0 14px;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/quicken.intuit.com\/small_business.jhtml?priorityCode=3969702399&amp;kbid=6758&amp;img=quickenaugbanners\/9241-r1_q_hb_06_ws.jpg&amp;sub=\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/qbgdm.intuit.com\/affiliates\/2006\/quickenaugbanners\/9241-r1_q_hb_06_ws.jpg\" border=\"0\" \/><\/a><\/div>\n<p>I track all accounts, balances, and financial transactions in Quicken 2006 Premier Home &#038; Small Business. This is also where I categorize my past and current spending, as well as monitor my net worth, assets and liabilities, and investments. I also use it to track all my small-business (namingly, this website and my wife&#8217;s jewelry\/craft business) inflows, outflows, and accounts. Quicken is also a tremendous tool for handling all tax-related items and accounts. I use the heck out of it for this. Is Quicken pricey? Yes, the fancier versions can be. Does it require a fair bit of learning time? Yes, though this also depends on what version you get and what you want to use it for. Would I give it up? No way. Not a chance.<\/p>\n<h3>Monthly Spending Plan \/ Budget<\/h3>\n<p>For all that I love about Quicken, I absolutely despise its budgeting setup. It&#8217;s cluttered, nonsensical, and useless to me. So, to budget (as well as monitor in real time) my spending for each month, I use a slightly-modified version of my Excel Spending Plan (v2.0). You can download it from the near-bottom of my <a href=\"http:\/\/www.mdmproofing.com\/iym\/excel.shtml\">Excel financial spreadsheets<\/a> page. And more details can be found at my <a href=\"http:\/\/www.mdmproofing.com\/iym\/spendplan1.shtml\">Spending Plan<\/a> page.<\/p>\n<h3>Emergency Fund<\/h3>\n<p>I don&#8217;t have a specific spreadsheet that I use to track my <a href=\"http:\/\/www.mdmproofing.com\/iym\/emergency_fund.shtml\">Emergency Fund<\/a>. However, I do keep most of my E-fund (say, 90% of it) in its own account at <a href=\"http:\/\/www.mdmproofing.com\/iym\/reviews\/bankreview001_emigrant_direct.php\">Emigrant Direct (review)<\/a>. Any transactions that affect my Emergency Fund get logged\/tracked in Quicken, as noted above, and I can always see its balance right there in my Quicken toolbar.<\/p>\n<h3>Freedom Account<\/h3>\n<p>I use ExcelGeek&#8217;s <a href=\"http:\/\/www.mdmproofing.com\/iym\/products\/freedom-account\/\">Freedom Account spreadsheet<\/a> to track my Freedom Account and all its subaccounts and balances. I keep my Freedom Account funds at <a href=\"http:\/\/www.mdmproofing.com\/iym\/reviews\/bankreview002_ing_direct.php\">ING DIRECT (review)<\/a>, in an account that&#8217;s separate from everything else. If you&#8217;ve never heard of Freedom Accounts before, or if you&#8217;re just not sure what exactly they can do for you, head over and check out my <a href=\"http:\/\/www.mdmproofing.com\/iym\/freedom.shtml\">Freedom Account<\/a> page.<\/p>\n<p>What combination of software (and\/or notebook paper!) do <b>you<\/b> use?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Note: There&#8217;s a newer version of this post here. Getting (and keeping) a grip on your finances isn&#8217;t an easy task. Every so often (like yesterday) a frazzled reader will ask, &#8220;How do you do it?&#8221; Well, I&#8217;ll tell you. My system works like this: The Grand Overview I track all accounts, balances, and financial [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[67,65,16,64,66],"tags":[8,3,5,9],"class_list":["post-206","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-banking","category-budgeting","category-quicken-software","category-saving","category-spending","tag-budgeting","tag-quicken","tag-software","tag-spending"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.2 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>How I Manage My Money - Money Musings<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.mdmproofing.com\/iym\/weblog\/2006\/10\/how-i-manage-my-money\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"How I Manage My Money - Money Musings\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Note: There&#8217;s a newer version of this post here. Getting (and keeping) a grip on your finances isn&#8217;t an easy task. Every so often (like yesterday) a frazzled reader will ask, &#8220;How do you do it?&#8221; Well, I&#8217;ll tell you. My system works like this: The Grand Overview I track all accounts, balances, and financial [&hellip;]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.mdmproofing.com\/iym\/weblog\/2006\/10\/how-i-manage-my-money\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Money Musings\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2006-10-15T16:35:00+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2010-10-13T04:00:26+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/qbgdm.intuit.com\/affiliates\/2006\/quickenaugbanners\/9241-r1_q_hb_06_ws.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Michael\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Michael\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.mdmproofing.com\/iym\/weblog\/2006\/10\/how-i-manage-my-money\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.mdmproofing.com\/iym\/weblog\/2006\/10\/how-i-manage-my-money\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Michael\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.mdmproofing.com\/iym\/weblog\/#\/schema\/person\/9d5b5e0cd8c50c2ff0f4a1df112a5a42\"},\"headline\":\"How I Manage My Money\",\"datePublished\":\"2006-10-15T16:35:00+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2010-10-13T04:00:26+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.mdmproofing.com\/iym\/weblog\/2006\/10\/how-i-manage-my-money\/\"},\"wordCount\":404,\"commentCount\":10,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.mdmproofing.com\/iym\/weblog\/2006\/10\/how-i-manage-my-money\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"http:\/\/qbgdm.intuit.com\/affiliates\/2006\/quickenaugbanners\/9241-r1_q_hb_06_ws.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"Budgeting\",\"Quicken\",\"Software\",\"Spending\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Banking\",\"Budgeting\",\"Quicken\",\"Saving\",\"Spending\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.mdmproofing.com\/iym\/weblog\/2006\/10\/how-i-manage-my-money\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.mdmproofing.com\/iym\/weblog\/2006\/10\/how-i-manage-my-money\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.mdmproofing.com\/iym\/weblog\/2006\/10\/how-i-manage-my-money\/\",\"name\":\"How I Manage My Money - 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