To manage your personal finances in this modern day and age is far more complicated compared to even just ten years ago. With technology comes convenience, speed, and accuracy; yet, it can also bring complication, information overload, and lack of control.
It is important to manage your personal finances well—and without the administrative hassles that go with it. This applies whether you are a simple Mr. and Mrs. Smith that merely want to get some advice on managing their investment, a person that needs to keep track of their spending habits, or a keen shopper battling to keep track of their loyalty cards.
We have explored the wonderful World Wide Web to see what is out there across the globe so that you can get ideas of how these technologies can help you become a better financially positioned person than before.
To know which app to use, you would need to know what it is you are trying to manage. Let’s explore the types of some of the personal finance apps.
Investment Management
- Personal Capital (Paid Service – USA)
- This Financial Management app is available for both desktops and smartphones. It is a paid app that was carefully designed to help you track your investments, assets, and savings in addition to your spending habits on your current accounts.
- According to Techradar, this app even helps you to set goals to see if you are on track for retirement and it tracks your current spending habits. It provides big picture dashboards to help you make changes are you go along.
- It even comes with an online advisory service for users that want to leave it to the experts when investing. Just be careful; there are charges involved. This is great for anyone in the U.S. that wants to get a better grip on their financial future.
- Buxfer (Paid Service – UK and Worldwide)
- This is a UK-based app that claims to manage about (USD) $2 trillion in wealth across a variety of funds. Access to this from outside the UK should be simple as it is a world leader in financial management. Just make sure you know what the limits are from wherever you want to send money to invest.
- It’s an online service that can sync with your banking details live or via a manual sync. It helps you to manage your investments, track your spending habits, and manage a personal budget. It has a pilot version that starts at an affordable rate up to a Pro version that unlocks a lot more features like online payments and forecasting tools that are way more comprehensive.
- 22seven (Free – Global)
- This is a free app that not only helps you manage your investments, but also your day-to-day spending with its great budgeting tools. It can link a long list of bank accounts, which then allows you to get a consolidated view and create a budget to track your spending.
- The investment piece is great, because it offers you a trusted list of options to invest your money online, with low fees and constant tracking capabilities. According to IOL, it not only links your bank accounts, but also credit and loyalty cards.
Spending Management (Helping You Stick to Your Budget)
- YNAB (Paid Service – Global)
- Some of us really need to be told what to do every step of the way. When you have a busy lifestyle, it can become hard to stay true to your goals and manage a budget that is realistic. YNAB’s primary objective is to help you curb overspending so that you don’t have to live paycheck to paycheck.
- Link the app with your banking information, enter what it is you earn, and list all the expenses you have (mortage/rrent, food, transport and phone bills, etc.). It gives you targets, warns you when you don’t stick to your budget, and even recommends a way to get back on track.
- It’s not solely aimed at managing your personal finances. It even helps small business owners to keep track of their finances.
- Money Dashboard (Free – World Wide)
- For the not so professional person out there, this is a great app to help you get started with good financial management. It’s free and will help you track your spending, with great statistics that are visually represented giving you a quick overall glance of your financial health/performance.
- It’s very safe and a read-only app that merely helps you to see where your money is going. So, don’t worry, this is merely for educational purposes.
- Other Alternatives
The golden rule here is that you are never too old to learn or to take control of your finances. A key to continued success is to also never become complacent. Always scour the web for reviews, latest trends, and new inventions. This will allow you to keep up with the best and avoid falling behind.
Don’t forget to use the budgeting features that your local bank’s online platform offers. Some people don’t have a long list of different financial services providers and would rather build a relationship with one bank. Many of them offer great tools to manage your finances and savings.
The best way is to start with something free and simple like 22seven and then see how you would like to continue.
