Mint Money Management Tool
I am horrible when it comes to money management!
Seriously – everything I touch could turn to debt if I let it. Fortunately for me, I have a husband who is very financially savvy and he handles all things concerning money in our house.
Part of what has overwhelmed me about money management is that all the information resides in so many different places. And there are so many choices with what bills to pay when, or what sort of savings plans to use where.
It baffles me!
This web-based tool called Mint seems right up my alley.
Mint is super easy to set up. You sign up with an email address (you can remain otherwise anonymous). Then you add your login information for any accounts you want to view collectively within Mint.
Then, according to Mint, it does the rest. It categories your expenses and savings, gives you recommendations, sends alerts on suspicious activity. People I know who have used Mint tell me that it’s not quite as automated as that. There’s still some manual categorizing that needs to be done each month, but it’s a lot less than doing it all on your own.
And apparently, you can sit there and let it do all of the work while you make plans for a fabulous vacation with all the money you’ll save.
Mint also suggests credit cards or banks that fit best with your financial profile. That’s a cool feature, since wading through the choices on that stuff can be numbing at best.
Mint allows you to set goals for particular tasks – say, a trip you want to take or for eliminating an item of debt – and tracks your progress. Plus, it gives you recommendations on how to reach your goals faster.
What’s the hitch?
This service is free on top of it all?
I’m not sure how they do that.
The one thing that made me nervous about Mint is security of my data. I read up extensively on their data practices here. I like that there are no money transfers within Mint – it’s read-only, so that made me a little less squeamish. Anonymous registration helps – you don’t give them any personally identifiable information. Also, Mint is now owned by Intuit, makers of Quicken software, so there’s a big company behind it.
But I’m still a little bit nervous about it. Which makes me feel like an old person.
Anyway, if you want to go check out this service you can sign up for free at Mint.
They make money management almost seem…friendly. And fun!
