What free budgeting apps do you use? I’d like to be able to hook my bank account to it so I don’t need to put every transaction in. I know Everydollar is good, but it’s delayed. If it’s not free, what does it cost and can I do a one-time payment?
Can anyone tell me the downsides to Rocket Money? I usually never see Rocket Money suggested.
I do a zero dollar budget on pen and paper. I have envelopes and withdraw our paychecks weekly. I noticed that keeping the money in the account doesn’t stop me using it. So, I just withdraw it all and keep them separate for each payment.
I was using MoneyLover on Android; I liked it a lot. I never used the bank connection option, but it lets you connect to banks, maybe it has yours. Might be a paid feature. A year ago, I moved to Money Manager EX on PC; it’s open-source and more complete. I don’t think it connects to bank accounts, but it’s really easy to import files.
EveryDollar isn’t delayed but will only bring over transactions when they actually post to the account. So, some of that depends on the merchant closing out the transaction and your bank posting it. You won’t find an app with a bank connection that is free because the banks charge the apps for the connections.
GoodSteward.io is free and local only if you don’t mind manually adding transactions or importing them (in CSV, OFX/QFX, etc.) from your bank. It should have everything you’d need for budgeting, including a budget template builder and customizable categories. But if you’re looking for automated data syncing from your banks, you might be hard-pressed to find free apps. If you’re willing to try paid apps for bank sync without outrageous prices, the paid version of Good Steward is based on the number of institutions you connect with, starting at $4/month with a 30-day free trial without requiring a credit card. So give it a try if interested.
Empower is free and can link to bank and credit cards. I personally don’t like the interface for categorizing expenses, but I use it to collect all the transactions and export them into an Excel file for my budget.
Heron (https://heron.money/) does what you want, but it’s not free. Data aggregators like Plaid charge per bank connection, so running a connected app can get pretty pricey. That said, it’s USD $4/mo or CAD $5/mo. There’s also a yearly option for USD $39 or CAD $49. Either option allows you to connect as many bank accounts as you want. There’s a 30-day trial with no credit card required, so please create an account and check it out.
I have a free 30-day code for Monarch Money. My first month using it has been great; I wish I started sooner. It’s $75 Canadian per month if you want to continue.
YNAB is usually a fan favorite; $13/month.
Or $109 per year (USA). They offer 34 days free to try it out. You can get a year free if you’re a student. Highly recommend.
Do you want to use the method of past expenses tracking? This is nice if you want to check what you really spent compared to some pre-established goals. There’s also the option of not bothering with the tedious tracking of expenses and just focusing on future expected incomes/expenses. For the latter, there aren’t a lot of applications available, but there are some totally free, as you’re looking for.
Check out these resources to learn more about free and paid personal finance software and budgeting apps: Top Free Personal Finance Software - Unlock Your Financial Potentia - The Learning Page and Best Budgeting Apps for Young Adults to Achieve Financial Freedom - The Learning Page.
I use a spreadsheet (Apple Numbers). Transactions are imported from .csv transaction files downloaded from the bank.