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Track your finance… for free!
Posted on January 15th, 2008 5 commentsWouldn’t you like to track all your assets? Wouldn’t you like to know how much you spent last month?
That too centrally, without having to juggle between several sheets and tools?
And wouldn’t you love it, if it is free?
Step aside Microsoft Money, Quicken, ( or our desi) Easylife!! GnuCash is here (www.gnucash.org).
I recommend that you visit the site immediately, download GNU Cash and then try it now!!!_________________________________________________________________________________Before you ask why, here is my list of pro’s:
- It is free.
- It is open source.
- Has a decent enough community size to keep it evolving into better versions.
- It works on Windows too.
- It uses double entry book keeping. So every single Rupee should match with an opposite entry. This means an almost 100% accuracy (discipline needed) in tracking your money.
- It uses a very intuitive interface if you are used to double entry book keeping.
- You can add as many sub accounts as you want.
- It handles mutual funds, stocks, banks, cash, bonds, loans, etc. And it tracks your income and expense too.
- Automatically can download stock prices from sites like Yahoo.
- You can schedule transactions like you SIP for mutual funds or even schedule your loan payment (it does the amortization itself). It beautifully handles the interest / capital portions on its own and credits / debits related accounts automatically.
- You can create an arrangement of accounts as you prefer.
- It follows a balance sheet approach of tracking finance.
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Well, any review is incomplete without talking about the shortcomings. So here are the cons!- The inbuilt reports seem to exclude a few accounts always. So the charts sometimes dont include all your assets. I think I am missing some trick here. Since I havent found it yet, I would put it under cons.
- It crashes once in a while. I can forgive that. After all, its free. (So I suggest that you click on save after every transaction).
- It may not be the best in terms of visual appeal. (Well, if you need visual appeal, I recommend you have a look at Priyanka Chopra rather. Leave poor souls like GNU Cash alone).
- I am not sure if it can update stock prices automatically for Indian stocks.
- Instead of creating a single database file, it creates a whole set of files.
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PS: I have experience using personal finance tracking software myself for 4 years now. I have used these tools for atleast some time in the past.
1. Quicken trial version
2. Microsoft money trial
3. Easy Life trial (Didn’t like this Indian based tool)
4. Other free tools like Turbo Cash, Ace Money Lite, Money Manager Ex.My experience is that either these tools are expensive or are incompetent. And hence I ended up using Excel sheets customized to my needs. But GNU Cash looks like a true bet!!
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Verdict:
GNU Cash is a great free financial tracking tool. It has its limitations. But it does its work very well.No related posts.
5 responses to “Track your finance… for free!”
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About GNU Cash I tried for a while, but as you said apart from visual appeal, it lacks simple interface for things which we are used in this modern world of Google!
I still would like to give it a try again, now that you have reminded us !
You could give it a try for http://www.buxfer.com..I have been using it for a year now & it works well if you like the online stuff ..But again it is only for managing income and expenses ..
I am still looking at software which will help me to manage the entire portfolio including automatic updates for MF NAVs, stock prices and multi-currency support
..I am a Maximizer based on this book which I read recently : http://www.amazon.com/Paradox-Choice-Why-More-Less/dp/0060005688enjoy!
sandeep -
Prem,
Try out the Equitymaster Portfolio Tracker/Personalfn.com (www.personalfn.com/ http://www.equitymaster.com) combo. You can create multiple accounts and it can support stocks, bonds, NSC’s, mutual funds, loans. It gives you a networth report and YTD returns on the stock and mutual fund investments. You can set reminders and map it to receive it on your email accounts.
I have been using Equitymaster Portfolio tracker for the last 4 years and I have been happy with that. I have been getting the reports to file the IT returns too.
The only catch is, its not free. It comes at a nominal cost of Rs300/- per annum, which I think is not a big amount.
regards
venkateswaran
http://www.venkateswaran75.blogspot.com -
@ Sandeep,
I have visited Buxfer previously, (I think it was your recommendation at my blog sometime ago). But it doesnt track anything apart from expenses..I am looking at a end to end finance tracker…and GNU cash is fabulous at it. It is powerful with its double entry book keeping. You have to balance accounts….. and that means your tracking is accurate!!
However, let me check Buxfer again to see if it has any updates.
@ Venkateswaran
I will definitely try to have a look at personalfn folio.
But does it
1. Track income and expenses?
2. Track your SIP investments automatically?
3. Amortize your loan into principal and interest and debit correct accounts (principal should be deducted from liability account and interest be added to Interest expenses)
4. Is it customizable like GNU Cash?If it does, I guess I wouldnt mind paying 300 PM. But since being online is a requisite, I would need to be really convinced to use it.
Thanks for your comments!!!
Regards
Prem -
nilesh February 6th, 2008 at 07:44
not a nerd!!
unzipped.
doesn’t it hav setup or .exe filesthere is a file install (notepad.)
thnx. -
Hi Nilesh,
Sorry, I didnt quite understand your question.Can you pls clarify what you meant?
Sorry for the trouble!Regards
Prem
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Sandeep January 18th, 2008 at 01:47