Helpful Financial Products to Help with Budgeting

Recommended Financial Products

from Jason Price, jrp.com

One of the goals of this website is for me to share financial products or services that I’m a bag fan of and have personally used to manage our family finances.  I’ll also share a few here that come highly recommended from friends.  I’ve provided a brief description of each and a link to the website or page that provides more information.

Please note that I receive a commission if you sign up to use these products.  If that bothers you, just go to the website directly versus clicking my link.  But if that doesn’t bother you, click the link as it will help me keep my website running.  :-)

You Need a Budget – YNAB, or You Need a Budget, is my favorite budgeting software. It’s user friendly and provides a simple way of creating and tracking a budget each month. It’s also helpful to see spending trends from month to month so you can either manage your spending better or make sure your budget is realistic. YNAB also has an iPhone app so you can enter your spending and assign it to a budget category while on the go. This eliminates time in front of the computer and managing your budget at the end of each day.

Mvelopes Personal – A close runner up to YNAB, in my opinion, is Mvelopes Personal. Truthfully you can’t go wrong with either product. Both are based on the envelopes budgeting method. Mvelopes is an online tool and YNAB is desktop software. Mvelopes provides automatic downloading of your bank transactions whereas you enter transactions with YNAB (or upload from a bank file). Mvelopes is easy to use and also provides an iPhone app for mobile budgeting.

Manilla – I signed up for a free Manilla account to manage all of our bills and their due dates in one place. I’m also a big fan of going paperless and one of the agreements with Manilla is that you accept electronic statements for your accounts. Manilla provides a nifty iPhone app and alerts me when bills are due as well as provides the balances. I can visit one place to see all balances and review statements versions logging into AT&T, CitiCard, etc.. I can also manage all of my travel reward accounts.

Perkstreet Financial Checking Account – My wife and I share a joint online checking account and like Perkstreet because we’re rewarded with cash back when we use the credit card option vs debit when spending money from our account. You can earn up to 2% back each month (25% on PowerPerk Deals)! We’ve used our rewards to pay for groceries, clothes for the kids and eating out. Perkstreet is online, but you can visit many free ATMs to get access to your money 24/7.

Capital One 360 Savings Account – We also have a short-term savings account. Capital One 360, previously ING Direct, is an online savings account with a competitive rate. Savings rates aren’t great in general, but having such an account provides a great shield against yourself for saving money. We automatically transfer money from our checking once a month to our savings account. In doing so we aren’t tempted to spend it! Capital One also offers a very good children’s savings account option.

Sound Mind Investing Newsletter – I’ve been a subscriber to the Sound Mind Investing Newsletter, America’s premier Christian financial newsletter, several years now and continue to learn new tips and strategies every month. It’s tailored to the do-it-yourself investor and is based on Christian financial principles. In fact, I use the SMI investing strategy to manage my 401K and IRAs. Subscriptions are available online or in paper form. Each subscription also provides access to the SMI member’s blog which is updated with new content regularly.

The Crown Money Map – The Crown Money Map has become an important tool for our family. It provides our road map from both a practical and biblical standpoint to managing our finances. I love this tool because I’m able to focus my efforts one destination at a time and not become overwhelmed with things too far into the future, or out of my control. The Money Map is easy to use and similar to Dave Ramsey’s Baby Steps, helps you achieve your goals one step at a time.