I supported Macs & PCs for many years. My advice was always to choose your software first, and let that determine what OS you would use. I agree that Quicken for Windows has always been the better product.
If you have at least 8GB of ram, a copy of Windows 10 Home running in a VM should handle Quicken/Win. Parallels and VMWare are the leading VMs for Mac, but Virtual Box is free virtualization software that I used several years ago to run Win7/Quicken. https://www.virtualbox.org
Iāve got VMWare but would beed to buy a Windows license. Currently running it with an ancient Windows 2000 install I need for 1 single applicaiton fo the sheep association.
I use Virtual Box, but it takes forever to load when booting up Windows. Do you just run your Windows emulator all the time, or only when you need it?
If Win2K works for you, then by all means, keep using it.
My Win10 suggestion was based on my opinion that, for users who rarely use Windows, spending $95 for a copy of windows and $0 - $100 for virtualization software gives you a more reliable system than most of the sub $400 laptops on the market.
I purchased a $350 major brand laptop a few years ago as a backup at work, set it up, used it once, then put it in a cabinet. When I pulled it out a few months later for a routine test, it was DOA. IMO, the low end seems to have poor quality control.
I dumped Quicken and Windows a few years ago. Yes, as I recall, boot was slow but once it was running performance was satisfactory.
But in my case I only ran Quicken once or twice a month, so boot was not a factor.
Iāve found the money management features my bank offers is now all that I need. It allows me to track spending, etc. from multiple bank & credit card accounts, and I handle my investments separately using my advisors website & IOS app.
Iāll need Win 10 to run the latest version of Quicken for Windows anyway. I could add a Win 10 VM for Quicken alone if necessary.
Banktivity does just fine for mymoney management, track spending and business expenses/income stuff. Our problem is that there is no single finacial advisor so if we tried to manage investments using the tools each institution provides Iām logging in to a number of different places to see a piece of the data. I have no single place I can get an overview. Since accounts at each location are focused on different investments I need a way to see how the overall portfolio is performing and whether it as a whole needs rebalancing.
For the YNAB cult lol j/k but Iām a dedicated MINT user ā i never wanted to try YNAB (another subscription) but Iām wondering if anyone else transitioned from MINT - like what itās attraction to the app???
As I am sure has been outlined above, Mint and YNAB are very different tools.
Mint is great if you want to get a sense of where your money is going. How much is going to your groceries, or specific grocer? How much are you spending on this or that other thing? Mint is a great tool for getting that snap shot and see trends over time. Mint, for the most part, answers the question where does my money go?
YNAB is almost the inverse. YNAB helps you decide how much money gets spent where. How much of your pay cheque do you need to devote to electric, water, gas. How much do you want to set aside for meals out, or divert to a specific savings goal? YNAB, for the most part, answers the question where do I want to spend my money?
Now, they can actually work together. In YNAB, whenever you get money (e.g., a paycheque), you allot that money to a specific job (groceries, car repairs, saving up for a new iPad, etc). But how much do you spend per month (or week, or two weeks) on groceries? Ideally in YNAB youāre budgeting approximately the amount youāre likely to spend between now and your next paycheque, but most of us have no idea what that amount actually is. I know we didnāt. We under-budgeted by at least $200 for the first month of using YNAB. But, if youāve been using Mint, itās easy enough to just have it spit out a report for much you spent on groceries for a given period. BAM, a rough starting point for your groceries budget in YNAB!
I have used Moneywiz for years. It has some quirks to it but works well enough for my purposes. Available for iOS and Windows as well. I dislike them trying to push us into their subscription mode.
Iām looking for a way to set up pay checks in Banktivity. I must be missing something unless there isnāt a feature for it. Too much Quicken on the brain I think!
You can set it up. On desktop, go to the account where you paycheck is deposited. Select the paycheck deposit. Go to the transaction menu and select āMake Scheduled Transaction from Selection.ā From there you can set it up. If you have a paycheck where the deduction amounts vary between pay periods, set up a memorized transaction for each of those paychecks. If you need more details, the Banktivity 6 manual (which still holds true for Banktivity 7) has a good explanation with screenshots.
Just upgraded to Banktivity 7 and it seems to have fixed at least some of my issues with multiple investment accounts.
So Years ago I used Quicken on Windows then when I switched to a Mac actually still ran Fusion to be able to run the Windows version of Excel (Which was always ahead of the Mac version) the the Windows version of Quicken.
Quicken for the Mac was terrible for many years.
I tried YNAB but like many others have stated, it is buying in with their mindset and processes. I tried Bantivity but I think it did not handle multiple currencies well so I used Moneydance for a while.
Now it seems that Excel for Mac has come a great ways and so has Quicken for Mac. I am running Quicken 2019 for Mac and quite happy with it. I think there was some management changes and it seems that more effort is being put into the Quicken software.
Also I heard that Microsoft is now using the same base code for Office software.
So I am personally happy with using Excel and Quicken for Mac OS now
Thank you very much. Iāll give it a go tonight!
FWIW, those who want/appreciate a bucket approach to managing finances and who are for whatever reason less inclined to want to use YNAB, MoneyWell has been acquired by Diligent Robot.
Based on the recent spat of activity compared with the long period of nothing, we can hope for greater things ahead.
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JJW
Iām happy with Banktivity. Iāve used both Quicken and YNAB in the past. When YNAB changed from a application on my computer to web-based software, I was turned off. Banktivity seems to hit all the notes I like.
Iāve been using Moneydance for the last two years to track and categorise my spending. It is not the most elegant of apps, and Iām manually downloading account activity from my bank websites, but Iām very happy with its overall functionality.
Iāve used Banktivity, Ynab, and Moneywiz. I prefer Moneywiz especially the recent upgrade to version 3. Itās sync is perfect the apps are regularly updated with any new features. Itās rock solid; Iāve never lost data in any way.
We have just transitioned to YNAB and as others have mentioned it takes a while to āthinkā in the YNAB way but it has given me much more of a feeling of control over my finances and reduced mindless spending.
As a sidebar, I think the subscription fee is worth it for me personally just to get real tome help via chat with practically no wait. Amazing. I have Saas programs I pay a lot more for where support is much slower.
Same here. Just joined yesterday (still in the free trial).
Has an amazing user community. The Facebook group itself has over 37,000 members and appears moderated. Very active reddit group as well.
Unlike other financial apps Iāve used in the past, YNABās following feels āpositiveā about the product.