I've looked into MoneyDance, Moneywell, Jumsoft's Money, YNAB, and so forth. I finally decided to give Quicken 2017 a chance and started diving in.
I've been using money management software going back to mid-90s versions of MS Money, so I'm really lost without it. Not that my finances are ridiculously complex, but just knowing at all times my checking balance, credit card balance, what I need to have in the bank to pay the next major bill, e.g., mortgage or car payment, and so forth. I can't just wing it anymore, there's far too much going on with my family's comings and goings to not have a complete picture. I also do not simply download transactions as I believe if you don't touch something it doesn't register, so everything I do, with the exception of investment price updates, is manual. I also don't want to be dependent on a network connection to see everything, which is why I'm against the online services.
So far, I have to say that Quicken 2017 isn't all that bad. It does not seem to be, in it's current version, geared towards a user who enters a lot of manual transactions. People like me don't care for using the mouse for every single transaction, we prefer keyboard shortcuts and the like. I think I've finally figured out the way to (mostly) use the keyboard only. Also, I had been using 2007 since 2010, so I had A LOT of transactions in my old file. Instead of simply converting, I wanted to start fresh, since neither 2017 or 2007 has a true archive feature, unlike MS Money, which had that since day 1.
Vs. Quicken 2007, I do like the fact that when you enter a new security it looks it up for you, and for your transaction you can just enter the symbol vs. typing out the security name. I also like that you can customize the columns in every register. You also don't need to know the entire path of the category when you enter. For example, if I want to enter a transaction as Groceries, I have that set up as "Food: Groceries," but instead of typing the entire string, you can just type groceries and it picks it up. That's a bigger timesaver than one might realize.
However, there are a few shortcomings for sure vs. 2007:
- After you enter a transaction it doesn't automatically default to starting a new transaction, you have to either enter new (via mouse or shortcut) or copy the transaction (via mouse or shortcut). These extra keystrokes/clicks are a pain. This is probably my #1 complaint.
- Changing the date on any transaction is not intuitive at all. There is still + or - functionality to quickly advance or go backwards a day, but say you wanted to change the date to months ago, you have to enter month SLASH day SLASH year vs. simply typing 080116 or similar (for August 1st 2016).
- Loan functionality is flat out terrible, from setup to payment entry. The setup allows for very little overrides of the calculated numbers so you end up with extra transactions in the pennies, and payment entry DOES NOT default a split between principal and interest, you have to enter those yourself, unless you want to schedule in advance the payments, which clogs up your account register. It also falls down when you set up a loan that's midstream, i.e., already has payments on it
- No consolidated view across all investment accounts, you have to look at each one separate, though you do have a list on the side of all accounts and their current values
- The font size is pretty large, which may look nice, but when you start to get a lot of transactions you want to see more on a particular screen vs. scrolling. I have to see if there's a way to shrink the font in the registers.
I'll probably just stick with Quicken for now. Hopefully they address some of these shortcomings.
