You need a budget (YNAB) advice thread

Glitzer

Happy new year!

So I've decided to start using YNAB4 now that Christmas is over and all the extra expense that brings. Plus it's a new year etc blah blah.

I've got YNAB4 as my trial is almost up and they only offer YNAB4 for free for students, not the new version.

Anyway... I'm a bit stuck as to what to do with everything. Basically, my husband gets paid weekly from his part time job, I get our tax credits and child benefit weekly and my ESA every fortnight. Some things we have to pay out weekly, some things fortnightly, some things monthly. Hopefully my husband will pass the DBS check which will enable him to be employed full time directly by the employer and come off the ESA completely, making it a little easier in terms of pay cycles at least.

Is anyone in a similar position with getting different pay cycles? I don't really know what to do. I've set up recurring payments (both inflow and outflow) so now it's looking like I have a lot more money than I have. Maybe I'm doing something wrong?

Also, I got given some cheques for Christmas, which I paid into the bank yesterday. That money clearly isn't actually available now but do I put them on then mark them as cleared next week or is it best to wait until they are actually cleared?

hiddenshadow

Glitzer wrote: »

Anyway... I'm a bit stuck as to what to do with everything. Basically, my husband gets paid weekly from his part time job, I get our tax credits and child benefit weekly and my ESA every fortnight. Some things we have to pay out weekly, some things fortnightly, some things monthly. Hopefully my husband will pass the DBS check which will enable him to be employed full time directly by the employer and come off the ESA completely, making it a little easier in terms of pay cycles at least.

Sounds like a time-based category organisation might be the best way to go. See here: http://classic.youneedabudget.com/support/article/budget-categories under "How should I organize my categories?" in the "Weekly" view.

Then when you get income (from whatever source) you budget down the list until you can't go any further because all your current money is budgeted.

Is anyone in a similar position with getting different pay cycles? I don't really know what to do. I've set up recurring payments (both inflow and outflow) so now it's looking like I have a lot more money than I have. Maybe I'm doing something wrong?

Setting up recurring payments is fine, but make sure that anything you don't want to "count" right now is in the Scheduled Transactions list, not the main Register at the top. (If you need to move something, check its tickbox and then in the Edit (1) Transaction menu at the top select either "Move to scheduler..." or "Enter in register now". Anything that's in the register will reflect on your budget screen (which can be handy - I have our DD for milk/egg delivery that will go out at the end of the month counting against our grocery budget now so that we know what we can spend when we go to A$DA).

Also, I got given some cheques for Christmas, which I paid into the bank yesterday. That money clearly isn't actually available now but do I put them on then mark them as cleared next week or is it best to wait until they are actually cleared?

I put them in immediately and clear them when the bank numbers update, but I'm also buffered so all my income goes to "Income for next month..." and it doesn't affect the current month's budget numbers. If you want to know exactly what you have on hand right now, I'd wait until they show up in your bank to enter them into YNAB (as technically the money hasn't "come in" until it's available to spend).

Hope that helps!

Pinkwhisk

I'm looking for help please! Thanks to this forum I've stumbled across YNAB. I'll start my free trail tomorrow. I just have a few questions:

1) from my understanding, as I'm new I would get the newest version of YNAB. I know I can buy from YNAB or stream. If brought from stream, is it still £30 p/y or is it £30 one off?

1A) am I best buying from them or stream?

2) I'm brand new to all this. We are entering into an iva and have a limited budget. Would this be the best management program I could get?

Thank you!

bobobski

Pinkwhisk wrote: »

I'm looking for help please! Thanks to this forum I've stumbled across YNAB. I'll start my free trail tomorrow. I just have a few questions:

1) from my understanding, as I'm new I would get the newest version of YNAB. I know I can buy from YNAB or stream. If brought from stream, is it still £30 p/y or is it £30 one off?

1A) am I best buying from them or stream?

2) I'm brand new to all this. We are entering into an iva and have a limited budget. Would this be the best management program I could get?

Thank you!

As of 30 December (the day I signed up by total coincidence!!) YNAB is now a subscription service. It used to be a $60 one-off cost (most recent incarnation called "YNAB4"). Now it is commonly known as "nYNAB" (new YNAB). nYNAB is an online version; YNAB4 was a programme you downloaded.

I very strongly recommend you attend the webinars - they are all very good. They'll teach you how to use the programme, they're free, and the teachers take audience questions. If they don't get time to answer yours, you can email them - they respond within a day or so (I've emailed them twice).

The price now is $50 per year or $5 per month, with a lifetime 5% discount if you sign up by the end of Jan.

I'm afraid I can't really help with your final question. I think you just need to find a solution that works for you. Hopefully a 34 day trial will be long enough for you to decide whether you get along with the software. I'm only on day 7 but I'm really enjoying it. I don't have debt personally (apart from a bit on credit cards I always pay off next month - YNAB is helping me get out of this habit!!) but YNAB has built in systems to help you see what your debt is and how to pay it off. One of the webinars is explicitly all about debt and how to "account" for it.

Have fun playing with it, definitely attend the webinars as soon as you can, but remember it only works if you actually keep it up to date. There's a free app for Android and iOS to help with this.

P.S. I don't work for them and only heard of them last week, but I have spent so much time watching webinars and reading around their website I feel like I should be offered a job!!

bobobski

Oh one more thing: pre-nYNAB users will tell you nYNAB is awful and YNAB4 was *amazing* etc. I never used YNAB4 and do not feel that nYNAB is missing anything. You can still buy YNAB4 (through Steam, for example) but I would recommend you don't. At the end of the year they will stop supporting YNAB4 which may mean that bugs get into the software sooner or later. nYNAB is web-based so you can access it from anywhere, and it has an app so I mean anywhere. And why go against the tide when you don't have YNAB4-prejudices?

Then again, the monthly subscription fee is putting a lot of people off nYNAB. But then again (again), it's about £3 per month.

La_escocesa

Hi Pinkwhisk,

It looks like you can get the older version (YNAB4) on Steam for a one-off £30.

The new version (from them) is the one that's £5 a month or £50 a year.

There seems to be a 'download demo' option on steam so maybe you could trial both versions and see which you prefer...?

I've no idea if it's the best you could get (it's the only one I've tried...) but I love it and it's helped us so much. It's so clear to see where everything is and where it is going to.

HTH.

Pinkwhisk

Thank you for you reply - I'll get onto the webinars and the free trail then decide once that's over with, thank you!

bobobski

La_escocesa wrote: »

Hi Pinkwhisk,

It looks like you can get the older version (YNAB4) on Steam for a one-off £30.

The new version (from them) is the one that's £5 a month or £50 a year.

HTH.

A little misleading to quote correct figures for YNAB4 in GBP and incorrectly insert GBP for USD for nYNAB figures but I'm sure it wasn't intentional I checked with YNAB and the only payment option for nYNAB is in USD so GBP equivalents will fluctuate over time. However, you can buy YNAB4 in GBP.

hiddenshadow

bobobski wrote: »

The price now is $50 per year or $5 per month, with a lifetime 5% discount if you sign up by the end of Jan.

The discount is 10%, not 5%. (I believe it also only applies to the annual price, so you couldn't lock in 10% off the monthly price.)

Oh one more thing: pre-nYNAB users will tell you nYNAB is awful and YNAB4 was *amazing* etc. I never used YNAB4 and do not feel that nYNAB is missing anything. You can still buy YNAB4 (through Steam, for example) but I would recommend you don't.

I would actually argue the opposite. If you buy YNAB4 you get 11 months free for nYNAB, so essentially you pay £30 for 1 year of the new and permanent access to the old. If you decide you prefer the old, you have it, if you decide you prefer the new, you haven't lost anything (may have even gained, depending on the exchange rate).

Otherwise, yes, definitely recommend the webinars. It takes a while to get used to the mindset but knowing that the money you're spending is planned and matches up to your priorities (whatever they may be) has been life-changing for me.

Pinkwhisk

I've taken the plunge! Well, the free trail anyway, am taking the webinars tonight too - I hope I like it, even though it costs!