YNAB...ing my way to freedom!

SuperFrank88

Dandytf said:

Hi mser's
Is everyone paying fort YNAB.
It went quite expensive, the last time I checked.
Though have some basic use form the original free version.

Hi @Dandytf
I am currently on the free year of student membership but I will definitely be paying the fee when the time comes around. I think the amount it saves me by keeping everything organised makes it so worth it...for me anyway  

Dandytf

SuperFrank88 said:

Hi @Dandytf
I am currently on the free year of student membership but I will definitely be paying the fee when the time comes around. I think the amount it saves me by keeping everything organised makes it so worth it...for me anyway  

Whilst I appreciate YNAB does work over considerable time.
I'ts not for me 64 pounds per year.
Guess it's mse excel budgets.
Which I don't mind only update it if any income or Spending changes.
thanks anyway.

joedenise

I don't pay for YNAB - I'm still using the old YNAB4 which I bought outright in, I think, 2014 which cost IIRC £60.  Unfortunately they stopped supporting it in 2016 so as long as it's still working I'm using it.  If it stops working then I think it will be back to Excel!  I don't think I want to be spending out month after month for something I can use Excel for.

SuperFrank88

joedenise said:

I don't pay for YNAB - I'm still using the old YNAB4 which I bought outright in, I think, 2014 which cost IIRC £60.  Unfortunately they stopped supporting it in 2016 so as long as it's still working I'm using it.  If it stops working then I think it will be back to Excel!  I don't think I want to be spending out month after month for something I can use Excel for.

Maybe I need to learn how to use Excel  But then I think of the time I would have to invest to get anywhere near the algorithms that they use in the YNAB software. For £5 a month, my time is more valuable to me. Knew I should have listened in I.T in school 

greensalad

I'm a web developer and even I would still use YNAB over trying to recreate everything it can do in Excel. Excel formulas can only go so far.

newlywed

I am fully competent at excel but numerous attempts to budget always failed for me. With ynab I can have the same budget on my android phone, my iPad and web access on the laptop. Making it so much easier to track spending. The categories and multiple accounts make life so easy! Plus my rent is set up as a tracking account so I always know how much behind (or now thanks to ynab, ahead) I am with rent.

I pay for the full ynab. It has helped me save sooo much more money than the subscription cost. I did a free month to try it and immediately turned from an ever increasing overdraft to reducing my overdraft by £120.  Saved me loads in overdraft interest too! 

Actually, I am totally happy to pay antivirus costs to protect my PC and my data. I view it as the same thing, just ynab is protecting my finances!

joedenise

Maybe I'll change my mind in YNAB4 packs up!  You all seem to think it's worth the money but it seems a lot to me when I was given to understand when I bought mine back in 2014 that it would be a one off payment for life - well it turns out life meant the life the developers thought it SHOULD last rather than how long it COULD last!

Sarahwithlove

I'm also using ynab via student free period but I will be carrying it on. I find it so much easier then any spreadsheet I created. It's made me so much better with money and is worth every penny it will cost for the amount I have saved and managed to clear off my debt. 

Mx_Emmin

SuperFrank88 said:

Hi @Mx_Emmin, Thank you for subcribing. I have been a bit quiet of late but need to pull my finger out and get back to staying accountable by updating more often.

Definitely a great idea to build that EF fund first. Do you have a diary?

I do, yes the link is in my signature!  

~*~

The YNAB program/formula/method has worked wonders for me. but I understand the trepidation about the price - I felt the same way at first. 
 
I feel like I could build a knock-off YNAB in Excel if I dedicated a few weeks to it... but I would need to buy Excel first, it wouldn't be as user-friendly, would be a nightmare to use on my phone, and it would be so easy to accidentally delete a formula and crash everything, so.

greensalad

joedenise said:

Maybe I'll change my mind in YNAB4 packs up!  You all seem to think it's worth the money but it seems a lot to me when I was given to understand when I bought mine back in 2014 that it would be a one off payment for life - well it turns out life meant the life the developers thought it SHOULD last rather than how long it COULD last!

That's kinda fair enough though. You wouldn't buy a washing machine and expect to get the same parts to repair it in 50 years time. Technology moves on so fast that if companies had to support legacy systems forever they wouldn't be able to publish anything new and progress would halt.

Personally I have just found that the money YNAB helped me save (mainly by encouraging me not to spend or manage my money better) is far more than I've ever paid for the product. For example, in the first year of YNAB (I also had the one year free as a student) I managed to pay off interest-charging accounts AND save for necessities that normally would've forced me back into a debt lifestyle. I'm sure the money I've saved as a byproduct of YNAB is more than the £60 or so the product costs.