How to keep track of it all

MaxiRobriguez

fin_ said:

Does that sound interesting to anyone?

Honestly - no.

Those who are adept at forecasting don't need it, and those that aren't will get a similar service from other providers which have been around longer.

I don't think you're onto a eureka moment here sadly.

Linton

AlanP_2 said:

Linton said:

AlanP_2 said:

I use MSMoney to track all our accounts - current / savings / mortgage / investments & DC pensions.

Downside is you need to record financial transactions to make it accurate, so every card or cash spend gets logged. Upside is you can allocate each spend , or even each item, to different expenditure classifications so you know what you are spending on what and there are a range of reports you can run including Nett Worth or the data can be exported to Excel.

It isn't much help in terms of "future pension" situation, so I use Excel for that. A paid for alternative is RetireEasy.

I retired on the basis of MS Money's Lifetime Planner and it's still my day-to-day tool for setting the budget and reviewing progress.  I pay for almost everything with a debit card and so full bank transactions can be downloaded and mostly automatically classified.  The Gaiersoft software is used to load shares and fund prices from an FT portfolio,  Updating is semi-automatic and only takes a few minutes daily for investment prices and weekly for expenditure.

I also run a complex spreadsheet model (it includes detailed and accurate tax calculations) but this is only updated annually at the end of the tax year.

My version is the basic one so no Planning tools.

Are you sure about this?  I run the final UK release as downloadable from here.  If you click on Planning or on PlanningHome, yes, you go to the MSN webpage.  However if you click the customise toolbar/shortcuts icon you have the option of including the "Lifetime Planner" in the toolbar.  That works fine for me.

[Deleted User]

fin_ said:

This thread is gold!
I'm new to the forum and joined to run a survey to understand better how people solve this exact problem!
I've been using a custom spreadsheet for a while but find it so cumbersome to keep track of all the changes happening, not to mention doing any "what if" modelling.
I'm thinking of building an app that would easily show all your savings, loans and investments across different banks and providers and would also show what you're likely to have several years from now. 

In later stages, the app could allow you to simulate different scenarios like what would happen if you change your pension contribution and maybe even have an element of financial education bordering on financial advice by recommending more tax-efficient ways to save money like ISAs and other government schemes. 

Does that sound interesting to anyone?

Interesting to a bunch of companies already doing it
Some examples 
https://www.altfi.com/article/6692_here-are-the-uks-top-5-open-banking-providers

AlanP_2

Linton said:

AlanP_2 said:

Linton said:

AlanP_2 said:

I use MSMoney to track all our accounts - current / savings / mortgage / investments & DC pensions.

Downside is you need to record financial transactions to make it accurate, so every card or cash spend gets logged. Upside is you can allocate each spend , or even each item, to different expenditure classifications so you know what you are spending on what and there are a range of reports you can run including Nett Worth or the data can be exported to Excel.

It isn't much help in terms of "future pension" situation, so I use Excel for that. A paid for alternative is RetireEasy.

I retired on the basis of MS Money's Lifetime Planner and it's still my day-to-day tool for setting the budget and reviewing progress.  I pay for almost everything with a debit card and so full bank transactions can be downloaded and mostly automatically classified.  The Gaiersoft software is used to load shares and fund prices from an FT portfolio,  Updating is semi-automatic and only takes a few minutes daily for investment prices and weekly for expenditure.

I also run a complex spreadsheet model (it includes detailed and accurate tax calculations) but this is only updated annually at the end of the tax year.

My version is the basic one so no Planning tools.

Are you sure about this?  I run the final UK release as downloadable from here.  If you click on Planning or on PlanningHome, yes, you go to the MSN webpage.  However if you click the customise toolbar/shortcuts icon you have the option of including the "Lifetime Planner" in the toolbar.  That works fine for me.

Well I never knew that as they say!  Thanks

Sailtheworld

I've used Quicken since 1996 and logged every transaction since whether it be investment, asset, saving, spending or mortgage. It hasn't been supported in the UK since 2004 which means I have to enter stock prices manually but as I only have a handful of shares it's not that big a deal. Increasing net worth is my main focus and having everything in one place and software with more than enough reporting functionality makes this a doddle.

Quicken also has planning functionality but I prefer to use a spreadsheet for retirement planning as I find it better to run 'what if' functions such as what if standard deviation of returns was 10%, 15% etc. or what if investment return was 4%, 6% and so on. As each year passes I update it with end of year values and reassess some of the assumptions I've made about the future.

I converted to MS Money when Quicken stopped UK support but couldn't get on with it (mainly it didn't chart net worth how I wanted) so went back to Quicken and started using the US version. Now on the 2017 version and will probably stay on this as Quicken have been sold and the new owners are trying to move to a business model which involves an annual fee rather than one-off purchase.

cloud_dog

Linton said:
I retired on the basis of MS Money's Lifetime Planner and it's still my day-to-day tool for setting the budget and reviewing progress.  

Not wishing to come across as all wide eyed and bushy-tailed innocent but... Gosh, I had forgotten MS Money had that feature.  Have just found it in shortcut customisation and will have a play.

Fphelp123

thanks for the replies. Is MS money still available I couldn’t find it anywhere. I am going to look into all of the suggestions I have created a basic spreadsheet but am not so hot on getting all of the formulas to work for projecting the various pension scenarios. It has helped me realise I’m doing okay in terms of overall worth having got my debt down. 

cloud_dog

Hi

I've got a copy of the last UK version of MS Money.  If you google for it you are likely to find the Sunset version which is very much US focussed.  I'll PM you a link if you want, to download and have a play. 

Linton

Fphelp123 said:

thanks for the replies. Is MS money still available I couldn’t find it anywhere. I am going to look into all of the suggestions I have created a basic spreadsheet but am not so hot on getting all of the formulas to work for projecting the various pension scenarios. It has helped me realise I’m doing okay in terms of overall worth having got my debt down. 

See my post near the top of this page.

Sailtheworld

Fphelp123 said:

thanks for the replies. Is MS money still available I couldn’t find it anywhere. I am going to look into all of the suggestions I have created a basic spreadsheet but am not so hot on getting all of the formulas to work for projecting the various pension scenarios. It has helped me realise I’m doing okay in terms of overall worth having got my debt down. 

Lars Kroijer has a video playlist on Youtube which takes you through how to build a financial planning spreadsheet. I incorporated some of the ideas into my existing spreadsheet.

Worth a watch - if nothing else it'll help you brush up your Excel skills https://youtu.be/1LUIQa5hgMg