Keeping track

Linton

droopsnoot said:

I'm also using MS Money, currently the 2000 version but I did download the last UK version, just not got around to trying it yet. There was someone on here developing a similar thing but I've not had chance to try it out. There are things I don't like about MS Money, but not enough to try to get years of data across into something new, even though I think most of them have import routines. I've never had it set up to download anything from banks automatically, which I think is the thing that most people complain about having stopped working - I don't have enough transactions to make it too much of a problem to just type them in.

I have used MsMoney since 1999 for all my finances.

 Both Santander and NatWest (and no doubt many other banks) can export OFX files which can be read by MsMoney. I dont believe importing directly was ever available in the UK.

The key feature of MS Money for me is the tight integration between investments and cash accounts.  The detailed configurable reports, again covering both cash transactions and investment data, are also important. I dont know of any other packages that do this.  Can anyone recommend one?

cloud_dog

I've always wanted an app version that simply mirrored MS Money.  All the apps I have tried wanted to take over my financial life in one way or another, so have just kept running with MSM.

trance

refluxer said:

trance said:

I'm not that good on excel - I have columns for where the money is, another column noting interest rates, but not much else.   I'd like one that could calculate how much interest I should be getting etc.

That's actually an easy one - if you've got a column populated with AER data and a column populated with your account balances then all you have to do is create a new column for 'Expected interest PA' and multiply those two columns together.

To do this - in the top results cell of your new column, type equals (=), click in the first cell in the AER column, then asterix (*) and click in the first cell in the balance column, then hit the Enter/Return key. If you do this for the top entry in your table, then you can select the cell, grab the + symbol in the bottom right-hand corner, drag that downwards and it should populate the values below with the correct formulae and data.

To avoid having to continually type % or £ (etc) and also to ensure that Excel treats the data correctly, then make sure you format the columns appropriately - just note that if you already have data entered, it may alter when you do this (particularly with percentages) so the best option is to create a copy of the column first and make changes to that, to avoid the risk of losing data you've already entered. If all goes well, you can simply delete the original column.

AER : right-click the column, go to Format Cells and select Percentage to 2 decimal places.

Balance and Expected interest PA : right-click the column, go to Format Cells and select Currency to 2 decimal places and a £ symbol.

Of course this only gives an approximate value for expected interest PA as it would require the whole balance to be present at the indicated rate for a whole year. This makes it ideal for fixed rate accounts (where interest rate and balances are fixed) but can still be useful as an indication of how much you could expect from your easy access or other accounts with variable interest rates, which may be helpful when keeping an eye on your PSA. For Regular Savers, I just over-type the cell formula with the amount of interest mentioned in the account Summary Box on the bank's website, as the actual amount received will be somewhere around that figure, but of course this will depend on how and when the account is funded. 

Note that AER presumes that any interest credited monthly isn't paid away to an external account so bare that in mind, plus for fixed rate accounts where interest is added to the account monthly, you either need to resist updating the balance monthly or if you do want to do that, then you're best creating a separate column for 'Initial deposit' and doing your interest calculation using that column and not the balance column.

My biggest bit of advice when starting out with learning Excel is to make copies of your spreadsheets at regular intervals. That way, if either you or your PC/laptop mess up (sheets can get corrupted, power-cuts, HDD failure etc), you minimise the amount of data that is lost and has to be re-entered. 

That's really helpful, thank you!

AlanP_2

Another satisfied MS Money user here. It has quirks but it's an easy way to record income / expenditure classified down with as much detail as you want / need and good enough reporting.

Use it to track all current accounts, savings accounts, cash & S&S ISAs, multiple pensions and Premium Bonds.

Haven't tried it on W11 yet, need to upgrade PC in next few months and move to that, so glad to hear it runs with no issues.

twadds123

there seems to still be some places to download msmoney.

https://www.garethjmsaunders.co.uk/2011/11/27/download-microsoft-money-2005-for-free/

appears to have both the last uk version and the us sunset version and some useful information.

Alexland

Never liked the later versions of MS Money when it started looking like a web site. They gave me a mail away voucher to buy it for £12 on Windows 95 launch day. That version was nice but limited.

For the past decade I have been using my own spreadsheet file designed to look a bit like a company balance sheet to track all my (and kids) account valuations and debts. I update it monthly and keep track of how my overall wealth has grown over time.

I don't bother tracking expenditure as I can easily see recent transactions on online banking and I know what my monthly budget is and generally stick within it and its pretty immaterial to my financial position.

My W10 desktop PC keeps telling me it cannot be upgraded so am considering if I continue with Excel or move to Google or Libre spreadsheets on my Ubuntu laptop. I have a W11 laptop from work but don't want to store personal data on it.

Google spreadsheet is probably the answer as I can then access it on all my devices.

Ocelot

Here's the top 5 rows of my spreadsheet.

'Need' is MOB, Can withdraw is Balance-Need(MOB)

trance

Ocelot said:

Here's the top 5 rows of my spreadsheet.

'Need' is MOB, Can withdraw is Balance-Need(MOB)

That's really helpful, thank you.  I previously created a similar one, but I'm not that good with spreadsheets so it was basic listing of money and accounts, which I updated whenever I thought about it!

I'll have to get more organised, and start it again I think!