Hey Jaysen, I just started using MoneyWell as well, but here is part of my debt reduction philosophy.
So your looking for a way to get out of debt and wondering how a bucket can do that compared to the multiple levels deep complex quicken way? I just got finished talking to a guy who came knocking at my door wanting to come in, stay for a while, and have some smokes but I dont even smoke, he does. He said he was at zero with alcohol still on his breath wondering if I have any beer, which I dont drink.I’m a smidge off topic because he dropped in, but in many ways I’m not. You see even he makes lots of money, but the smokes and drinks and constant liquor on his breath and lack of planning has gave him more work hauling wood now when its cold out. Thats why his hands are now black, lack of planning and always spending everything he has now instead of letting the buckets fill up first. So how do you get in the black with a mountain of CC debts and other debts? Multiple levels deep complex quicken way? Your time is worth money, that includes the time you waste typing in stuff in a complex system. Why fight setting a bunch of complex categories if in the end they force you to keep the data there? The best way to pay off debts is to make more money! Thats the first thing to do. Every hour you spend starring at Quicken you could be making more money doing something else. So I’m loving this MoneyWell and will soon be spending more time making money then spending time tracking it. Its bucket system accomplishes just that. Dont fret about placing your stuff multiple layers deep in Quicken, make your finances streamlined and focus instead on that one extra thing that would make you some cash to fill another bucket! What else can you do? With MoneyWell you click on a bucket you see the totals and at a glance can see which ones are the bigger payments and which ones are the stupid debts, cause MoneyWell makes it easy to flag them all. You can even click backwards a few months and see how those “flows” of debt changed. Did they get smaller or bigger? Are you moving forward or falling behind. If your falling behind its a good chance your living beyond your means. I also sorted out the fees I pay and again can quickly see where I pay the stupid tax. Where can I make reductions by avoiding stupid things? Well for starters I see I pay more for things I dont value then what I do value things I dont buy cause I viewed it as a luxury. Cutting out some stupid buckets and wasteful fees is a start. payong $35 a month for tanning sessions is nothing compared to what I spend on other things I dont value yet pay more for. So MW can help you get more out of life, the bright lights will even help make me feel better and I’ll go on the days I drive past there to do something I have to do saving fuel. I will enjoy the tan and cut the stupid purchases out more for the things I dont value. But whats next? For starters I wont worry about skimming a bucket to the water line, MoneyWell puts your spending a virtual plane (watch the video) so instead I’ll focus on letting the buckets fill up if possible. Time is money and the time I save not having to type in Complex quicken I can instead focus on making money and spending less time in MW. For starters I’ll take the time to cook more meals or pack a lunch rather then dining out. That hits the dining bucket one of my largest expenses and when you do that you free up more liquid to fill up other buckets. I’ll eat less fat and salt while I’m at it and the money I save will more then fill a few more buckets. I even downloaded a “grocery IQ” shopping program for my ipod and will force myself to buy more easy heat n serve meals, keeping a mind on the price vs. eating out, for when I dont have the time, as I still will save money. Now I wont forget as much and have to make a second trip, costing more time and $$ on fuel. What will I also do now that the buckets are filling up to get out of debt? First off I’m not going to stew that a buckets filling up and look for ways to spend it, thats not the way to get ahead. For starters instead I’m going to program in standard reasonable, close to average or min payments to auto pay my bills online. Saves me fuel driving to make a payment each month, saves me time but also makes sure the regular payments help improve my credit rating. I can see in my bucket the loans that are being paid, I know the monthly numbers I’m doing now and its easy to see how much I owe. I grab my statements and write down the interest rate, logging the highest rates first. Last week I went to the bank to change one card from a zero membership fee to one that costs $50 a year with a much lower interest rate. I was able to see clearly what I pay in fees and interest charges. So I picked a credit card with a lower interest rate, which will also translate into savings. How much do you save? Well here is another app I found on the ipod/ iphone its called “loan shark”. With it you type in your payments, your interest rate etc and you can see the effects of what an extra amount will do. That brings me to the point about portability and my desire to start using moneywell while on the go, on my ipod and iphone. Spending my time burring my finances down even more levels in Quicken doesnt solve my problem. Being able to see the bucket of debt at a glance while using a Mortgage and loan payment guide does, for its the easiest way to reduce debt, by knowing what making an extra payment does or getting that lower interest rate. I’ll also spend my time shopping other banks for lower interest rates. The biggest problem I have always had with my life is that when I’m at the store making that purchase, thats the best time for me to log the expense, its fresh in my mind and I know how its being allocated. What has happened is it piles up in a shoe box of papers that makes me dread having to do the books, but MoneyWell and my ipod/iphone are going to change that this year. But life instead makes you stand at the till wondering if you have enough in that account to pay for it, so instead you grab the plastic put it on a higher interest rate instead of debit cause you dont want to see it declined. I have found that MoneyWell does indeed work with QuickBank for making purchases and it runs on a ipod/iphone. At the store I can buy something and log it as an automobile expense. Later when I get home I can import that directly into MoneyWell. At this point I can even use PocketMoney to download my full accounts into my ipod so I have a good idea what I have in my accounts, although at this point the dates are wrong and I dont want to use that app to import data back into MoneyWell. So with PocketMoney I can use that to decide what is the best method of payment at the till when I’m standing inline to buy something. So while everyone is standing around with blank looks in their eyes at the till, I instead will actually make my best purchase using the best interest rate and at the same time have those items logged and categorized to compare against the Bank logs downloaded into MoneyWell. That saves me a lot of time. Not only that, but an app called Trip Cubby allows me to be able to log a trip in my car as a business expense or a personal one. Taking that extra time and logging my mileage and what purpose the business trip was for and being able to deduct so much per km and having that record of what I did that day will save me more then what I currently have been duducting. It all shows up in a spreadsheet format and I can use this seperately come tax time. It doesnt need to be built into MoneyWell, it needs to be in my car when I’m about to start my car and make that trip. I’m also currently using “TankBunch” a free app that I type in how much gas I bought and the mileage and it tells me my fuel economy. One of the biggest expenses is your car, so spending time starring at Quicken isnt solving your problem. Knowing when your car starts to consume extra gas is cause its a sign that its going to need servicing. Maybe the car should be sold off before an expensive repair comes in? All I know is the automobile bucket is very large so thats an area I should be looking for ways to save. Being able to deduct more for business trips will do that and there are some business trips I wont be making if it doesnt justify itself. Lastly, I wont be competing against the Jones any longer. People buy as expensive house as they can afford and they do the same with the automobile they drive. Looking at those two buckets and the interest you pay should tell you that your car and house consume a lot of interest. Myself I have actually started renting out my top floor of my place, while I build a basement suite and live downstairs. I already have another house rented out andhave aquired another one. People spend to the maximum of their spending capabilities decorating. Why not instead make sure that the house you use pays for itself, instead of you working for it? My goal is simple on that, as long as debts remain on my house or houses, then I have to be willing to accept a lower standard of living and generate revenue from my places by renting parts out. Its actually starting to work out well and has allowed me the ability to aquire other reasonable housing for the same purposes. At some point in the future I will be able to buy my dream house to live in, but right now my time is building my revenue streams and my asset base. You cannot pay off quarter million dollar houses while starring at ways to save a few pennies. My freind who is single took a larger house and divided the main floor into two suites, one he lives in and the other one he rents out. He is now currently fixing up the basement to rent out too since he doesnt use that space much. Doing those changes will allow him to live for free and he plans to actually rent out his suite and buy another house outside the city with a better shop to do some mechanics. Once the house is paid for, he plans to then move back in it and spend some money fixing the insides up the way he wants it to look. All too often we aquire stuff and for what reason? All that stuff takes space, it costs money to heat and also takes energy to keep maintained and cleaned. Renting out part of your house allows you to instead plan that vacation trip elsewhere and know full well that the heat and power is helped being paid by the tenant who is also staying there and keeping an eye on the place. So MoneyWell does help you save time when doing the books, by using a portable device I save time in data entry and have better more accurate logs. I’m able to use my ipod with Loanshark to focus on areas to lower interest rates or to make that extra payment on a loan to reduce long term interest debt. That same ipod also helps me track business trips better using tripcubby. Finally I’m also changing my life so that I can travel while still paying off long term debt, letting my renters help make that extra payment on my loans. When my buckets fill up enough I will be switching to bank accounts that offer no fees for holding a deposit there. A lot of banks will do this with $1500 or $2000 cash held on deposit. Presidents Choice bank is a free one that I recommend too as interact fees really add up. So I guess what it comes down to is finding balance in your life, by doing some stuff in my portable device and reducing expenses in other areas while at the same time increasing my income flows. Making more money and living within my means, renting part of my place out rather then having my place costing me every cent I have. Buying a house that fits my budget and slowly moving up instead to better ones. Using the rentals as a way to spend more time in the sun travelling. At points I will even be able to use the amount held on deposit for paying cards off and moving things around. Less time entering stuff with MoneyWell more time to make the changes in my life to produce more wealth and reduce expenses. On Dec 17, 5:15 am, Jaysen <[email protected]> wrote: > One of the reasons I am really liking moneywell is the quick feed > back. The lack of feed back has been hampering my efforts to get out > of debt. What is the best way manage "liability" accounts from > Quicken? > > I have the following loans and debts to manage: > • Mortgage > • CC x 2 > • Home remodel > • Auto > • consolidation > > I am used to seeing these as liability and asset accounts in Quicken > and figure that I am likely to wind up with the same mess in Moneywell > if I don't simply ask advice. > > Do we just look at these as buckets? If so, one bucket of debt, > separate individual buckets? > > How do we track the interest? Do they all get a but "interest" bucket? > > Sorry for the questions. If I am going to meet my 12/31 divorce from > quicken date I need to wrap my head around this stuff pretty quick. > > <little side conversation to the person who pointed my to Moneywell> > Hello tannie. You only have yourself to blame for all my questions > here. Your answers pushed me over the edge on this. Now I am obsessing > over this instead of working my other projects. See what you have > done? On Dec 17, 5:15 am, Jaysen <[email protected]> wrote: > One of the reasons I am really liking moneywell is the quick feed > back. The lack of feed back has been hampering my efforts to get out > of debt. What is the best way manage "liability" accounts from > Quicken? > > I have the following loans and debts to manage: > • Mortgage > • CC x 2 > • Home remodel > • Auto > • consolidation > > I am used to seeing these as liability and asset accounts in Quicken > and figure that I am likely to wind up with the same mess in Moneywell > if I don't simply ask advice. > > Do we just look at these as buckets? If so, one bucket of debt, > separate individual buckets? > > How do we track the interest? Do they all get a but "interest" bucket? > > Sorry for the questions. If I am going to meet my 12/31 divorce from > quicken date I need to wrap my head around this stuff pretty quick. > > <little side conversation to the person who pointed my to Moneywell> > Hello tannie. You only have yourself to blame for all my questions > here. Your answers pushed me over the edge on this. Now I am obsessing > over this instead of working my other projects. See what you have > done? --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "No Thirst Software User Forum" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/no-thirst-software?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
