For those who are new, those who have used it and fell off the wagon, and those who are seasoned pros - come in and chat! Share tips, discuss plans, and let's support one another in our effort to a frugal and affordable 2015.
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Just bought it on Steam and gotta download it first to get started. I'm excited!
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I just did my budget for January! Love the end of the month so I can start clean!
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@Mrs. High Heels: Walk us through it, sensei
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I feel like I find a way to recommend YNAB in ever conversation I have lately
We are starting off the new year without any credit card debt (YAY!) which I still find amazing. My husband was just promoted and will be getting a raise effective in February, and we are going to use the additional income towards getting our buffer and then maxing out our retirement contributions. Being financially responsible feels GOOD!
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Mwhaha Got it up and running.
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Joining in!
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@Mrs. High Heels: @Mrs. Grizzly Bear: @mrsrain: Can you have it installed on more than one desktop/computer? I know you can have multiple smartphones connected to it, but not sure about the "main" computer. Debating on whether to install on my work laptop or our personal one (which I got for Xmas and haven't even taken out of the box yet).
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@HabesBabe: yes, we have it installed on all our comps. Just need Dropbox to make sure they all stay in sync!
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@HabesBabe: What @Mrs. High Heels: said
I had it on one laptop, just downloaded it to a second laptop I'm using more often and I intend to use DropBox to keep everything synced. Still have to see if it'll work on my work tablet or not.
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@Mrs. High Heels: @Mrs. Grizzly Bear: ah, ok, good to know. would you recommend taking any of the workshops offered on YNAB's site?
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@HabesBabe: yes, all their workshops and tutorials are very helpful.. and if you can't attend or miss one they send you a link of videos you can watch. all of their live class materials can be found here if you want to watch on your own time - http://www.youneedabudget.com/support/article/introduction-to-ynab-class-materials
i feel like one of the biggest benefits to ynab is all the support they offer - and the forums can be very helpful too!
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@Mrs. High Heels: oh awesome! i'd rather watch a recording on my own time than wait for the next live class. thank you!
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I completely fell off the ynab bandwagon last year. I ordered it the night I had DD (not knowing I would have her that night), and just never felt like I made the appropriate time to do my budget.
I really want to buckle down big time in 2015 with our finances. Between our daycare and mortgage, there isn't a whole lot left after.
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@matador84: Yeah, I totally fell off the bandwagon. I just didn't 'get' the whole $0 balance thing the first time around. And I was super frustrated that we were paying for two houses. Now we're down to one house (yay!) and I'm starting a job in August. I'd like to have our finances in order before we add that second income.
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Thanks! I told my husband about it, and he immediately bought it. He's an accountant, and I think he is seriously having fun figuring it all out! We are trying to buy a house the end of 2015, and need to buckle the heck down even more!
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Okkk, I'm going to drink the kool-aid! Just downloading it now
We need to buy a new car, and we have a whole bunch of home reno projects that need to get tackled, so we need to get a budget nailed down asap.
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So exciting to see all these new people aboard the YNAB train!! It's seriously life changing (and fun!) - I never ever thought budgeting could be fun and something I actually looked forward to!
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@Mrs. High Heels: I'm scurred that the software is going to take one look at my finances and spontaneously combust
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@Synchronicity: those are ynab's favorites! It likes a challenge, hahaha
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@Synchronicity: LOL, I almost spit my lemonade out! I know we throw away too much money on eating out.
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@Mrs. High Heels: Haha, phew!
@dc yoga bee: Lol! Our overspending usually occurs in the grocery store, so I feel ya!I just watched the intro video, and I'm loving the whole premise of it! Building a buffer, living on last month's income.. that's awesome!
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Target. Target is my downfall... Really have to avoid walking anywhere except to the diaper aisle and back up to checkout.
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We're approaching a year of YNAB. We don't stick well to it like we used to (constantly moving money around to different categories) but we still input every transaction and give every dollar a job. It's working well still even though we're half assing it. I would like to be more strict with budgeting...but I already have a resolution this year. Haha
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So, I've entered all of my accounts, but I'm guessing at this point I don't enter anything for December in the budget/outflows categories, and I just move on to budgeting for January? No backtracking, right? This seems daunting.
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@Synchronicity: crap, don't say that! i haven't even downloaded it yet and i need to stay positive!
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@HabesBabe: It's super user-friendly, and now that I've got everything entered I am becoming more positive myself! I'm over-budgeted, because I obviously haven't entered any income for January yet and I don't have the one month ahead buffer built up (will I ever?!)... that is the part that seems a little daunting, lol.
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@Synchronicity: Don't backtrack and don't forecast! I learned that the hard way. Add your income in as you receive it and budget that money as you go.
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@Synchronicity: what do you mean by backtrack? as in, can you readjust your budget categories after you've inputted them?
if that's what you mean, then you can backtrack. rule #3 is roll with the punches - things come up and life happens, and it's ok.
"With Rule Three:
Your budget says—in an überfriendly voice—“Okay, that’s fine. It’s cool. I see you went over in ‘Groceries’ so go ahead and move some surplus money from ‘Clothing’ into ‘Groceries’." If you don’t make any adjustments, YNAB automatically deducts overspending from next month’s money. You don’t feel like a failure. Budgets do work. You just haven’t ever budgeted like this ;)"we've personally been relying on this one a little too much lately and have been overspending on certain categories and using other categories to cover them! i'm with @Danizaur: about the phoning it in! but it's still helping us stay within certain parameters so we are still in a better place with ynab in our lives.
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@Mrs. High Heels: and @twist are the YNAB gurus! They have helped me SO much! I've been using YNAB pretty religiously since September and it's been amazing. I was really confused at first but it's really user friendly. DH rolled his eyes when I first bought it and he's exclaimed a handful of times since then how much he loves our budget
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@Mrs. High Heels: By backtracking I meant entering stuff from previous months, but then I watched the intro video and it told me not to do that! I was also being bad and forecasting bills and such with money that wasn't there yet... @Danizaur:, I deleted those entries so my budget seems to be on track now.
I think that once I get into the habit of entering all of my transactions and that sort of thing, this should be really helpful! DH is not entirely on board, so my budget right now only includes my income and expenses... Oh well. I'll keep working on him.
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@Danizaur: @Mrs. High Heels: Great tips and reminders, thanks!
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Joining in on this chat....I love to get some tips and info. Loving my YNAB so far, but not very strict with my budget right now. I always end up moving money from one category to another.
Do any of you transfer money to a savings account every month? This part confuses me since I'm also putting money aside for my yearly expenses (i.e. life insurance, car insurance, etc), so I feel like I'm always in the negative. Maybe this means, I don't need to keep the savings account.
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@Mrs. High Heels: with a buffer, do you wait until the end of the month to plug in your budget for the next? i'm a weirdo and like to have $0 at the top, but i think that hinders me instead of helping.
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@lawbee11: DH was the same way at first, but he's completely on board now! We recently both started using the iPhone app more regularly (I know I can't believe I waited so long to use it...), and it's made reconciling accounts so much less tedious.
@Synchronicity: Ah ok - I understood your question wrong. Thanks for clarifying!
@Mrs. Grizzly Bear:
@DisneyBee: I do, but it's not the savings for rainy day categories. I have a category called "savings" and it really is just savings... it's not categorized to be used in any way. That money gets auto-debited from our checking to our savings monthly, and I don't touch it - so there's no transferring back and forth. I guess you could call it our emergency fund. My rainy day funds - stuff I'm saving up for like vacations or gifts - I still keep those in my checking.
@birdofafeather: Yes I wait til the end of the month because if you use the phone app, if you enter anything too soon it all adds up. For example, say I have $25 left in my groceries budget... but if I budget for the next month too soon and budget $500 for next month's groceries... on my phone it's going to show up as I have $525 remaining in that category, even though I'm still in my current month. Hope that made sense.
Also, with my buffer... I would still have $0 up top for my current month even with new income coming in because all my paychecks that would come in for the current month, I categorize it as "income for next month" (since I'm fully buffered and am living off last month's income). Am I making any sense?? Not sure I'm explaining this clearly...
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I love YNAB!!! We're a few months away from being totally debt free besides our mortgage. I love this tool to help us get there! We've been using it just shy of a year.
ETA: Now that we have a good idea on what our holiday expenses are, we are planning to start saving NOW for Christmas time next year! This program makes it so easy.
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Following! DH just set this up for us!
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@DillonLion: Congratulations!! You've accomplished SO much! We started budgeting for Christmas too - it's forever going to be a line item in our budget. No hiding that category~
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@Mrs. High Heels: Definitely! This year we were like...uhhh...how much are we supposed to budget? We have no idea how much we usually spend on this stuff.
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@Mrs. High Heels: Okay, that totally makes sense because I've seen that happen at month end on the app. And yeah, my current month is $0 but the next month has its income on top waiting for a job! Ha. I need to do one month at a time.
We need to buy a new car, and we have a whole bunch of home reno projects that need to get tackled, so we need to get a budget nailed down asap.
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