Use Quicken

to be able to print out a cash flow and show my hubby in black & white where we spend our money. It really helps in cutting costs and being realistic when you can see it in print. I hope I’ll stay on top of it!

just came in and I reconciled it and put it to bed. I need to go back to my credit cards. One month (or more) a night until I’m caught up.

I have entered all our information, and gone through and catagorized everything. I download our information daily from all our accounts.

This has been a great tool to get a good look at our financial picture overall. I love Quicken, and don’t know how I lived without it until now!

sat down with a pot of coffee and entered about 2 months worth of transactions. just about have a handle on 2008 data. aaaah. satisfying.

....and since I’m on a role I reconciled it and got it put to bed. Nice feeling to be caught up.

Reconciled November & December and filled in all the blanks. It DOES feel good to have this more under control. Especially since $$ is tight these days.

remind me that I used to be diligent with this. but I stopped mid-last year and…lately miscellaneous odds and ends seem to be cropping up on statements, and I can’t quite wrap my mind around what the heck they are and what they amount to. I’ll have a lot more peace of mind and satisfaction – since I’m a sucker for a good chart – when I do this again.

I bought Quicken 2008 to start the New Year off right. I am going to pay off the car, and make sure our retirement money is on track.

I want to use quicken to keep tabs on what I owe and how I’m doing paying it off etc.

The amazing thing is that I paid bills and reconciled my CURRENT bank statement today. I can’t remember the last time I reconciled the current statement in the same week as I received it…..maybe, never!! Wahoo! THen I actually filed all the paperwork away! Oh yeah! I CAN act like a real disciplined grown up and not leave the mess of papers on my desk (or worse, on the floor next to my desk!!)

I spent some extra time cleaning up some of the blanks so I can review my quicken against our budget. I had categorized all my credit card bills as “household” just because its a pain to break them out by category (I use my cc for everything!)...today I tackled the latest cc bill and broke it down into budget categories. I’m going to do a quarter’s worth and then judge if its truly a valuable use of my time.

But I’m happy with how far I’ve come with quicken!!