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MoneyDanceArticle for: Anyone using Quicken or interested in a personal finance program Difficulty: Bookkeeping isn't easy. Importance: As Quicken gets more and more expensive, and clumsier and clumsier, a good alternative is more and more valuable ![]() What is it good for?MoneyDance is a Quicken replacement, but also much more. It is simply a better personal finance manager. It will handle all your personal financial, credit cards, investment accounts, checking and savings accounts. You'll be able to do just about everything Quicken can do. Often you can do it more easily.
Can I use it for business?
I use it for my business. I can get all the reports I need for taxes. I can separate out my personal and business expenses. I can divide my income into gross income and cost of goods, subtotaling to net income.
However, MoneyDance is not made for business. It works for me because:
If you have a similar sole proprietorship, you could look at it as a possibility, but it is not appropriate for most businesses.
Basic Features
The negatives
My experienceI could import all my bank accounts, credit cards and investment accounts with little difficulty. I followed advice I heard and didn't do it all at once, but imported the accounts one at a time.
I found data entry, split transactions, and everything else easier to use than Quicken 2016. Backup worked better as well. I don't import transactions online, but just go online and check against my accounting. A friend downloaded all her USBank transactions without difficulty. I enter my transactions as I make them and then just verify with the bank online. It is quick and easy to mark the transactions I see online as cleared.
I could get all the reports I needed for taxes and personal interest. I configured the opening dashboard, so it is better and easier for me than Quicken ever was. The left panel is like a table of contents.
The summary pageMoneyDance has a summary page that is configurable in three sections. Their example shows how they have things configured.
![]() As you can see, theirs is rather complex. On the left pane, you can show or hide any account. So I hid dropped credit cards and investment accounts. They appear in reports, but I do not need them on my summary page.
This is my summary left pane.
![]() Below the investments is a list of reports. MoneyDance has lots of reports, but, as with the accounts above, any report can be hidden, so the only ones I have listed, are those I might actually use! All reports and accounts are still accessible from the pull-down menus.
The middle and right pane allow you to select which items will be added to or removed from those panes. From the list of many possibilities, just add or remove for each of those two panes. Then you can move any item up or down.
My Middle pane
![]() For the accounts, clicking on the > breaks out to show all the accounts of that type. I use current balance for the balance, but it also offers balance (include future items already posted), and cleared balance.
Reminders
I like the reminders. As you can see, I set it for one month, but MoneyDance has a wide range of date options. Reminders are of two types:
The total for upcoming, sums all pending known amounts for the time period specified. When the item is posted, it is no longer upcoming. Reminders that have to be hand posted, because they are not fixed amounts, are removed from upcoming by right clicking on the reminder and choosing Acknowledge. This way, you will see whatever needs to be paid, and don't see what has already been paid. However, reminders that have been paid show on the calendar in light grey as the Hulu payment in my calendar below.
Right panel
![]() I show a breakdown of my expenses and a calendar of my reminders on the right pane. The Expenses are currently showing by month, but there are many time periods available. I like to see how things are going this month. You can zoom any group to see the details that contribute to that total.
SummaryI am thrilled with this purchase. For my purposes, it is better than Quicken and is certainly a more responsive company. You can download it and try it out for free, importing accounts, posting transactions and everything else. You can continue for free until you have 100 manually posted transactions, so you can test it thoroughly.
For personal finance, or some sole proprietors, this is the best option I've found.
Date: July 2021
![]() This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License. |
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