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Gothmog1065 posted:Anyone know if there is a way to pull a scheduled payment ahead when you pay it, rather than wait for it to drop? Right click on it and select "Enter in register now"
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Jan 30, 2014 19:50
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Eegah posted:Yeah this is probably what I'll do. I have enough elbow room in my cash buffer that I can afford the ticket even if I don't get my refund this month so I'm not particularly worried, but the thoughts of "in my mind I'm paying for this with my refund" and "I want to lock in the seat reservation and ticket price before I get my refund" kindof conflict in YNAB's world. Technically you are paying for the ticket with your own cash not the refund. You purchase the ticket, record the expense in YNAB, and go negative in the Vacation category. So you remove some cash from your reserves right now to 0 out the balance. When you get the refund you can increase the categories that you borrowed from. For a really contrived example. Let's say you have $1000 to your name which is exactly how much money you need for February except all of your bills are due 2/28. So for 2/1-2/27 you have $1000 in your checking account that can be spent but is earmarked for your bills on 2/28. However, Uncle Sam is going to send you a tax rebate of $200 which is how much you need to purchase your plane ticket. So you spend the $200 on the plane ticket from your checking account right now. You'll just use the tax rebate to get you back to $1000 so you can afford your 2/28 bills. Except the government is behind and won't get you your money until March (or April). Now you are behind on your February bills by $200. This is why YNAB wants you to only spend the cash you currently have access to. Plus when you open your budget you know exactly where all of your money is sitting. I have a confession. I started using YNAB at the beginning of January but I didn't get a chance to actually budget until last night. I saw my January Available to Budget was like "that's a large pile of money I'm good!". So I budgeted out January and I had a bunch left over even after giving myself an OK emergency fund. So I deferred all of my paychecks from January to February and started to budget February. This is awesome I'm in step 4! Except when I was done I had a negative balance for February. Not good. I'm not living paycheck-to-paycheck but that "huge" buffer I thought I had was not there and I was living month-to-month. Much better than most people but not financially stable in the long term. gariig fucked around with this message at 18:47 on Jan 31, 2014 |
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Jan 31, 2014 18:41
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Veskit posted:Why not just start over, at this exact moment if you didn't use YNAB in Jan at all? The program is pretty forgiving about that. I redid my budget like 3 times after figuring out the software. Took me a week or two to adjust my brain enough to where I was spending the budget money and not my future planned money or bank account money. While I didn't budget I did record everything. Last night I just zeroed out all of the categories for January and since I looked flush with cash I deferred all of my January income to February. So when I started budgeting February with my January paychecks I realized I over spent in January. Over the long term it evens out with bonuses, gifts, and leaner months. However, I don't want to do that and want to have all of the money ready to go for vacations and emergencies. February is the first month on a real budget and I'm excited.
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Jan 31, 2014 20:51
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How do people handle small yearly bills? Like every year I buy a State Park pass for $36. Should I be budgeting $3/month for that? I can see needing a bunch of categories for this and it being annoying to fill out constantly.
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Feb 3, 2014 16:44
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For YNAB I consider it my net worth of money I could reasonably spend tomorrow. I'm probably not going to raid my long term investments (401K, IRA, CDs) to pay for something tomorrow. I would just keep track of your long term investments by just looking at them monthly/quarterly/yearly and not bother recording them in YNAB. If you suddenly have a great year on your 401K does that change your monthly budget? If you are putting your left over budgeted money into a long term investment I would just consider it an outflow and it's money lost. For credit cards with a balance the Handling Credit Cards video says how to handle interest payments on credit cards. It does seem really strange. If I had to guess the credit card payment to YNAB is just shuffling money around even though in the real world it's a loss of cash to you. gariig fucked around with this message at 19:37 on Feb 6, 2014 |
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Feb 6, 2014 19:15
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DrBouvenstein posted:It's not so I can remember what the transaction/transfer is for, it's just because having to make two separate entries for one payment is annoying. For credit cards with a balance the Handling Credit Cards video says how to handle interest payments on credit cards. Like Shadowhand00 posted you shouldn't be double posting. You'll budget some cash to just paying your CC plus your normal expenses and then transfer that money to you credit card. Later add the interest back in as pre-YNAB debt. The video goes over the whole process even if you start carrying debt later.
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Feb 6, 2014 20:42
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peter banana posted:I need to make some bigger purchases from having leftover by being under budget for a few months. Should I add new categories for these? It's 2 purchases of about $500 each. I'd only do it if it's something really different. Like inheriting a house I would create new categories. The house expenses are going to be ongoing into the future. However, if you are just buy a new TV and couch (one time purchases) I'd just shoehorn it into an existing category and move on
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Jun 13, 2014 19:13
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Henrik Zetterberg posted:Just got an email from YNAB saying the iPad app is now in the AppStore. It's not working for me. It started some sort of upgrade process and then crashed. Now when I open the app it crashes
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Aug 25, 2014 18:30
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HonorableTB posted:This thread has been inactive for a while, but I hope someone will see this and give me some help: You carry your balances over from month to month. Like if you budget $100 for groceries. If you spent $90 last month you'll have $110 this month ($100 budgeted and $10 from last month). If you are reconciling your accounts and have everything entered your budget should be correct. If you have too much budgeted for an account you can always push some of it to another category EDIT: VVVV You are right. Long ago I stopped looking at my account balances and just keep enough in my checking to pay for everything. HonorableTB is it possible to close your savings account and just use a savings account? You aren't really earning any interest but causing you a bigger headache. gariig fucked around with this message at 00:54 on Oct 9, 2014 |
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Oct 9, 2014 00:23
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HardDisk posted:How do you guys handle multiple installments of a single thing on the credit card? I'm assuming you bought something on credit that has a 0% interest rate if paid in 6/12/18 months? I'd just budget how much you need to pay it off in time and just make it a budget category in YNAB. When you make your monthly payment it's not a Transfer like a regular CC but money you are sending to a payee. If this is a CC you need to keep on budget because you use it daily then I don't know.
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Oct 14, 2014 00:25
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Defenestration posted:I have a bank account and a credit union account. I've been siphoning off $100 from every paycheck to the credit union, which I don't have a debit card for and is therefore difficult to use. It is currently Off Budget. You should have your CU account on budget and just put everything in it to your emergency fund category. The one problem with multiple accounts, as Xik mentions, is you might think you have $500 to spend (by your budget) but really your bank has $200 and CU has $300. If you have enough emergency fund to cover next month's budget you are only deluding yourself by not going to rule 4. If on January 31st you lost your job and stopped getting paid you'd have to budget February with your emergency fund so you might as well start dipping into it now to make your life easier with YNAB. For loan payback you should mess with a repayment calculator, your loan company will have one. For example, I'm old and mine is like 2-3% so paying off today vs letting the loan ride out would save me like $1000 over 10 years. I'd rather keep the money invested because I'll make more money than I will save. You also have evaluate how risk averse you are. If you empty your savings paying off your loan but an emergency happens next month you might have to float it on a credit card at 24% interest for a month or two.
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Jan 9, 2015 16:21
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I just don't track cash. I just have a cash category that I use for ATM withdrawls. If I'm getting cash for the farmer's market I'll split the ATM transaction to be groceries for what I spent at the farmer's market and the rest just goes into a cash category. I only put like $60 a month in there and I don't mind missing that part of my budget compared to the ease of tracking (I don't track).
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Feb 5, 2015 20:24
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Teeter posted:Anybody have some tips for reconciling? I don't bother with trying to match my credit card statement. When I reconcile I just head to the website and reconcile the current balance with YNAB. The one annoying part is having to go from current activity to your most recent statement to find all of your transactions. I also sort my transactions by amount in YNAB and go through it that way. Easy to find that $11 transaction when sorted by amount instead of chronological order that doesn't match my CC EDIT: For the statement balance I would just take it as inflow on my CC and assign a category like entertainment.
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Apr 8, 2015 20:13
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Let categories roll over. If a category gets too large (like gas) just don't fund it for a month and put that money someplace else. When it needs money again just fund it again
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Apr 24, 2015 23:02
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Pinball posted:Kind of a weird question, but I hope you guys can help me out. I'm currently living off savings (as I am a poor grad student), with two small paychecks coming in monthly from my part-time job and another monthly check from one of my parental units (who refuses to stop giving me money, and I've tried to make her stop), all of which goes into the savings account and gets withdrawn at the beginning of the next month. Obviously, YNAB doesn't like this weird situation, and when I try and set up the budget for the next month, it insists that I'm overbudgeted. How do I get it to understand that withdrawing money from my savings is technically income? Can you describe how you are recording your income? There are basically two ways to register income in YNAB. The first is to say it's income for this month or next month. This puts money into an account but gives you unbudgeted money to be put into a category. The other is to register a transaction to an account and category as an inflow, this is money being brought in but is given a category. If you are putting your money into a "savings" category this month next month you'd subtract from the account on the budget screen which would push the money into your overall budget. For my paychecks I flag them as income but returns I generally just do the inflow I don't suggest making your savings off budget because it makes it hard to see your overall financial health. I suggest watching the initial 4 training videos.
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Apr 30, 2015 00:08
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I highly suggest signing up for their free training. Not only does it go over how to use YNAB but also their methodology the Four Rules. I also suggest moving the car loan to off budget or just not showing it in YNAB. It's making me super depressed looking at it EDIT: VVVVVVVVV It's nice to be there. However, in this case getting rid of the CC debt is more important. To me seeing a red 5,000 instead of 20,000 makes the goal seem much closer. gariig fucked around with this message at 19:40 on Jun 12, 2015 |
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Jun 12, 2015 19:31
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Gothmog1065 posted:Okay, so I'm going to "start fresh" in July, a few questions: For the side business I would either treat it like a work expense. Have a category for "work expense" and let the category stay negative and carry it over until it's been reimbursed. Maybe you can explain why your side business has a negative balance, that could help us give you a better way of fitting it into YNAB. For your credit card don't worry about previous transactions that's what pre-YNAB debt is. Even if you pay off your credit card every month the pending transactions are an obligation that is taking money from your current cash to be budgeted. Remember when you spend any money within YNAB you are taking it out of cash you have on-hand even if it goes on a credit card. That's why a credit card payment is a transfer from your checking to the credit card. That cash has already been budgeted and spent. If you have a pending transaction that isn't part of your current balance when you start using YNAB enter those transactions into YNAB. So all of your credit card balances when you start should be pre-YNAB debt. You might find out you are actually in the hole. You might have $5000 on your credit card but only $2500 is due today and $2500 next month except you only have $4500 in total funds today. You are actually -$500 today when you start if you budgeted everything to pre-YNAB debt which is how YNAB works. I think this is the greatest power of YNAB because it shows you all of your obligations outstanding and has you budget them before they need to be paid.
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Jun 23, 2015 15:07
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Gothmog1065 posted:I understand most of this, but the thing is, this is all going into a new start. In other words, I"m retiring this database and starting a new one. All of my "previous statements" from cc's will be paid before July 1st (I get my check on the last working day of the month), but the unpaid amount is what I'm looking at. Should I just go in and re budget them item by item since last statement or just do a bulk budget for past due? I know most of it was "last month" but that's kind of how I've been working it for a while, and I"m trying to back into this month, and maybe a month ahead like I'm supposed to be (Lots of personal circumstances that aren't a problem anymore). OK, that's totally up to you. I'd just take the credit card balance as pre-YNAB and not worry about it. If you are a day or two into your current billing cycle and can pay the previous balance I'd probably do that. You'd pay off the balance, enter all of my current transactions for this current credit card period, and enter 0 pre-YNAB debt. If it's a bunch of day or lots of credit cards I wouldn't worry about it. Six months down the road is it going to make a difference if your first month has lots of transactions or having a few weeks be pre-YNAB debt? Probably not. However, I'm "lazy" when it comes to this and I want to biggest bang for my time. Also, doing a "bulk budget" item is the same as pre-YNAB debt. You don't need to carry your pre-YNAB debt month-to-month if you have enough cash to cover it plus this months expenses. I suggest watching the training video on how YNAB treats credit cards and what pre-YNAB debt is. You can read about the credit card float to see why YNAB doesn't like it.
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Jun 23, 2015 17:21
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Gothmog1065 posted:Yeah, I know I"m behind, but I'm not going to carry a balance on these cards at all because I *JUST* cleaned them off. We have to use them right now because I went from getting paid weekly to monthly and we were never fully caught up on things. I'm hoping over the next few months to remedy that. That's the biggest problem with going from getting paid immediately the week after you work to getting paid a month after you work. I meant to mention that. On the credit card float page go with option #2. Just run deficits in categories until you can catch up. Don't do #1 and pay interest. Never pay interest if you can avoid it. I'm actually upset YNAB even suggested paying interest especially as the first option. It's more YNAB-y but it's going to cost you extra money that you could be budgeting just to satisfy a program. I'm glad you caught that, you'll be rule #4 in no time! gariig fucked around with this message at 18:56 on Jun 23, 2015 |
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Jun 23, 2015 18:53
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Chin Strap posted:Anyone have any good rules of thumb for maximum values on a rainy day fund? Like we have some maintenance categories like "Home Maintenance", "Car Maintenance", etc where we add decent amounts every month, but I figure there must be a point where enough is enough and I can redirect to other items. These funds are different from our actual emergency fund. I'd say until you can cover most reasonable expenses. For Car Maintenance I'd say around $1000. That won't cover a blown engine but it will cover most maintenance (tires, brakes, alternator, radiator, etc). You could keep funding it has maintenance or future down payment. The Home Maintenance I'd probably keep putting money into it forever, unless you are good at having a New Roof or Bathroom Makeover category. I'd at least keep enough money in there to cover your home owner's insurance deductible. For most other funds, like gas, I generally stop putting money in once it could cover a month without additional. EDIT: ^^^^ I think this is for additional savings on top of a 6 month emergency fund. Like I have that plus extra for my car, vet, and some basic medical expenses (enough for a simple ER visit). This way I don't have to touch my emergency fund for minor inconveniences like my car popped a tire and I need a new set. gariig fucked around with this message at 14:43 on Jul 1, 2015 |
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Jul 1, 2015 14:41
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baby puzzle posted:Once again, I am more than a month behind on entering transactions. I am thinking about entering items as I spend, but what do you do when you miss something? What do I do with my bills that pay automatically? I have no idea when this poo poo happens. My fear is that when I go to reconcile I will be way off because I will have missed a lot of stuff, and I will have no hope of finding the missing transactions. If you have an Android or iOS device there's a YNAB client but requires Dropbox to synchronize. I actually use Mint to pull everything and I do a "make sure everything is inputted" against that. I do that because my wife and I both have accounts and this way I get one place to do inputs. When I've verified transactions I tag the entries in Mint with YNAB. I use the following Mint URL to see what I haven't seen: https://wwws.mint.com/transaction.event#location:{"query":"-YNAB"} Just mark all of your old transaction with the tag YNAB to use that query. I use my CC or bank website to do reconciliation. I generally use Mint 1-2 a week to do inputs and do a reconciliation every 1-2 weeks.
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Jul 29, 2015 22:14
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Randler posted:I have a category for Traveling and Transportation, where I budget for my regular traveling expenses and which I adjust if I have to go somewhere quickly. I think thread consensus is to put work expenses into it's own category and don't budget for this. That way you can see that you still need to be reimbursed. When you get your reimbursement put that towards the work expenses which should zero out. You are basically using your emergency fund to pay for your travel expenses. EDIT: Super beaten
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Aug 3, 2015 19:44
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Sockser posted:I budget, let's say, $300 for groceries every month, and I have a $200 overflow budget every month so if I spend $320 on groceries I just knock a $20 off the overflow, so at the end of the month everything is nice and zeroed out. For some categories I eventually will stop funding it and live off the overflow. These are generally categories that are somewhat "capped", like my fuel budget. I know I'm never going to spend for than X (say $100) a month so once I go over by a lot (say $200) I'll just not fund it for a month and redirect the money someplace else. Other categories I will just fund indefinitely like my car maintenance budget. I'll eventually use all that money for a large expense (engine blows) or towards a new car. It's not like you can't redirect the money someplace else totally unrelated. Move $100 from groceries to dining out to eat at a fancy place with your friends.
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Oct 23, 2015 18:47
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Dead Pressed posted:For those of you concerned about a new ynab coming out, you could try out Dave Ramsey's new "every dollar" tool. A lot like ynab, and free for the basic (not connected to banks) service, which replicates ynab pretty well. I'm currently taking it for a test ride and it seems pretty decent. Except to have "accounts" you need the premium account. Also, no Android app until next year.
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Oct 28, 2015 03:40
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IllegallySober if you haven't taken the YNAB courses I highly suggest it. Even if you can't make it to a "live" course signup and I think they send you a link to a pre-recorded one. It goes over how to use the software (which is a bit obtuse) and the whole "4 rules" aspect of YNAB.
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Nov 12, 2015 23:51
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IllegallySober posted:Is this too convoluted or does this make sense for what I want to do? It depends. Why are you doing this? What benefit do you get for putting the $1000 into an off budget account? If you think you'll check your account balance, realize you have an extra $1000, and buy a PS4... then hide it! However, I think keeping way more cash than you can spend on hand and in your checking account is the easiest. You don't have to worry about over drafting because your net worth is accessible right now but you're spending to your budget not your account balance.
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Nov 13, 2015 07:50
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Combat Pretzel posted:As far as reimbursement expenses go, does it kill anyone to front them the first time and then reallocate them in the budget this or next month, whenever you get them reimbursed? It's just a numbers game. And practically exactly what happens in your wallet. I used to to do this for my wife's work expenses but it gets real easy to forget about them. Mostly the $5-10 random expenses she'd have when not on a business trip. It was nice seeing the red $-5 in YNAB to remind me that something needs to be expensed or is incoming. Still going to try you the subscription based YNAB to see if it's better. I'm suspecting it won't be today but by the end of 2016 I'll switch over once the system has matured a bit.
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Dec 29, 2015 19:48
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TheCenturion posted:And I don't get why people would float an overbudget for reimbursable expenses, as that seems exactly contrary to YNAB's philosophy. Seems to me that what you should do is cover the expenses, then assign the reimbursement as new income. Sort of. It's not really a budget expense for me it's more that I'm loaning out money that is going to be paid back. You are right and technically what is happening is I record a reimbursable expense, minus the money from my emergency fund to fund my work expense category, get reimbursed, and add that money back to my emergency fund. If your company is good about work expenses it's easier to just skip all of that and just float the work expense until paid. If you are paycheck-to-paycheck and not having access to ~$500 is going to be a serious constraint on your monthly budget then overflowing you reimbursable expenses is bad. Trying out the nYNAB. Since I'm starting from scratch it's hard to tell if it's any good or not.
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Dec 30, 2015 19:03
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Ludwig van Halen posted:Hmm the month rolled over but my overspending didn't carry over? YNAB4 can work this way, but nYNAB does not allow carryover month-to-month. You need to subtract $10 from something in January to cover your January expense and refund the $10 in February
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Feb 1, 2017 20:21
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