Get on the right financial track with these 15 online resources, which can help with money management, investing, and smart spending.
by Jennifer L. DeLeoBuzz up!
on Yahoo!
In these trying economic times, it's more important than ever to manage your finances. That means saving your receipts to track what you've spent, cutting back on electricity, and thinking twice before buying that shiny new gadget. According to a recent AP article, "consumer prices rose 1.1 percent in June from the month before, far faster than the expected rate of 0.7 percent." Rising consumer costs have led to millions of families struggling to keep up with their mortgage, credit card, and loan payments every month.
Unfortunately, money management doesn't come naturally to most people. NY Metro recently quoted a panelist at the annual U.S. Department of Labor conference on financial literacy as saying that much of America's recent economic woes could have been avoided if everyone simply learned financial planning.
So what can you do to protect your home from foreclosure, provide food for your family, and secure your retirement fund? PC Magazine found 15 great Web sites that offer advice and tools to help with your financial well-being, including money management, stocks and investing, general finance, and smart spending. Check out these apps, blogs, and Web sites so that you can live a more frugal life.
These great resources will help you track your finances, balance your checkbook, and link you with other financially concerned individuals.
1. Mint.com
Rated 4.5 out of 5 stars by PC Magazine, the free Mint.com Web service automatically tracks your monetary life for you. If you feel comfortable with handing over your banking and credit-card account log-ins to the site (according to the company, it never has direct access to your accounts and employs bank-level data security), you'll be able to see your assets and debts in total for each account—conveniently on one screen. Mint.com sets up your budget based on your average monthly spending. Then you can easily customize it, if need be. An interesting section of the site is "The Ways To Save," which compares the terms of your current financial accounts with those of other companies, looking at details like fees and minimum balances, to see if you can save money by switching.
2. ClearCheckbook.com
Managing over two million transactions for over 17,800 active users, ClearCheckbook.com is a simple-to-use Web app that lets you balance your checkbook from anywhere you have Web access; view your spending habits in charts and line and pie graphs; manage your finances from your mobile phone via ClearCheckbook's mobile app; set up reminders to pay your bills; and CheckBot 2.0, which lets you update your account from your mobile phone via SMS or AIM, ICQ, MSN, Yahoo!, and Google Talk Messenger services. Simply set up an account to get started. In addition, you can set monthly spending limits to see how much you have left to spend within your budget and export your transactions into a CSV or QIF format.
3. Wesabe
Wesabe is part financial software, part social networking community. Download Wesabe to your Mac or Windows machine for free, and you'll be able to see all your bank accounts and credit cards in one place, categorize your transactions with tags, set spending targets and goals, and receive saving and spending tips based on your purchases. Peruse the Groups section to chat with others about debt, savings, and money management. One discussion group recommends not getting a WaMu credit card; another provides the Wesabe community with tips on paying off a car loan
(read more at www.pcmag.com)
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