Quicken Users! Please fill me in on the pros and cons of using Quicken to manage your...?

Question

...finances. Answer questions within!
Please answer all questions below:

1) What things do you really like and find convenient about Quicken?
2) What things do you dislike about Quicken?
3) How long have you been a Quicken user?
4) How does Quicken save you time and make managing your finances easier?
5) I like to account for every purchase I make with my credit/debit cards and balance them with my receipts. Does quick make this process simple?
6) What version of Quicken are you using?
7) Anything else you would like to share about Quicken and its uses.

Answer 1

1) What things do you really like and find convenient about Quicken?



Very straight forward to use, like a check register.





2) What things do you dislike about Quicken?



I think this was more me than it, but had trouble setting up mutual funds at the beginning. Did it incorrectly and have too much history in it to change it. (but works ok for my purposes anyway)





3) How long have you been a Quicken user?



Years... maybe 10?



4) How does Quicken save you time and make managing your finances easier?



Let's me keep track of all bank accounts (checking, money market, cds) all credit card accounts, house value, special things of value for insurance purposes, mutual funds, stocks, bonds etc.





5) I like to account for every purchase I make with my credit/debit cards and balance them with my receipts. Does quick make this process simple?



Yup, I do that as well.

6) What version of Quicken are you using?



2004... friend says she uses a newer and there are improvements... I have ported my info from machine to machine and through more than one version. Very simple.



7) Anything else you would like to share about Quicken and its uses.



Backups are suggested and very useful to have in case of problems (which I haven't had but it gave me practice when I needed to switch to a new computer). It comes with a bunch of categories of expenses, inciomes but you can easily add more AND as you type in receipts they start to try to match for you for example if I type in Pub I see the categories Publix (groc store) and Public Storage showing donw below (like a google search toolbar) so I can select rather than keep typing. You can split a receipt if you want to intemize it.



You can also use online features (I haven't) and I think my online banking can be integrated as well.



Summary: I use it all the time, like it very much and think it is worthwhile. I used it to track accounts I had set up for nephews and neices as well so that when they hit 21 and had control of the money, they could see how it grew over time.





Other systems may be just as valuable. I got a version for free on some computer purchase years ago and really liked it. I can print out reports (like charitable contributions for the year for taxes), track net worth, keep up with IRAs, SRAs, 401ks etc pretty easily

Answer 2

1) I like that everything is in one place, that I can have reminders, and the ability to run reports.

2) I don't like that they dropped the ability to import qif files. Because of this, I still use the 2004 version.

3) I have been a Quicken user ever since Managing Your Money moved to Windows - it was not a very successful move - probably 10 years now.

4) Again, everything is in one place, easy to transfer funds between accounts, track loans and assets. I also have a complete household inventory in there.

5) It is easy to keep track of all purchases and spendings.

6) I use 2004 Home and Business.

7) I use it a lot for keeping track of my consulting invoices. It can also track mileage expenses, and business expenses which can flow over to the invoices. It can also accept payments from paypal from your invoices. It's also very handy for tracking all of your investments.

Answer 3

Both are essentially the same, except that quickbooks (a variety of quicken) os set up to run a business, and talks to TurboTax.



1: I enter all transactions & throw the receipts into the appropriate file & usually never handle the receipts again.



2: I sometimes struggle to undo mistakes



3: quickbooks about a year, microsoft money at least 10 (my folks have used quicken for ages)



4: the computer can shuffle data around much faster than I could pencil-and-paper it. (taxes go FAST)



5: point-and-click simple



6: I think it's the 05 release of Quickbooks Pro for contractors



7: if you set up your quicken file correctly, it dumps all of your data directly to turbotax, and makes tax filing point-and-click simple, as well. (as well as giving you a free e-file)

Answer 4

1) Easy to track my finances, can balance & reconcile my checking acct daily if I want to.

2) It doesn't do a good job of importing some kinds of accounts.

3) Since 2001 (first version I had was on a Mac)

4) See above

5) Yes.

6) 2008

7) Works for me.