I’ve been trying to get my finances in order for a while. I’ve been looking up different software to help me budget, but I can’t find privacy respecting software besides Firefly III, which is self hosted. I usually try to find a few options then evaluate from there, but was wondering if you guys had any recommendations to throw in the mix!
As long as you are fine with self hosted, another option is Actual.
Seconding Actual. I’ve been self-hosting it for a while. You can also just use it as a standalone application on Windows and Linux. I update every week or so manually(you can also set up bank autosync or upload files exported from your bank), then I export a copy and back that up on an external HDD and upload to Filen.
Thirding Actual, I will admit I was using Mint for way longer than I should have for convenience, and moved to Actual after Mint shut down. If you only have a few accounts, it’s not that terrible to download transactions as QFX files and import them once a month when paying the bills. I haven’t tried SimpleFin or anything automated, but that would get you even closer to the experience of Mint.
Fourthing Actual. I download OFX files from my credit card and bank and import them and it’s all pretty easy. Never tried paying for the banksync option.
Fifthing Actual - I’ve been using it for a year now. I started with manual imports and then slowly added accounts to SimpleFin for syncing. Now all of my accounts are syncing with SimpleFin and it works great.
Another vote for Actual.
Mint was amazing, and that’s probably why it died. Credit Karma gives you basically no useful tools for getting a handle on things. And then they advertise services that are like “hey are you bad at your money? give us some of it and we’ll help you!”
Regarding Mint, If I’m remembering correctly, it seemed like they were doing a redesign of the site and then decided to shut it down. I’d have to imagine after they got purchased, all the original devs left and maintaining each connection with each bank was a huge hassle. They probably spent so much modernizing the site and still had to maintain connections, that the operational costs outweighed the income from advertising.