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Clearing Up the Confusion E-Zine Vol 02 Issue 23
------- Clearing Up the Confusion E-Zine -------
Vol 2, Issue 23
This week is Kaylie's big first birthday. We had a party for her
on Saturday. She was cute as a button, of course, in a little
pink dress and white tights. Of course, she was as excited by
the paper and boxes as she was the actual presents, but that's
much to be expected, or so I've heard. Lisa and I have also
decided she won't be getting more chocolate cake until at least
her second birthday. That resolution came at about 3am while we
watched our daughter running back and forth with what can only be
termed an "excess of energy".
All that aside, though, it shocked me how fast that first year
had gone by. Wasn't it just yesterday that I first held her in
my arms? It's time now to start looking to her future and how we
are going to help her get there. I've heard I might even have to
*pay* for a few things! That being the case, this issue's tool
should come in handy. Read about it below.
Oh, and I'm sure Lisa will have some new entries up on Kaylie's
blog. Feel free to check it out at:
http://kaylie.cyberdatasolutionsllc.com/blog.php
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In This Issue...
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1. Article: A Mint on My Pillow
2. Shameless Self-Promotion
3. The Fine Print
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1. Article: A Mint on My Pillow
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OK, I'll admit it, I'm a bit of a numbers guy. Figuring
percentages in my head, doing math-based puzzles, even balancing
a checkbook, are all good, clean fun for me (pity my wife).
Still, for all of that, going through my bank statements and
credit card records to analyze my spending habits can be a little
tedious. Wouldn't it be cool to have an online tool that would
help me with some of this?
Enter Mint.com.
When I first heard of Mint.com, I thought it was some sort of
online version of Quicken. Not really. What it actually does is
help you track your money flow automatically. It helps you
analze your behaviors and develop budgets and financial plans for
the future.
Sign-up is pretty straight-forward. You don't even need to enter
your name. Just use an email address for your login ID and
you're pretty much set to go. Add the access information for
your various bank accounts, credit cards, and investment
accounts. Mint downloads and tracks the transactions from these
accounts to give you a pretty accurate picture of where you stand
at any given moment.
One group for whom this would be helpful right away would be
folks like my father-in-law, Joe Herness. He likes to check his
accounts on a daily basis in order to make sure nothing odd is
happening. He could even set up a series of alerts to track the
activity on those accounts if he chose.
Mint is a tool under constant development and, as such, is still
missing some features that would be nice to have. One glaring
omission is the inability to record your assets. I would really
like to record the value of our house in the system. Right now
it just records the mortgage, which makes our net worth
significantly worse than it really is.
Of course, if you aren't comfortable with online banking, then
you might run into a few challenges with Mint. For every account
that you want to track through the service, you have to have
already set up online access to the account. Even those who have
already done so may have qualms about letting Mint have access to
their information. In this respect, at least, Mint seems to have
gone to great lengths to ensure security on multiple levels. You
can check out what they have to say at:
http://www.mint.com/privacy/
Of course, ultimately it is up to you whether you are
comfortable.
For me, Mint has already proven quite useful. Not only is it a
convenient place to have all of my current financial information,
but just recently it sent me a reminder about a credit card
payment that was coming up. I probably would have remembered,
but it was nice to realize that I would have been OK, even my
memory had failed me.
Do you use any online banking tools? What have worked best for
you? Drop me a line and let me know about your experiences at
gpeters@cyberdatasolutionsllc.com.
Copyright 2008, Greg Peters
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2. Shameless Self-Promotion
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The "Clearing Up the Confusion" E-Zine is a production of Greg
Peters, owner, chief cook, and bottlewasher of Cyber Data
Solutions. CDS has been helping website designers develop better
web presence for their clients for more than a decade. Visit us
on the Web at www.cyberdatasolns.com to see how we can help your
webmaster.
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3. The Fine Print
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