At the end of 2022, I discovered this software that I’ve been using all year. I’d like to hear your thoughts or experiences with GnuCash, or whatever system/program you use to track your personal finances!

For the ones unfamiliar, it’s based on a double-entry accounting system; every transaction always has at least two accounts involved. Example: if I spend 200 SEK on a restaurant, it goes from Assets:Cash to Expenses:Food.

Starting by creating my own accounts, it helped me immensely to have an overview of my general financial situation.

Around March, I found enlightening to re-define what expenses needed their own category from what I was unconsciously lumping into ‘others’. Having it all already logged, made it quite easy . The caveat is that all the entries are manual, but my finances are not as complex, so with 30-45 minutes a week I have it updated.

You can even create diagrams for your monthly expenses, or general balance, among other reports that come quite handy if you want to run a query.

  • namelivia@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    I’ve been using Homebank for this, I may easily have every transaction for the last like 10 years

    • FaceButt9000@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      I tried gnucash but also went to homebank. It isn’t perfect, but I found it worked a lot better for my purposes than gnucash.

        • FaceButt9000@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          I don’t remember anything specific. I think homebank just felt simpler. I’m just using it to track personal finances across a few bank accounts and a couple of credit cards, so I didn’t need anything special.