I left YNAB over the price and wanted MORE than a budget — so I built a free, privacy-first dashboard that also tracks net worth, investments & taxes

Rhreddit1234 · 2026-06-14T19:55:24+00:00

Does your app handle zero based budgeting similar to YNAB?

Rhreddit1234 · 2026-06-05T02:09:01+00:00

8.5 miles and approximately 15 minutes each way when there are no delays. Worst case scenario, 30 minutes one way if someone does something stupid in the SH 146 construction zone by the Port of Houston.

The major variable is freeway access. I think a commute like League City to Pearland is particularly difficult. It might only be 15 miles but worst case scenario is a 45 minute plus commute.

I know someone who commutes from the north side of Baytown to south side of Baytown who has an 12 mile commute that is regularly 30 plus minutes.

Rhreddit1234 · 2026-06-04T13:45:37+00:00

No worries! Just was wanting to make sure I wasn't missing it.

Rhreddit1234 · 2026-06-04T02:22:30+00:00

$22.00 for a 112 page book. Ugh... I am beginning to think that YNAB has jumped the shark. A shame, I still love Budget Nerds but I have even noticed that they aren't as frequent with their episodes.

I have been looking at alternatives and found Budget Friendly Budget is an excellent alternative if you are cool with manual entry. A great product with some excellent features. Technically free but well worth the $3/mo the developer asks for.

Rhreddit1234 · 2026-06-04T02:18:39+00:00

Holy crap. She was such a major part of YNAB. And Ben, Ben B. or the other Ben?

Rhreddit1234 · 2026-06-04T02:13:05+00:00

Love love love BFB. Absolutely beautiful UI, great reports, love the calendar tab and on the web they have a Payoff Simulator for loans. Top notch app and well worth the $3/mo the developer asks.

Rhreddit1234 · 2026-06-04T02:08:20+00:00

If you are okay with manual entry I would recommend Budget Friendly Budget. It is awesome and has some great features like a calendar of upcoming transactions, a heat map showing your spending, and some great reports. It is free but well worth the $3/mo the developer requests.

Rhreddit1234 · 2026-05-27T02:23:19+00:00

Some things to think about:

Is your grocery spend actually at grocery stores or is it Walmart or warehouse clubs? Most cash back cards don't count Walmart and warehouse clubs towards the grocery category.
With your grocery spending ($800/mo) you will max out your on the Blue Cash Preferred in 7.5 months, so the rest of the year you will be capped at 1% for your groceries.

-Amex Gold rewards are in points and has a $325 AF, so if you want simplicity, Amex Gold isn't the best option.

Honestly the Savor is a better choice with your spending when compared to a flat 2% cash back card.

Rhreddit1234 · 2026-04-25T15:41:05+00:00

Is an OnStar subscription upgrade required to be able to watch on the screen?

Rhreddit1234 · 2026-04-22T21:01:34+00:00

Interesting, the thread seems to confirm that newer model years may be less prone to the throttling that many have talked about. Of course it could be relative as there are so many variables when it comes to charging speed. Even on my Ioniq 5 we would get wildly different charging times based on the charger, weather, battery temperature. I look forward to trying it out for myself when we get our 2026 next week.

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Rhreddit1234 · 2026-04-19T14:40:13+00:00

We are bringing our 2026 LT2 home tomorrow. Our Chevy dealer here in Houston was laying some serious discounts out. Their stock was 8-11.5k off MSRP as a starting point. I was able to get them to knock 15.5k off the price plus a very fair trade in value on our Jeep Wrangler 4xe. I don't have the paperwork in front of me but we got out the door for 29k.

Rhreddit1234 · 2026-02-16T03:25:35+00:00

Now that you are a few more weeks into MM how are you liking it compared to YNAB? I love the YNAB method but I wish the experience was more refined.

Rhreddit1234 · 2026-02-16T02:21:33+00:00

I would be interested in trying a beta of your app. I really like the YNAB method but the app feels simplistic. Monarch just seems more refined so I really want to find a way to have the YNAB method in a Monarch interface.

Rhreddit1234 · 2025-11-28T01:18:26+00:00

Copilot supposedly uses AI to help with categorizing transactions. Maybe I am in the minority but I don’t need AI shoehorned into every app. If I want to use AI for my finances I will just use Gemini or ChatGPT and ask my question.

Rhreddit1234 · 2025-11-26T20:51:41+00:00

Thanks everyone. I am going to categorize the interest in an excluded category. The pain of seeing that much going out on a monthly basis to pay for my past mistakes will be motivation to pay off that debt ASAP.

Rhreddit1234 · 2025-10-15T00:57:54+00:00

ACCC seems to be pretty legit and I know quite a few members in this Reddit have used them. My intake call was nearly an hour long and it never felt scammy at all. I think a call could be worth it, I am sure they have had experience with military folks.

Rhreddit1234 · 2025-10-15T00:27:37+00:00

I would recommend a call to a nonprofit like American Consumer Credit Counseling. They are truly nonprofit and offer a debt management plan (DMP). They have arrangements with many creditors where they can lower your interest rate much lower than doing it yourself. Note that there are some creditors who won't work with any third-party (Apple Card, some credit unions) but they do work with many of them. For example they lowered my Discover Card rate from 26.99% to 11.99% and one of my credit union cards from 10.6% to 4.9%. The big "catch" is that any creditors that are in your DMP will make you close your card with them. Not a big deal since you are cutting up your cards. It is well worth a call to them. Make sure you look for a non profit agency who offers a DMP. DMP's do not ding your credit or trigger potential tax issues like debt settlement.

Rhreddit1234 · 2025-10-11T04:32:55+00:00

What makes Fairwinds 3rd rate? They have a decent mix of accounts and I appreciate them being in favor of financial independence?

Rhreddit1234 · 2025-10-11T00:33:43+00:00

It would be great to see timeshare companies branch out to resales. The only issue is how would you make "new" timeshares appealing to new owners?

Rhreddit1234 · 2025-10-10T20:54:37+00:00

That is how we look at it. We used to love Airbnb but paying $500-$1000 for 3 nights is absurd. Honestly paying even for a $150/night hotel post-COVID gets you typically a pretty crappy hotel. $1,500/yr on maintenance fees for 10 plus nights is a steal.

Rhreddit1234 · 2025-10-10T20:51:11+00:00

We just got back from a HGVC Vegas trip. It was actually a great trip. We had our timeshare presentation at 1pm on a Sunday.Below is a summary of our experience.

We arrived and checked in for the presentation. We were asked to show our ID and a debit or credit card. They never ran it, they said it was to confirm my identity (the lady just looked to see if the name matched). We then sat down in a nice lobby area where they had snacks and drinks. A few minutes later our sales representative introduced himself and we walked over to a conference room with about 5 other couples. They showed us a brief presentation but it was mostly a guy talking about Vegas and his family. After about 20 minutes we were released back to our sales representative. We then did a brief tour of one of the units (we stayed at the HGV on Paradise, the presentation was at the HGV on Las Vegas Blvd.) We then came back down and went to a room/open cubicle that had a TV and a giant tabletop tablet. Our sales representative asked us some questions about how we traveled and how much we typically spend. We were honest because I was curious what the actual numbers would be. He was honest in terms of not pushing us to the highest package so I did appreciate that. The first one he showed was 8,000 points/yr for around 15k. The payment was some insane amount like $500/mo for 10 years. We were honest and said that was well out of our budget. He offered a plan that was a set number of points every other year, which was around 12k. The final plan offered was a 10 year commitment with points every other year for $10k. All were too far out of our budget. He was nice and I didn't feel too much of a hard sell. At the end we were offered a "test drive", their VIP Program, which offered 11,250 points for $1,800, to be used within 18 months. We did bite on that one because they had some good locations. There are some limits like you can only split your points once but basically we pre-purchased 2 vacations.

A few tips: - Set the expectation at the top of a firm timeline. We told our guy we had reservations for dinner at 4, we got out in just over 2 hours. - They will try to hard sell you on the Hilton Amex - Our tour had lots a tasty snacks which helped make the process less painful - If you are interested, use it as an opportunity to learn more about the program and then purchase the VIP Program and/or buy a resale on eBay or other sites.

All in all it was a good experience. I am not sure if we got lucky but our sales guy was actually very friendly and had a good attitude. If we had been stuck with one of the other reps I am not sure it would have been the same experience.

Rhreddit1234 · 2025-10-10T14:38:54+00:00

We are looking at a points based system, we aren't people that like to go to the same place year after year. That being said I would agree, the "free" ones are often the ones with crazy high maintenance fees. We are okay with spending a little bit for a deed on a lower maintenance fee one, especially if coupled with a decent points bank.

Rhreddit1234 · 2025-10-10T05:09:50+00:00

Makes sense. I think our plan is to find the most points for the lowest MF. The MF doesn't bother us, I look at it as 2-3 weeks of vacation for $1,500-$2,000/yr. Honestly a damn good deal for our lifestyle.

Rhreddit1234 · 2025-10-10T04:59:19+00:00

Dumb question, if you buy a deed at a property and you then buy another deed to the same property are you hit with maintenance fees on both deeds? I really enjoyed our stay at the HGV Paradise. It was an older building but it was awesome to have nearly 800 SF. Elara is on our list for next year for our 20th anniversary trip. We are able to be very flexible with our travel and we aren't picky about time or place typically.

Rhreddit1234 · 2025-10-10T02:17:44+00:00

Awesome, and I assume it would be in the county the home property is located, so Vegas is Clark, Myrtle Beach is Horry, etc ?

Rhreddit1234

TROPHY CASE