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Quicken 2007 Update Available

by Luke Landes

Last month, I wrote about my disappointment with Quicken 2007 Home & Business on Windows. Today, Intuit released an update to the software. Here are the listed improvements: * A choice of color schemes is available in the Preferences dialog. * Quicken no longer moves accounts assigned to the Business Center to the Cash Flow ... Continue reading this article…

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Do Not Upgrade to Quicken 2007, It’s Horrible

by Luke Landes

If you have been considering upgrading to Intuit’s Quicken 2007, don’t. More than a month ago, I upgraded from Quicken Home & Business 2006 to Quicken Home & Business 2007, and many things have not gone smoothly since the transition. Many of the new features that the company claims to have been added to the ... Continue reading this article…

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Free Software to Make Your Computer Run Better, Stronger, Faster

by Luke Landes

These tools are indispensible. When I coach people through buying and setting up computers, I always suggest they forego the software pack that comes with computers purchased at Circuit City, Best Buy, and any number of manufacturer-direct shops, and install the following free software instead. AVG Free Anti-Virus. This anti-virus scanner is as good as ... Continue reading this article…

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Tracking My Cash Spending

by Luke Landes

Somehow, I haven’t been diligent enough in tracking my cash spending. According to my Quicken software, my cash account balance is about $550. That means I should have $550 in my wallet and coin jar. That is obviously not the case. My lowest cash balance was $50 in May 2005. Since then, the recorded balance ... Continue reading this article…

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New HSBC Direct Customers Can’t Access All Features

by Luke Landes

Reader Brian submitted the following: According to your Savings Account Rates page, HSBC Direct supports Quicken Direct Connect for downloading transactions. However, I just opened an Online Savings account there, and when I tried to set up Quicken with Direct Connect, I always got an error message saying, “Your financial institution has rejected your request.” ... Continue reading this article…

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Excel Template for Net Worth Report (Balance Sheet)

by Luke Landes

The way I create my personal balance sheet is similar to the process I just described for my income and expense report. I export a net worth report from Quicken, customized to include all my accounts through the end of the reporting month, and import the data into Excel. My personal template is linked directly ... Continue reading this article…

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Excel Template for Income and Expense Report

by Luke Landes

Related: Excel Template for Net Worth Report (Balance Sheet). And when you’re done, learn to make accurate predictions. In order to create my Income Statements (here is the latest for example), I use two main tools. All of my transactions are entered into Quicken. I used to use Microsoft Money but I switched a few ... Continue reading this article…

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Fed Up

by Luke Landes

The Federal Reserve Board raised the federal funds rate to 5.25 percent today. Consumers like us will eventually see that increase in mortgage loan and credit card interest rates. While I don’t have a mortgage and I don’t pay interest to credit cards at the moment, I do have student loans that have been affected by ... Continue reading this article…

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Quicken 2007?

by Luke Landes

One of my banks (Wachovia, where I have a checking account) is already offering downloads for Quicken 2007. The software’s not out yet, and I’ve come across only one report of a beta test for Macintosh users. I don’t expect there to be many improvements in the software compared to Quicken 2006, which I have ... Continue reading this article…

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Google Spreadsheets, a New Web App

by Luke Landes

Today, Google will launch Google Spreadsheets, a web application within the Google Labs “playground.” This might be a great medium to share financial calculators and the data I include on my net worh and income statements. ZDNet says the service will be able to import Microsoft Excel spreadsheets. Excel allows the user to create intense ... Continue reading this article…

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Quicken Fanatics

by Luke Landes

Over a year ago, I switched from Microsoft Money to Intuit Quicken for managing and recording my personal finances. I wouldn’t call myself a fanatic of either software. Neither one is perfect and does everything the way I want. There are people out there who are Quicken fanatics. According to one site, there is a ... Continue reading this article…

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Tracking Restricted Stock in Quicken

by Luke Landes

As I mentioned earlier today, employees in my company have been granted restricted stock, vesting in three years. I decided to do some research to try to determine how to track the value in Quicken, which I use for tracking my personal finances. From what I can tell through some Google research, you don’t track ... Continue reading this article…

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Microsoft Money 2004

by Luke Landes

Over the last couple of days, Microsoft has released their new version of their personal finance software, Microsoft Money 2004. PC Magazine has already reviewed this updated version. They seemed to be quite happy. I’ve used both Intuit’s Quicken 2003 and Money 2003 (concurrently) to compare the two pieces of software, and unlike many people ... Continue reading this article…

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