There are many personal finance apps out there that can make paying bills and balancing accounts as easy as texting your friends. Ashley Bona found herself in a boatload of financial trouble when she graduated from college with $70,000 in student loans and no clue on how to manage them. "My college loans were a little bit out of control when I graduated and I didn't have a realistic grasp on them." But Ashley found a high-tech way to fix that. She uses a couple of different mobile apps that break her spending down into categories and alert her to overspending. "I set a budget whether it be monthly or weekly of how much I want to spend on each category," Ashley said. "It will send me weekly alerts if I'm going over, if I have room to spare in my budget and it helps me keep track of where my money's going."
Personal financial management apps like the ones Ashley uses pull data daily from your banks, credit cards or even your 401ks. Some apps feature a snapshot of your financial standing with graphs and charts highlighting what bills need to be paid, where you spent that last $50, and how that savings plan is coming along.
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"It takes a lot of the headache out for consumers and gives you that good picture of what your money looks like without the tedious effort associated with balancing your checkbook and comparing all of your statements from all of your different online applications," according to Julie Conroy. She is the research director for Aite Group Financial Services. She said, "Some apps can help you avoid overdraft and late fees. Others may alert you of opportunities to pay down a balance quicker. "There are a lot of different things that you can get out of this. The question is what is it that you want? What are your greatest needs and then just go out there and find the app for it."
No matter what app you choose, checking your accounts regularly will not only keep you updated on your cash flow but alert you to any fraudulent behavior that you can immediately report to your financial institution. "The safety that's involved with mobile banking and digital monitoring is far superior to waiting for the statement to come to the mailbox and looking at it 30 days down the line," Conroy said.
As with any time that you download an app and share personal data like financial information and passwords you must be careful and wary of the bad guys. Mark Schwanhausser is the director for Javelin Strategy & Research. he explained, "All personal financial management applications were not created equal so you do kind of have to know who you are trusting your personal data with"
Ashley Bona uses mint.com as her go-to personal finance app but there are plenty others to consider, according to our experts. These include personalcapital.com, learnvest.com, check.com and betterhaves.com.
And here's a tip about apps: download them directly from the financial management website rather than an app store. Sometimes the bad guys post fake ones.