You Need A Budget Catch-all

Gah, almost a year to the day after I started using it.

I don't know about web-only. The pricing seems fair so long as they make it worthwhile. I'll try it out for a year and see, but subscription pricing has always seemed to me to be a way to sell a piece of software at full price every year without necessarily needing to convince users the software has improved enough to justify the price. I'll wait to see how impressed I am, the site is down at the moment.

Not impressed, I think the price is too high compared to the value we've had from YNAB 4, many of the features aren't there yet - you can't even import your old budget.

They could have introduced the web version as a cheaper subscription add-on to the current product and gradually improved it while maintaining syncing and features of the desktop app, I think that would be easier to accept.
For now I'll continue with the current version and try out the new one when it has a few more features.

Man, I'm fine with good software going subscription. I'm not fine with the subscription being the same price as buying the software every year. It's the same with Office 365.

Wow, that really is unfortunate. I can understand no longer doing deep discounts, but $50 a year is too much. Not impressed with online only, either.

I've owned this for a while now, but never got around to actually setting it up and using it. Kind of feels silly to start now, since I'll apparently only be able to use it for a year. I'm in the boat that $50/year is too high for a subscription fee.

$50 a year is only $4 a month (give or take), or, less than $1 a week.

I pay $11/month for Netflix, and I pay $10/month for PS+. I also pay $99/year for my kids to use IXL Maths software, and I pay CrashPlan $69/year to look after my data. YNAB doesn't seem that expensive compared to those other prices, and if it's helping you maintain a budget, move away from that paycheck to paycheck cycle, then isn't that a good value proposition (especially if you're using it everyday)?

I haven't set up my system, as the numbers and spread sheets just didn't gel with me in the desktop App. The philosophy did, however, and in the last 18 months, we've gone from being in the situation of foreclosing on the house, to being able to 'weather' an unexpected Tax bill of $3,500. I can say that YNAB saved me financially. I'll be checking out the web site to see what the over haul offers, and might use it to maintain this even keel. I've noticed this last Christmas that a few 'splurges' can really rock the boat.

I like online (as long as it is verified secure) as it means I can "finally" access through my Windows Phone.

m0nk3yboy wrote:

I pay $11/month for Netflix, and I pay $10/month for PS+. I also pay $99/year for my kids to use IXL Maths software, and I pay CrashPlan $69/year to look after my data. YNAB doesn't seem that expensive compared to those other prices, and if it's helping you maintain a budget, move away from that paycheck to paycheck cycle, then isn't that a good value proposition (especially if you're using it everyday)?

I like online (as long as it is verified secure) as it means I can "finally" access through my Windows Phone.

This is how I'm looking at it for the first year, but these subscriptions add up.

There's an app to check balances on WP, but it's useless for entering transactions.

Has there been any confirmation that YNAB 4 will stop working? "Not supporting"' doesn't necessarily mean your local software stops functioning.

I'd been waiting for a steam sale on this, but I guess not now.

I'll keep rocking my own spreadsheets I suppose.

It's a great tool but I'm not really sure it merits $50 each year. Like m0nk3yboy, I've found it very valuable and have evangelized it to others who found it even more helpful but it's a tool that SHOULD be straightforward and not in need of constant changes so just let me pay for it once.

It's ironic considering one of the first things YNAB helped me do was question the recurring charges I wasn't getting the full benefit from.

Michael wrote:

Has there been any confirmation that YNAB 4 will stop working? "Not supporting"' doesn't necessarily mean your local software stops functioning.

They've said they are not going to do anything to stop it from working, and they will put out fixes and patches for at least another year. They are even still selling it on Steam. I hope to get at least another three years out of it.

I use Netflix enough to justify the price.
The same with Amazon's Prime and LastPass $12.00 subscription.

I cancelled my Marvel Unlimited after a year because I didn't feel I was getting my money's worth.
I don't know why, but even with such a great piece of software, I don't feel YNAB is worth $50.00 a year.

Not because of the quality, but how much I use it and how much I benefit from using it.

Here's their blog post about the changes. It includes the pricing, security information, and details on the year of support for YNAB 4 and related apps, and what to do if you bought YNAB 4 in the last year to get some free new YNAB. It also links to migrating instructions and comparisons with YNAB 4.

Some other highlights I saw:

Will there be a desktop app for the new YNAB?
Yes. It’s on our roadmap as one of our first major initiatives.
...
You can now import transactions directly from your bank. (Yes! Really!) This improves upon the prior import feature, which required you to first visit your bank’s website and download a set of transactions. YNAB now does that for you in the background.

The import part is probably where some of the recurring cost is coming from. I know my bank charges for the privilege of program automatic downloads if I wanted to use that. Manual downloads are free, just not the type YNAB is talking about.

There's some other neat stuff they're adding with moving money around category to category, as well as managing goal-based budgets (saving for a new computer, type of things).

It's well worth a read. I've loved YNAB 4, and use it every single day. It's right up my budgeting alley, and after reading up on all the changes, I'm on board for the new YNAB. I'm not too thrilled for another recurring cost, but the time savers they're adding will more than make up for the >$4 a month I'll be spending with the lifetime 10% annual discount thing.

tl;dr Here's some official information. I liked the improvements and will be upgrading. But I also use the heck out of YNAB, so it'll be worth the cost for me.

EDIT: Well, it looks like Gravey hit those links a page back, too. So, here they are again.

Here's a new update from YNAB about getting the discount:

Some of you YNAB 4 users have wanted more time to lock in the lifetime 10% discount, especially as it relates to waiting for some favorite features (reports, the blessed calculator) to make it into the new YNAB. We don't want you to feel any anxiety about locking in that lifetime discount. As of today, if you sign up for the new YNAB with the same email address you used when you purchased YNAB 4, you'll get the discount. You won't need to subscribe. Just set up that trial. If you come back two weeks or two months from now and choose to subscribe, you'll get that 10% lifetime discount.

I'm with m0nk3yboy and Antichulius: I'd just as soon YNAB wasn't a subscription, but then I add up all my other voluntary monthly and annual subscriptions—Netflix, Lastpass, Crashplan, WRC+, food bank (plus the fact that I just used YNAB right now to look those up)—and yeah there's room for a program I use every day, plus it's cheaper than all those except Lastpass.

Antichulius wrote:

Here's a new update from YNAB about getting the discount:

Some of you YNAB 4 users have wanted more time to lock in the lifetime 10% discount, especially as it relates to waiting for some favorite features (reports, the blessed calculator) to make it into the new YNAB. We don't want you to feel any anxiety about locking in that lifetime discount. As of today, if you sign up for the new YNAB with the same email address you used when you purchased YNAB 4, you'll get the discount. You won't need to subscribe. Just set up that trial. If you come back two weeks or two months from now and choose to subscribe, you'll get that 10% lifetime discount.

I wonder what email that is if you bought it off Steam like I did...

LeapingGnome wrote:
Antichulius wrote:

Here's a new update from YNAB about getting the discount:

Some of you YNAB 4 users have wanted more time to lock in the lifetime 10% discount, especially as it relates to waiting for some favorite features (reports, the blessed calculator) to make it into the new YNAB. We don't want you to feel any anxiety about locking in that lifetime discount. As of today, if you sign up for the new YNAB with the same email address you used when you purchased YNAB 4, you'll get the discount. You won't need to subscribe. Just set up that trial. If you come back two weeks or two months from now and choose to subscribe, you'll get that 10% lifetime discount.

I wonder what email that is if you bought it off Steam like I did...

As did I. I used the same email I have on steam, just in case, but I'm sure there will be more details coming soon for us Steam users. I imagine a quick message to support would resolve it if needed.

yeah there's room for a program I use every day, plus it's cheaper than all those except Lastpass.

Are they providing you an ongoing service? If not, that's like renting a machine instead of buying it.

Malor wrote:
yeah there's room for a program I use every day, plus it's cheaper than all those except Lastpass.

Are they providing you an ongoing service? If not, that's like renting a machine instead of buying it.

Antichulius mentioned the automatic import of transactions which isn't free for YNAB to do, plus they dropped Dropbox for syncing, so I guess there's that? In the sense that I'm also paying for syncing with Lastpass, and storage space with Crashplan?

Gravey wrote:
Malor wrote:
yeah there's room for a program I use every day, plus it's cheaper than all those except Lastpass.

Are they providing you an ongoing service? If not, that's like renting a machine instead of buying it.

Antichulius mentioned the automatic import of transactions which isn't free for YNAB to do, plus they dropped Dropbox for syncing, so I guess there's that? In the sense that I'm also paying for syncing with Lastpass, and storage space with Crashplan?

Mint.com offers automatic import of transactions for free. I am not saying Mint is better than YNAB (and IMO it is not) but there are business models that currently allow to provide this service without charging for it. Besides, automatic import is a convenience feature a lot of us could live without and, by itself, it doesn't justify subscription. Additionally, it introduces security concerns and for many people/banks it simply won't work properly for quite some time (or ever), similarly to Mint, simply because most banks don't like sharing this information with other companies.

In other words, it could be an optional addon.

Fortunately, they say automatic import is not the only new service this subscription-based software is going to provide. Unfortunately, it is completely unclear what other service(s) there will be and when.

As such, between web-based UI (yak!), security concerns, their technical challenges and unclear value-add compared to YNAB 4, I will wait for at least half a year, maybe a year, to see how it all shakes down. $4 a month is not going to break my budget but I am not going to pay them subscription price for something I already have either.

Hedinn wrote:

As such, between web-based UI (yak!), security concerns, their technical challenges and unclear value-add compared to YNAB 4, I will wait for at least half a year, maybe a year, to see how it all shakes down. $4 a month is not going to break my budget but I am not going to pay them subscription price for something I already have either.

+1 to wait-and-see approach. Being a European the import of banking reports is meaningless to me. Besides I'm used to once-a-week reconciliation that is a snap with mobile banking (I enter ALL my spending through YNAB app as soon as it's made, so reconciling is quick), so I think auto import would be more hassle for me. I'm curious what new possibilities will nYNAB offer but so far I'm sticking to YNAB4.

I have mixed feelings about it. Could have stayed with the older version which still will work till the end of days.
But, I don't mind supporting them a bit more and the price is pretty fair (year sub). I look at it as something that will pay for itself in the end. I just need to commit better to it to make it work how it should.
Will give it a year and see how I like it. I can always go back to the old one.

wanderingtaoist wrote:
Hedinn wrote:

As such, between web-based UI (yak!), security concerns, their technical challenges and unclear value-add compared to YNAB 4, I will wait for at least half a year, maybe a year, to see how it all shakes down. $4 a month is not going to break my budget but I am not going to pay them subscription price for something I already have either.

+1 to wait-and-see approach. Being a European the import of banking reports is meaningless to me. Besides I'm used to once-a-week reconciliation that is a snap with mobile banking (I enter ALL my spending through YNAB app as soon as it's made, so reconciling is quick), so I think auto import would be more hassle for me. I'm curious what new possibilities will nYNAB offer but so far I'm sticking to YNAB4.

This. I don't really save any money by using YNAB, it's more of a reporting tool for me.

I've been running into multiple bugs on the new version. I'm thinking I'll stick with the old YNAB until they at least get a desktop app. Then I'll consider it unless they add a WP app when I'll probably subscribe.

Yeah, I tried to set up the new version, but a couple things are bugging the hell out of me.

For one, I just can't wrap my head around the new way they handle credit card purchases. Before, you budget your money for the purchase, make the purchase with the credit card, then transfer that amount from the bank to the credit card. Now, though, credit cards are listed as their own budget items, and purchases made on them get transferred as a negative balance to the overall balance of the credit card's budget category, I guess? I had just become so used to a credit card not counting as an actual budget item if it's been paid off, that the way they handle it just throws me off.

Aside from the credit card business (or maybe because of it, I can't figure this one out yet, either), the budgets just don't line up the same as my YNAB4 budgets. I mean the total amount available to budget is different, the amount available per month after assigning all of my categories their total budgets (monthly addition + last month's leftovers). After doing the math on paper between all of my accounts, my wife's accounts, and credit cards, YNAB online just doesn't line up. I have no idea what's going on-- starting from scratch is WAAAAY off. Trying to transfer from YNAB 4, either manually or through their transfer option, has the total worth correct, but then "Available to Budget" is completely off after assigning the same budget amounts from YNAB4.

Extremely frustrating, so I went back to YNAB4 for the time being. I'd love to have the bank import option, and everything being online is convenient, but until I can wrap my head around the way they handle credit cards, I'm going to hold off.

I do miss a dedicated desktop app as well. Using a browser makes it feel cheaper in a way. Maybe it's just me.
Too bad I cannot use the program with my Dutch bank account.

Sparhawk wrote:

I do miss a dedicated desktop app as well. Using a browser makes it feel cheaper in a way. Maybe it's just me.

No, it's not just you, it's a well known "feature" of browser based applications.

Honestly, I am surprised they decided to release their subscription based service in such a half assed state. IMO release and first impression are hugely important for services like that, once your customers are disappointed and left, it's much harder to get them back a few months later.

Hedinn wrote:

Mint.com offers automatic import of transactions for free.

Only for ones that occur after you have connected accounts, and this feature breaks all the time (my mortgage account hasn't updated for over a month, and Mint blames the mortgage provider for upgrading their login security!). Learned this the hard way when I tried to fix an investment account for which the numbers inexplicably wonked out by removing it and adding it back.

Does YNAB let you track direct deposit pay checks and investment accounts? Would love a service that could track adp directly to follow how much I'm putting into 401k etc. each pay period, and provide all up growth/loss metrics. Mint's investment tracking is completely broken.

Hedinn wrote:
Sparhawk wrote:

I do miss a dedicated desktop app as well. Using a browser makes it feel cheaper in a way. Maybe it's just me.

No, it's not just you, it's a well known "feature" of browser based applications.

Honestly, I am surprised they decided to release their subscription based service in such a half assed state. IMO release and first impression are hugely important for services like that, once your customers are disappointed and left, it's much harder to get them back a few months later.

They had a deadline. If I remember right they've said before that about half of their business comes around January with new year's resolutions. That doesn't excuse it of course, they chose to roll out an unfinished product rather than wait another year. On the other hand, smart software companies don't roll out an all new release at their busiest time... they've handled the whole thing poorly.

Chairman_Mao wrote:
Hedinn wrote:

Mint.com offers automatic import of transactions for free.

Only for ones that occur after you have connected accounts, and this feature breaks all the time (my mortgage account hasn't updated for over a month, and Mint blames the mortgage provider for upgrading their login security!).

And all this stuff is going to be the same for YNAB, it's not like they've designed a standard unified interface that all US/Canada financial institutions agreed to start using for transactions import/export.

Automated transactions import is at best unreliable. Which makes it double puzzling why they don't have manual import at "release".

The smart thing for them to do was to dress this release up as a free beta and use it to build awareness as they deliver more and more features. Then at some point, like October 2016, go live and start charging for it. Lots of people who got hooked on a free beta would continue to pay and the whole thing would have been a positive PR for YNAB.