The YNAB Blog
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The dreaded red Ready to Assign
It is startling to open your budget and see a negative Ready to Assign (RTA) at the top of the screen. Instead of the soothing grey or the buoyant green RTA you probably expect, the red one is like an ugly alarm. And this is the time of the month that it usually happens, because…
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Keep an eye on your direct import
Linking your bank and credit card accounts to YNAB can make it very easy to keep up with your transactions. They’re entered for you; all you have to do is categorize, recategorize or approve each transaction. But sometimes the direct import link breaks. And when it does, you need to pay attention. Recently I’ve had…
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Time to check your targets?
I’ve had a tumultuous summer, with downsizing from a house to an apartment and a major surgical procedure in my family. But YNAB has kept me on the straight and narrow financially. For the most part, I kept up with daily transaction categorizing, covering overspending and reconciling. (Daily is so much easier than letting it…
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New spending breakdown on mobile app
Have you noticed that on the desktop version of YNAB that Reports have been replaced by Reflect? Even better, on the mobile app, there’s a new Reflect option that provides an at-a-glance breakdown of your spending. I feel that reports have never been YNAB’s strength. I don’t tend to use reports a lot and when…
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How I process a deposit with YNAB + Profit First
I love the Profit First methodology to help small businesses be more profitable. I first read the book Profit First: Transform Your Business from a Cash-Eating Monster to a Money-Making Machine, by Michael Michaelowicz in 2015 and shortly thereafter started using it for my organizing. It revolutionized how I think about my business’s money. When…
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My favorite day of the month
Tomorrow is June 1st. Ever since I got a month ahead in YNAB, the first day of the month has become my favorite. Here’s why. Once I’ve entirely funded a month, I choose to assign additional funds that come in to a category called Future Months. The alternative would be to flip ahead to a…
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How YNAB is helping me navigate a move
After decades years in our home (our first home!), my husband and I have decided to move. It was a big decision, of course. And it’s a good decision for us. YNAB was instrumental in helping us figure out the financial side of the decision and giving us peace of mind. We’ve to decided to…
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Quick Tip: Move a transaction to another account
Have you ever manually entered a transaction into the wrong account? I typically use Direct Import but occasionally I enter a transaction manually. One reason I prefer Direct Import is to avoid entry errors, which I seem to inevitably make. One of those entry errors is entering a transaction into the wrong account. For example,…
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Simplified targets are coming!
When YNAB added targets (back then they were called goals), it was such a great feature addition. But the target types were challenging to understand. In fact, it wasn’t until I took my training to become YNAB Certified Budgeting Coach that I actually understood the target types and could explain them. Even then, the ones…
Are there YNAB and budgeting topics you’d like me to write about?