Thursday, September 17, 2009

Quicken takes Mint... refreshing?

Intuit (i.e. Quicken, QuickBooks, TurboTax also has the free online version of Quicken) is buying Mint for approximately $170 million.

wow, after reading this I was thinking poor Mint got taking over, but the blog talks about Intuit's plan!

...After the acquisition closes, the Mint.com team will be leading the development of both Mint.com and Intuit’s existing personal finance products, Quicken desktop and Quicken Online. The fact that Intuit has agreed to acquire Mint.com, and is leaving our team intact, is evidence that Intuit has been impressed by and wants to build upon the user experience that Mint.com offers. We’ll not only improve upon that experience for Mint.com but also bring our know-how to the Quicken product line. Destroying the Mint.com user experience does not make sense for Intuit, Mint.com or any of our users.
(Aaron Patzer
Founder and CEO)
It's interesting because my previous was talking about the online personal finance application and MS Money.

Reference: businesswire

Saturday, September 12, 2009

Microsoft ran out of Money?

I am a unwelling Quicken user but couldn't believe Microsoft would drop their only entry into personal finance software. MS Money no more after June 30th, 2009!

The excuse:
With banks, brokerage firms and Web sites now providing a range of options for managing personal finances, the consumer need for Microsoft Money Plus has changed. After suspending annual updates of Money Plus in 2008, Microsoft ended sales of Money Plus on June 30, 2009.

What will happen to the plus member?

Update (8/5/09): Later this year, Microsoft will release versions of Money Plus Deluxe and Money Plus Home & Business that will not require online activation. This version will allow you to keep your Money files and transactional history but will not allow access to online services or premium services. Check back here for additional information or look for future announcements in Money Plus.


of course this got me thinking what will I do if Quicken drop it's support? I know it's unlikely since Quicken is Intuite's bread and better. I'll continue this line of thinking at end of this blog.
But first Intuite's ad to get M$ Money's shares:

The Quicken team is here to help.

Right now, Quicken can transfer up to 10,000 transactions from Microsoft Money. We're currently developing an easy way for Money users to transfer more of their data into Quicken desktop products. Our goal is to make it as simple as possible to make the transition.



There are other desktop applications, but for Windows platform Quicken is the best. Other good desktop personal finance software is Moneydance it can run on Windows, Mac and Linux!

A new trends is the online version of personal finance portal they are free! Best two that I have tried is Quicken online and Mint both have it's good and bad... nothing ugly yet :-) I'll have to list the pros and cons on my later blog.

Best of luck to M$ Money users!