Comments on: Making Personal Finance Effortless, Profitable, and Free

By: Bocaboy

Bocaboy — Sun, 20 Sep 2009 14:02:12 +0000

So if Quicken was so expensive and guilty of upselling, how come you just sold Mint to Intuit? Will you continue to have any say in keeping the site free, or was the purpose of the purchase for Intuit just to push Mint off to the side and continue to build quicken.com?

By: Mark

Mark — Sat, 10 Jan 2009 16:19:42 +0000

I don’t quite understand this story. If Aaron invented auto-categorization, why is Yodlee using it? And why is Mint a weaker version of Yodlee? Did Aaron patent his idea and sell it to Yodlee? Is Yodlee one of Aaron’s project?

By: Highlancer

Highlancer — Wed, 13 Aug 2008 19:24:16 +0000

I am having a real struggle with trying to move completely over the Mint.com, I have been using Mvelopes for awhile and while I am very disappointed with technical aspects of the product (have to authenicate with my bank every time) it does provide one key feature that Mint does not. Mvelopes allows you to track monies that we NOT spent and carry them over to the following month, i.e. I budget $50/month for gifts, but I don’t buy gifts every month, I want to be able to see what I have saved TOWARDS gifts when I need to purchase one. This is the ONLY reason I have not been able to switch completely over to Mint.com.

Is this possibly something that is in the roadmap for Mint.com and if so when?

Thanks!
~Lance

By: Riz

Riz — Sun, 02 Mar 2008 00:11:49 +0000

Eric,

The business model seems to be in the ‘More ways to save’ tab of the software. It shows ways users can switch vendors of their existing services to save money, like Utilities and Credit cards (For example: “You now pay Comcast $150, switch to Verizon FIOS for $100 and save $50 every month.”) There’s a small label ‘Sponsored Advertiesement’ by the side of the vendor (e.g.: Verizon). It seems like Verizon and others pay to have their quotes presented to applicable potential customers. A great twist on the online pay-per-click search business model if you ask me. Looks like there’s growth in this model IMO because the potential cost savings for a user (i.e., a user’s real value) increases the likelihood that Mint actually results in actual business to vendors (as opposed to simply taking you to the vendor’s site and leaving the user to decide the value in selecting that vendor).

Thanks,
Riz.

By: Raj

Raj — Fri, 18 Jan 2008 20:29:49 +0000

I’ve just registered with Mint and and learning all the features. Reading your story I’m more assured that I’ve come to the right product because your story of dealing with MS Money and Quicken parallels my experience as well. Having to manually reconcile and enter missing ledger data was a chore all for just 5 minutes of analysis that I actually wanted which was usually where was I spending my discretionary dollars–dining, entertainment?–should I stay home a few more evenings and actually rein in my fast food spending? That’s all I wanted to know, and every product I tried made it so difficult to know this simple information.

Prior to finding Mint I looked into Mvelopes and QuickenOnline, but both charged monthly fees. I like you thought, “why should I pay to save?” It seems so counterintuitive. Someone who was likewise doing the trial period at QuickenOnline mentioned Mint and so here I am. With Mint I look forward to understanding my budget in 2008 and making management decisions with confidence & knowledge and not fear and intrepediation. If my wife asks me if we can treat ourselves to a nice restaurant this month, I’d like to say, “yes we can!” instead of finding out no we couldn’t when our credit card statement arrives. For accomplishing this simple task, I hope you get your patent!

By: Paul

Paul — Tue, 12 Jun 2007 23:30:56 +0000

Will you be able to easily create some sort of spending “budget”, track non spending accounts, and net worth?

By: Viet

Viet — Tue, 12 Jun 2007 23:15:34 +0000

Paul: We do have a post with a slight preview of how Mint can track your spendings.

How well Mint compares to other services and software depends on who the user is. Some people actually like to use Quicken, and carefully categorize each of their expenses. We’re creating Mint for those that don’t have the time or capability to manage their finances (e.g., like categorizing each of their transactions).

In short, we’re focused on a free, simple, and secure personal finance tool that not only shows you where your money is going, but gives you personalized ways to save and make more money via patent pending algorithms.

By: Paul

Paul — Tue, 12 Jun 2007 17:02:18 +0000

Can we at least see some sort of preview/screenshots/intended feature set of the software. I am highly interested in a web based alternative to quicken for a number of reasons. I am also a fairly impatient person. I just need a bone to chew on to keep me around. I love what I’m hearing here and am very interested, but I’ve been looking at a couple others too. Free sounds great!!! I am also willing to pay a small fee for the features I need though.

I guess the real question I have is how exactly will your service measure up or surpass the completion (web based or not)?

I hope that doesn’t sound to harsh it’s not meant to be…I just don’t see a lot of details here:)

By: Dr. Mary Gresham

Dr. Mary Gresham — Sun, 29 Apr 2007 19:33:29 +0000

Hey..I am a psychologist interested in money issues….especially for women in their 20′s..once again I am noticing that the majority of the posts are from guys….where are you, young women of the US? About the financial interviews, I think I can shed some light on some of the topics so here it goes…I totally agree that sharing personal stories is one of the best ways to learn and this is especially true for women…who may all be on relationship blogs right now. The sooner you start, the better off you will be. My biggest mistake is the same one that most women make…not getting that interested in money until I got divorced and became a single mom. …and getting too much student loan debt in grad school. I love your idea and am on the list to be notified when your product becomes available . Currently I am using Quicken and I really like it…but guess what, I still write paper checks every week!!! My favorite money book and one of the best ( because it is all based on behavioral finance research and is not just opinion or common sense) is Why Smart People Make Big Money Mistakes by Gary Belsky. My best move is changing from being a growth investor to a value investor and finding an advisor that I really trust. My biggest is passion is trying to get women in their 20′s interested in money…mostly with my daughters but I have been known to ask my son’s friends if they have opened their Roth IRA yet….I think the Roth is great when your income taxes are still kind of low, before you get self-employed and hit the self-employment tax…it’s more flexible, you can use part of the proceeds at no penalty to make a down payment on your first house and if you are ever disabled you can tap into it with no penalty….take your distributions whenever you want after age 59 and 1/2..(Why the extra 6 months I have to wonder?)….anyway, keep up the good work…sincerely, Dr. Mary Gresham , Atlanta, Ga psychologist

By: Facebook User

Facebook User — Tue, 10 Apr 2007 19:12:09 +0000

Jeff,

I will have our VP of Engineering, David Michaels (formerly of PGP) address security in a future post.

Nick,

Nice to meet you. Please feel free to call me anytime and we can chat about Mint, 510 866 6624.

In short, Mint is a free, effortless personal finance tool that also shows you exact ways to save money. There are many different people with different needs around personal finance. Aaron, our CEO, wanted something extremely simple, free (why spend money when we are trying improve people’s finances?) and actionable. There was nothing out there like it and he started coding…