I am about to be made redundant, and taking the opportunity to FIRE. But I am thinking I need a better way to track my spend in the early years of this new journey.
At the moment I have a Santander current account, and between my partner and I we have two credit cards (Barclaycard and MBNA). In preparation to FIRE i had been doing manual extracts into Excel and trying to categorise things to check my assumptions on spend and budget. I want a smarter way to do this.
My criteria is: easy way to track monthly/annual spending and check for trends.
Features I would like:
all finances (bank, credit card for sure. optional: paypal) reporting in one place.
Auto labelling of costs (e.g. coffee) but ability for user overrides (e.g. a label for "coffee" i can apply to spend at a Garden Centre)
custom reports and trends. I don't mind if this is an app or if its a new bank account we need to move to. I would rather not have to input anything manually, but would not discount it (e.g. vibe code something specific for me, and then use monthly upload of extracts from statements). Website as well as mobile app would be a bonus.
MoneyHub looked like it was a good option but I am unsure now since they sold the app/service to WPS - anyone have any experience with the new "LifeStage Money" service? Price looks good.
Alternatives (Emma and Snoop) seem expensive for what I need, assuming free tier is not enough. I am happy to switch banks if that helps - Monzo tiered plans maybe. I would get value from their £7 plan for a free Greggs item each week!
I would pay, but free or cheap is better. What are you using?