r/ynab

For a while now I’ve been pondering how to handle “perks” from credit cards or other memberships.

The ones that come as “cash back” are easy; I’ve just counted the inbound credit as RTA and assigned it where I want to put it, mostly to the category that generated it. The ones that don’t come through as bank transactions are tougher, for instance one card puts money each month in my uber account but it never hits a bank account. When I’ve used that money I basically count it as free stuff that isn’t tracked in ynab, and it doesn’t’show up in records of how much I spent in that category. The amount is low enough that I didn’t work on a better way to do it, but it can lead to inaccuracies. For instance, recently I used the uber credit on a trip that was reimbursed by my work, so my “passthrough” section for reimbursable expenses in YNAB is going to show more inbound than outbound.

Last week I got the Costco rebate certificate, and just used it on a grocery run. I realized that I don’t want my grocery spending to be off by the amount of the certificate, so don’t want to just let it be “free stuff” that isn’t tracked. I had the idea of entering the certificate as a cash transaction. Inbound to RTA, outbound from Grocery category. I can reconcile the cash account for it, grocery category tracks correctly, and the certificate amount can be assigned somewhere else. Hence, it has been “laundered.” Yay!

I think I will go back and do that for the uber transaction a few weeks ago as well. Is this how you all do it, also?

edited to add paragraphs LOL

I’m starting to think I am using the wrong app. I attended two live sessions - thought I had a pretty good handle on using YNAB but I was WRONG and it is stressing. me. out. Can anyone share like 1 video or tutorial they recommend? Or should I just move to Monarch which I heard has an easier learning curve?

Hi everyone,

I’m currently using YNAB with 3 separate budgets/plans:

• one personal budget for me
• one personal budget for my partner
• one shared budget for common expenses

We’re wondering if there’s a good way to merge everything into a single setup without losing clarity on personal vs shared spending. Also because we have a lot of categories...a lot...

How do you handle this in YNAB?

Hey there. I budget with YNAB for four years now and really love it as it helps me keep my finances in check. Now I’m gonna marry in a couple of months and we want to have our separate bank accounts and a shared one. My wife-to-be isn’t keen on budgeting so her using YNAB too isn’t an option.

How do I budget those fixed dollars I’ll be sending to our shared bank account (like rent, groceries, etc)? Just as I always did or should I create that shared account in my YNAB and do the whole budgeting for it?

For example I currently budget 400 per month for groceries, 400 for rent, etc. Since we split those costs 50/50 atm and since I know what does are for that works. But what if I’ll be sending a fixed amount of my paychecks to that shared account at the beginning of the month without actually knowing what it’s gonna be spend on?

Genuinely love the tool. Used it for 5+ years - why are there no ai features yet?? This seems like a no brainer?

-Ai chat about the data in your account
-input your goals, get recommendations on how to optimize (but no ads for credit cards) - ex. I want to pay off debt - recommended action might be “save $100 more a month and save X in interest”

Please product team 🙏

Edit: lol ok I have an unpopular opinion all good - interesting to read the povs

I'm finishing my master's degree this semester, and I'm really looking forward to seeing that net worth go up, having regular income, being consistently a month ahead (hopefully), and saving more.

Do you have any tips or experience that you want to share in regards to budgeting and YNAB as I'm transitioning to working full-time?

I suppose to some degree at least, it will probably be much the same though. But thought I'd ask:)

I am moving a section of my budget to a new stand alone budget. I know many of you are going to say I don’t have to do it but I want to for multiple reasons including reminding myself that it is not part of my everyday spending and don’t touch it.

Anyway, when I try to delete the items (because there isn’t an option to just move them) it, of course, wants me to move my old transactions and there is no place to put them. Do I have any other option besides just hiding them?

Sorry I missed a few things. The new budget has its own account that only that money is in. It is for a rental property. I just want to keep it separate from my everyday life. Also I it is multiple months ahead.

I've been using YNAB for six months, read the book and inflation isn't mentioned, not once.

My bank doesn't offer a decent return on cash deposits, so placing it on-budget in YNAB means assigning my six month emergency fund as a cash account even though it continues to sit in the brokerage in an ultra short term US Treasury ETF, effectively the same return as a money market fund.

What is everyone doing to fight inflation when you're several months ahead?

These are two different categories, with the same target. Why can I Snooze one and not the other?

None of them have any money assigned, saved, spent or any thing. I created them just now and I can't see what the difference is? What am I not seeing?

I'm in May and just clicking from the first category to the one that is underneath.

Edit: For some reason it suddenly worked.. I was in May when I was looking at both of them. One is right under the other and I created them at the same time.

https://preview.redd.it/nrmylvth5a2h1.png?width=488&format=png&auto=webp&s=5c3de37fa8265faf29673f21e7c8ce7ae8978569

https://preview.redd.it/yc62quzo5a2h1.png?width=342&format=png&auto=webp&s=22f172d2de2e3a097bafaa085e8e3b685ae6d8b4

https://preview.redd.it/umyv4yrp5a2h1.png?width=355&format=png&auto=webp&s=9953a24441c3b80079783f0da6a463dbc9fea3d2

Hi! I just started YNAB and I have a question.

My paycheck this month is very different than what it would be normally, and because of that I'm one month behind so June's payments will be doubled. Is there any way to skip months in the plan and force the plan to start in July instead?

Bonus question, for months that have 3 checks instead of 2, how are yall handling that?

Thank you in advance!

In my head, I've got a good idea of what comes in and goes out on a monthly basis and income almost always covers expenses.

What are then the benefits of scheduling transactions?

Seeking advice for getting back on track with budgeting after a year of shame or negative feelings.

YNAB was my go to tool for quite a while, but after my wife stopped working last year I stopped budgeting. It seems counter intuitive since that would be the BEST time to maintain a budget, but it was just so hard to watch my credit card bill rack up and not being able to fully pay it off without dipping into savings. Most of my purchasing felt justified: My wife says we need something like dog treats so I get on Amazon and instantly order it. I want to ensure I can bike in colder weather...I order cold weather gear. I constantly feel like I am solving problems, but the math simply doesn't work out.

I am 39. My base earnings are somewhere around $130K with a $30K annual bonus. I also do consulting on the side which earnings me ~$15K annually. Recently I received a bonus of $150K which was highly unusual/overwhelming. My immediate reaction was to pay off all debts including my CC which I think was the right move and threw the rest into savings which is ~$100K now...by far the most money I have ever possessed.

Here is where I am seeking advice: I feel like this is a fresh start and a lot of advice seems to be around digging yourself out of a hole. What would you do to ensure a hole is not being dug?

Thank you in advance

Hello friends! I am teaching a 5-week course on how to set up and use YNAB. Curious if anyone has ever done that and if they've put content together. Mainly looking for a slide/deck presentation. Would appreciate it if I didn't have to start from scratch and thought I'd see if a fellow YNAB-er has done something similar. Thanks in advance!

Additional note: This is a free class I am offering through my church

Is this a feature and I just don’t know it? And if not, where can I suggest this to YNAB? 😅

It’d be cool as part of the YNAB Together feature to be able to flag a transaction made by a partner so that when they log in it prompts them to update the details for that transaction if they forgot to do so or if they forgot to put in the memo any relevant details, etc.

We started using YNAB in January and I created a whole category group solely for pet expenses for my 6 pets.

Prior to YNAB vet bills always caught me off guard and immediately went on a credit card and I carried a balance.

This year my oldest cat has numerous vet visits, dental surgery, an ER visit on top of her monthly medications and supplements.

We decided we would be helping her transition from this life later this week. We have spent just over 2k on just her this year as well as everything we’ve paid for our other pets.

Thanks to YNAB we have been able to pay for everything without going into debt! When we have an unexpected vet bill that exceeds what we have in our pet medical expenses category I am able to reevaluate our priorities and pull from other categories.

I’m so thankful that we decided to start YNAB this year. We are able to help our sweet girl pass peacefully without worrying about the costs.

Hello there! I've just started using YNAB to keep track of my spendings better and I have set up my accounts, categories, everything.

However upon assigning my currently available money, I have encountered an issue.

As I said, all my money is assinged, so my ready to assign amount is 0.

But if I want to assign more to a category, I can do that without any problems, lets's say I assign 30$ to something, my ready to assign amount is still at zero. I can assign 60, 90, 120$, up to 192$ in my case. If I try to assign 193$ to the category, then I get the error that my ready to assign amount is -1$.

What can cause this kind of behaviour? I am sure I am missing something, I just cannot find out what. Thanks in advance for the help! 😄

Got the email about the fidelity issue being resolved a couple of weeks ago. Used the new connection process and authorized YNAB to receive transactions through the fidelity website. Everything worked great the next few days.

Today - I tried to reconcile my Fidelity Visa Credit Card and dozens of transactions from the end of last week, the weekend and this week were not imported. Never got a prompt to import them either, even after waiting for 5-10 min and refreshing a couple of times. I had to manually key them all.

Anyone else experiencing this?

I used YNAB for YEARSSSSS and finally gave it up last summer because despite seeing so many people say that they put in requests for a calendar view, and I personally put in multiple requests, it somehow never makes the cut.

Has anyone heard anything about it ever coming up as a feature? I understand the YNAB method and don’t need it explained. But I do much better visually seeing my upcoming bills and actual projections. It’s literally my only major gripe with the app but it’s one I can’t get past. I’d love to come back but not without that function.

Until then, unfortunately, I’ll struggle with PocketSmith.

I can't believe I haven't really seen this talked about anywhere before.
Do you have someone, perhaps a partner, or family, or roommate, that you regularly need to reimburse for "random" transactions (ie, not recurring costs that you already should have a budget line for)?
Do you want to be able to keep track of those things easily, even if the transaction and the date you paid it back are in separate months?

Consider: setting up your friend/family/loved one as a Credit Account in YNAB.

You will have to do it manually, but you can add a transaction every time you owe that specific person, correctly categorized, and if there's money in your category, YNAB automatically moves the money from your category to your "Credit Card" (aka, your friend).
You can easily see how much cash you have on hand to pay off your friend, you can easily track repayments to said friend. And, like a credit account, the negative balance will transfer from month to month.

My partner and I do not combine finances, do not share bank accounts, and have separate budgets in YNAB.
I've started doing this just this month, and my brain finds it much easier than

1. Transferring money to his account every single time we make a shared purchase
   or 2) Un-assigning money from the category it belongs, to re-assign it to a "Send to Partner" category that I then RE-re-assign to the correct categories when I pay him back in a lump sum at the end of the month.

Perhaps my view on it will change over time, but for now it's been working really well.