YNAB, I need account reconciling please :(
So I logged on to our bank account this morning to see a puzzling number. ~$1700.
How can that be? Let me explain.
I just wrote a check this morning for my kids’ school, which is ~$1400, so that number up there will soon change to ~$300, not to mention a few gas purchases that always show up as $1 until they finally clear for the real amount.
School tuition is budgeted for! Gas is budgeted for! And I have money built up in my “buffer” category, and there is also a couple hundred built up here and there in categories that won’t be spent until later in the year.
What is going on?
Have I miscalculated something?
I must have, because this can’t be right.
The only thing I can think of, is maybe I have already entered our expected escrow refund check as “income” (thus making it available to assign to categories and spend), even though it hasn’t arrived yet - but I checked on that last night, and I *thought* that I hadn’t entered it.
Hmmmm.
I have to admit, I used to be a quicken user. I would go through spots and spats of not using it, and then have a ton of transactions to download and enter at a time. I would plan ahead by entering upcoming bills/paychecks ahead of time in the register so I could see the timeline of when the money comes in and when the bills getting paid goes out, but even doing that, it didn’t give me/us the control over our money that YNAB does. I actually hadn’t opened it up since about November. And with YNAB, I haven’t done any hard core reconciling or register balancing. I enter in the transactions by hand every night, or every other night, and since we have money socked away, I idly make sure the balance on my checking is kind of close to the balance in YNAB, but I haven’t really worried about the actual account balance.
OK, I take that back - when we refinanced our mortgage, I was VERY worried about the checking account balance/register and timed everything out just so, in order to take enough money to closing and still have money for certain bills etc. But now? This is nothing like that.. I was clear sailing, the end of the month is nigh, everything should be comin’ up roses.
I feel like I’m cheating on YNAB or something, but I really do need more register/account balancing going on.
I have checked out a few other money programs, one my brother swears by adamantly (Ace Money), and it does look pretty good, but the budgeting aspects of it are nowhere close to YNAB, so I’d be doing 2 money programs, and that just makes me tired thinking about it.
Argh. Frustrated.
Oh, and a teeny side note on the power bill - Last night I was feeding our cat, and thought, “Damn, it’s cold over here in this corner!” glanced at the window, and realized it was open a crack.
ARGH! ARGH SQUARED!