Mint.com bought out

One of my favorite online budgeting tools, Mint.com, was recently bought out by rival software maker Intuit (which those of you who use QuickBooks and Quicken already know).

Mint.com was, and still is, a free service. What it does is it gathers all of your financial information (checking, savings, loans, credit cards, mortgages) and compares it against your assets of record (reported houses, cars, retirement accounts, etc.) and calculates out your net worth. Not only does it do that, but it tracks and organizes your spending information so you can create useful budgets. If you're about to go over a spending amount you set (for something like Entertainment, or Gas) it sends you email alerts warning you. Also, it compares your investment portfolio's performance against benchmarks like the S&P 500, showing you whether or not you're really outperforming the market.

For a free tool, that's pretty freaken sweet!

I introduced my parents to Mint, since they had checking accounts with three banks, two credit cards, a mortgage and home equity loan, two vehicle loans, and a recreational vehicle (aka boat) loan. Up until recently, they never worried about what debt they had, since they always maintained good credit. The interest rates they paid were not enough of an incentive to pay cash instead. Since using Mint however, they've been able to see just how much money in interest they're wasting, and have been able to re-organize their payments to pay off select loans and apply the monthly payments to other ones. Within 2 years, they should be completely debt free and ready (even if they aren't able) to retire.

The point I'm trying to make is, no matter where you are in life, a little time spent looking at your finances is warranted. Young people might need help budgeting, where as older individuals might benefit from looking at what their money routine is doing for them.