The Orb of Confusion

Been wanting to write up something today, but always seemed to be drained of that impulse when I got too close to the computer. Plus I spent most of today (and yesterday) doing something resembling actual work on the computer - categorizing my finances.

I've been looking at how money flows in and out of my accounts - generally out much quicker than in. Figuring out the "how" and "where" requires an analysis of the past. Once I have the data in a suitable form I can start analyzing it. Or "mining" it to use something resembling a current buzzword. So the start began for the right tool. I believe Mr. Scott from the original Star Trek had something to say about the right tool for the job. For now I'd settle for the a tool to do an adequate job, as nothing is leaping out at me.

I started looking at open source stuff - don't want to spend money to figure out where my money is going! Got a spreadsheet program and a financial analysis tool. So far the spreadsheet is looking pretty good, but I already have an older copy of Excel, so it wasn't the thing I needed most. The financial program can't import comma separated value (CSV) files, so I skipped trying to import my banking info into that. And that was Saturday.

Today I got a trial version of Money 2007. I've use Money in the past, but it has its drawbacks. I ran into them today. It was easy to import directly from my online banking institution into Money, but reconciling the data was difficult. Very difficult. First I had to categorize all the entries (about 1000 I think), then cross-reference them. The second step involve linking transfers between accounts and payments to credit cards that sort of thing. However the program couldn't tell a transfer from one account and a deposit in another were related, so I had to classify one as a transfer manual, go to the other account and delete the other transaction. Painful. Plus the items on the credit cards were implied as debit actions (makes sense) but so were the payment of the credit card bills, so there was double-counting going on. Either that or I'm making a lot more money than I thought...

So looks like I've done lots of work (most of today) with little good data to show for it. The spreadsheet is likely the best bet as it is the simplest tool. Maybe even dealing with the CSV files directly will be better - but I think some graphs would be nice. The key thing is to categorize the items going out properly so that I can figure out where money is going. That will give information on how to proceed.

Proceed means setting up a budget. Something I haven't really engaged in for... ever I guess. As a kid, money was for extras. I saved up for things I wanted, but I had food and clothes so other things were rare and nice. School was not bad - had co-op to help cover things, plus my parents covered the school portion when I couldn't. When I was working, I had few expenses so the money came in faster than it went out. Much like vacation time does for me now - I have to keep track to make sure I don't lose any. More recently, things have been more constrained and need more attention, so here we are. The real trigger was buying a house - not that we didn't plan for it, but that a few hiccups or lapses in attention will lead us in the wrong direction financially. And now Christmas is behind us for a while and with it the typical cluster of extra expenses.

Enough talk of expenses. Time to turn out all the lights and go to sleep. Doesn't cost much there I suppose...