A Year of YNAB
I have been so excited to write this one! If you know me, you know I tend to be a dabbler. I try a few new things like productivity apps, organizational systems, etc. and then end up ditching them.
YNAB came into my life fall 2022 when I felt like we kept running into “surprise” expenses that left me super frustrated. I knew how much we were making and generally what expenses we had but I didn’t have a lot plans for random things like the annual $800 vet appointment.
Before YNAB, I would look at our checking account and be like ok, this looks fine to buy a couple flights. We’d buy the flights, then a random expense would come up and I’d become frustrated because I would think to myself “I wouldn’t have booked the flights NOW if I knew X was goign to come up.” It was an endless cycle of annoyance and stress.
I heard really great things about YNAB from friends so I decided last August it was time to get serious about getting a better lens on our financial life so we could make incredible, empowering decisions.
One year later, I am still using YNAB almost every single day and am a massive fan girl. It’s completely changed how I think about our income, how we spend as a family, how we prepare for larger expenses and travel. I feel incredibly disciplined in this area of life which has created a lot of mental freedom.
Why I Love YNAB
The biggest reason I love YNAB is because I make decisions with actual money that comes in the bank, not hypothetical money that isn’t there.
For example, let’s say payday comes and I get $5000. Now the money is “ready to assign” by YNAB in their app. I created a few dozen categories where I can start to move that money, like virtual envelopes.
I’ll take the $5k and start to populate the categories with the recurring things like mortgage, car insurance, electric0 bill, phone bills, etc. first. Then I’ll populate our groceries / eating out categories and hit more of the “misc” categories. The goal is to always to get to $0 so every dollar has a job.
Every time I make a purchase with my debit or credit card, it’s synced up and so I know the Hy-Vee purchase of $20.22 is for the “grocery” category, the Madewell purchase comes out of my “Emily” category, Lincoln’s last doctor’s appointment comes out of our “health” category which is linked to our HSA.
Every once in awhile we might need to spend more in a certain category than I have allotted, so I’ll move money from category to category, knowing that the category I moved from has less. An example…
I knew I was going to buy my mom and myself tickets a show at the Civic Center! I didn’t know how much tickets were so I put aside $150 and it actually cost $200. Since it was $200, I ended up finding $50 from the “transportation” category that felt like it was probably a little high since we can get most places using the “e” part of our car. 😁
Sometimes groceries cost more than expected so I’ll move money from category to category. I try my hardest not to ever touch our savings account or specific categories related to a goal.
Goals in YNAB
Some of those “goals” accounts I’ve built up include:
Christmas / holiday spending
Our travels to Panama in February
Annual tax bill
Annual vet appointment
HSA
I love the “goals” section because I say “YNAB I want to have $10,000 in this account by December 1, 2024” and it will show me how much of every paycheck I need to move into that category to hit my goal. It’s so straightforward! So when our $400 tax bill comes in April, I’ve been slowly adding $33.33 to that category every month and it’s ready to go.
The great part of YNAB is that I never look at my checking or savings account to make decisions! I never worry about putting things on a credit card versus our debit card. I have a plan for bigger purchases like the last set of blinds I want and several weeks away this winter. I don’t spontaneously spend because I see a certain number in our checking account.
And if there is truly an emergency, I know I can dip into savings because that’s what it’s for.
YNAB Wrapped
I can say with confidence through and through that this is one of the best subscriptions I’ve ever used and the focus of using it has paid off tremendously. When I log in every day, I have a snapshot of where we’re at with money and that brings me so much peace of mind.
YNAB was and is a game changer and I cannot recommend it enough for people who are looking for something really easy to help them manage their money.