Is Monarch Money a Good Replacement for Mint?
Disclaimer: We are not associated with or compensated by Monarch Money in any way. Our sole aim is to provide the best possible care for our clients and their finances.
Mint.com is a free financial budgeting tool that we've recommended to many of our clients in the past and many on our team used personally. Unfortunately, it will be shutting down at the end of the year. If you have been a Mint.com user, like Ben has for the last 15 years, then you'll need to find an alternative.
Mint.com Alternatives
One option that is available to all of our ongoing clients is the budgeting feature in eMoney. Some of the major advantages of eMoney are the way you can give our Guide team viewing rights, it’s free, and it doesn’t require an additional sign-in. Some other options for budgeting are YNAB, EveryDollar, and Monarch Money.
What We Like About Monarch Money
Of those three, Monarch Money is the one that Cal, Kiersten, and Ben of our team have switched to and really love. This is what they have to say about it.
Flexible Automated Categories
Cal, one of our Certified Financial Planner™ professionals, says, “The ability to create your own categories and deactivate some of the pre-built ones so that only the categories that you use are visible is a great feature. Assigning an emoji of your choice to each category is a nice touch as well as it allows you to quickly identify the category without too much text on your screen. Setting up rules to automatically categorize transactions is quick and intuitive. Finally, I really like that both spouses can have a profile on one account and each spouse can assign transactions to one another to be reviewed and categorized by that person."
Budgeting & Cash Flow Management Features
Kiersten, who has an active family of five to manage, says, “I like the budgeting portion. It’s easy to set up, customizable and you can quickly see if you’re on track for the month or not, as you can see below.
You can customize your budget and set it to roll over to the next month, which was not an option with Mint.com.
You can also customize your budget and use by group or by category.
I really like that when you add a note you can view it right on the transactions page by simply hovering over the note icon:
I love the Cash Flow section as well; it helps you easily see where your highest spending categories are and what percentage of your budget they are in a simple chart.”
Cal concluded that, “Overall, I feel that the Monarch Money app’s budgeting tools are a step up from Mint.com because of the customization it offers and ease of use.”
Account & Investment Linking
Kiersten said she had a much better experience linking accounts in Monarch Money and was able to connect more of her accounts than she was able to in Mint.com. You can also add your address and it will directly link to Zillow and update your home value for the Net Worth portion.
The investments section is also an addition that Mint.com did not have; you can easily see all of your holdings in one place and their historical performance.
Visuals
Ben, financial planner and founder of Guide Financial Planning, says, “Overall one of the things I like best about Monarch is how impressive it is visually, both on the desktop version and the mobile app. Not only is it enjoyable to look at, but it can also quickly give you a more comprehensive view of where all of your income is coming from and where it is going. An example of what I mean is seen in the Sankey Diagram below.”
Transitioning from Mint to Monarch Money
Monarch Money is aware that Mint.com is going away and they are trying to make it as easy as possible for you to make the transition to their platform. While it is not free (the price is $14.99 per month or $99.99 per year), Kiersten said she felt that it was worth a paid subscription to avoid having ads. They are currently offering a 50% discount on your first year and a 30-day free trial. If you were a Mint.com user you can also upload all your data to monarch for no additional cost and this video shows how to do it.
From what our team members have experienced so far, it appears that Monarch Money is a great budgeting tool and an excellent replacement for Mint.com. It will help you track your money to give you a deeper understanding of what you have and what you’re doing with it. If you want to take your financial stewardship even one step further, consider working with us to build a comprehensive financial plan so you will know how to better utilize your money to achieve your goals and God’s call on your life. Schedule a free introductory call to learn more.