Microsoft Money 2004 Standard

I'll summarize my favorite items:
1. The budgeting feature that allows you to customize and categorize your weekly, monthly and annual expenditures. This is really a handy feature for trying to stay within a budget, and the program clearly ties the outcome of the budget to savings goals.

2. The reporting features. At first, the sheer volume of report types that you can generate is a bit intimidating, but after a few times of working through what was available, it became clear the select few that I liked. Another handy feature is the fact that Money will save the settings of each report independently. I find that the best report is the monthly report, as it tracks your top expenditure categories, how you are doing on your savings, and how your net worth and investments are changing over time. Really a pretty useful thing to look at once a month.

3. The debt reduction feature. If you have a lot of loan, credit card or mortgage debt, this feature will be a great tool. You can select debt accounts that you want included in the calculation, tell Money how much you want to spend each month, and it will calculate the most effective way to make monthly payments for each of the loans to get you out of debt ASAP. Really a nice feature, and the best part is that you can run several scenarios very easily so that you will get a quick feeling for how much money you will save in the long run if you pay 500 a month vs. 250.

4. The feature that ties it all together for me is the monthly bill pay feature. While it is possible to use Money to get your account balances and pay your bills on-line (if your bank will let you), this feature will simply let you create a list of all of your monthly bills, paydays, and other recurring expenses/credits. Then, you can see what bills to pay in between what paychecks, and maximize the use of your money for a given period of time. Of course, the debt reduction feature is integrated into the bill summary, and the bill summary outputs to the monthly budget! Really a nicely done and tidy little package.

Before software like this existed, I used to do all of the same tasks, but keep them all on a MS Excel spreadsheet, which required a lot of extra work on my part, and really didn't look as good at the end of the month. Suffice it to say that MS Money 2004 really gives you more data, and more options, than you will want, but doesn't clutter up the program by making you wade through them. The interface and data entry methods are all very clear and straightforward.

That being said, often times people have a certain way that they like to do their finances. You may like to transfer money between accounts, or you may have odd types of accounts. In some cases, the program doesn't easily recognize what you are doing. For instance, I would make weekly savings deposits, but the program kept telling me that I should start making savings deposits or else I wouldn't meet my savings goals! I tried everything but eventually just learned to live with it (and then for some reason it started working). I think that the documentation for the program (all in the form of a help file) is good, but misses a lot in how to completely customize the program to capture the nuances of your financial plan. Despite that, I wholeheartedly recommend this program to both the financial fanatic and the average person with a checking account.


Money 2004   January 31, 2004
 2 out of 4 found this review helpful

This is a top-notch money management program. It has a lot of great features and has helped me to streamline my finances. There are no more missed payments or over due bills thanks to the bill remiders and it can be synced with your Pocket PC. My roommate uses Quicken and I have tried it out and watched him use it. In my opinion Money 2004 is a much easier program to use, more user friendly. If you're stuck between Quicken and Money, I would definitely recommend Money.


Top Notch Personal Finance Solution!   January 22, 2004
 2 out of 5 found this review helpful

I'm very new to managing my finances electronically, but Microsoft Money made it extremely easy! I have multiple accounts set up, and it ties right into my Pocket PC! I can enter transactions and track my account while I'm on the go! This tool has been indispensible, the reports it provides are in depth and easy to understand. Worth every cent I paid for it, so what if it's made by Microsoft, it's great software!


I've been very happy with MS Money   November 29, 2003
 12 out of 16 found this review helpful

I'm not quite sure what everyone has been having trouble with... I started using Money 2003, soon after it was released, and was very happy with it. I'm not convinced that the upgrade was worthwhile, but Money has certainly done the trick. I've had no problems connecting to my accounts, setting up budgets, creating and viewing reports, etc...

Yes, it is a glorified spreadsheet, but Money saves me a ton of time, and I've found it to be a wonderful tool.


Microsoft Money is a waste of my money   November 10, 2003
 8 out of 18 found this review helpful

At $20 (after rebate) this is way overpriced. For all practical purposes, this is a glorified spreadsheet. All the extra things are merely annoyances or little gotcha's that you have to fork over even more $$ to microsoft to use. If this is an improvement over previous versions, I'm glad this is the first one I've used. I couldn't even use it to edit a simple budget after I'd entered only one(!) scheduled deposit. Overall, annoying and worthless. I'll buy quicken next time.