With KMyMoney, say goodbye to stacks of paper and piles of bills!

Personal computers are absolutely wonderful for keeping our financial household straight. There are many financial software applications available for keeping our checkbooks balanced.  (And by the way, if you’re NOT using a PC and some form of personal accounting software, you are really missing out on a terrific tool!)

Over the years, I’ve used the two main personal financial software powerhouses on the market, Quicken and MSMoney. Both are fine personal financial software programs, and quite easy to set up and use.

But they come with an initial cost.  Anywhere from $50.00 on up.  MSMoney is about the same price.  However, Microsoft has discontinued this software title. So, you may be able to pick up a used copy for a few dollars less.  In fact, I’ve seen Microsoft Money 2004 Standard on Amazon.com for as little $19.00.

Or, you can make the switch to Linux and install a FREE personal  financial software application.

It’s called KMyMoney and it has all the power and features you’ll ever need to keep your finances in order.

KMyMoney is:

• Free
• Powerful
• Accurate
• Easy to use and set up
• Familiar
• Manages as many accounts as you want
• Offers Online banking
• Offers data encryption for extra security

I’ve been using MSMoney for years.  It’s done a very good job.  But, since moving to Linux, I’ve been looking for a totally Linux solution to my personal finance needs.

Since Microsoft made the decision last year to discontinue MSMoney, it was clear that it was time to make the move.

I suggest that when you do move to KMyMoney, make a clean start.  Even though MSMoney and Quicken give you tools to export your financial data into a QIF, the file sometimes doesn’t translate over as reliably as we’d like.  I took this piece of advice from Scott Carpenter on his blog called “Moving to Freedom.”

You can also get a nice overview and screen shots of KMYmoney at the KMyMoney web site at http://kmymoney2.sourceforge.net/index-home.html

So, I started from zero, so to speak.  I made note of my ending bank balances, entered these and a few other transactions to get things caught up, and then started using KMyMoney.  I also continued to use MSMoney just to make sure things were working out and being recorded correctly in KMyMoney.

Well, it appears to have worked and I’m now ready to cut the strings on MSMoney and use KMyMoney exclusively.  I will, however, need to keep my MSMoney data file for archival purposes.

If you want more information regarding the features of KMyMoney, I highly recommend Scott Carpenter’s blog post.  He gives a very thorough review of KMyMoney.

His review, along with Microsoft’s abandonment of MSMoney, convinced me to give KMyMoney a try.  I hope it convinces you, as well.

Get Linux and then get KMyMoney.