# Personal Finances Ledger Software

**URL:** <https://community.clark.com/t/personal-finances-ledger-software/7230>\
**Category:** Uncategorized\
**Created:** [March 7, 2025, 5:44pm UTC](https://community.clark.com/t/personal-finances-ledger-software/7230 "2025-03-07T17:44:54Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Lothian](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/community.clark.com/lothian/32/3848_2.png) [@Lothian](https://community.clark.com/u/Lothian)\
**Post date:** [March 7, 2025, 5:44pm UTC](https://community.clark.com/t/personal-finances-ledger-software/7230/1 "2025-03-07T17:44:55Z")

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Years past I used Kiplinger Simply Money, then Quicken Deluxe, then Microsoft Money software (in this order) as my general finances ledger. Primary benefits: ease of use, form-based data input, snapshot reports and trend analysis of household spending vs income.

Ironically, as a given software helped me get smarter about my personal finances I became aware of the software’s inadequacies; and so I’d move to a different product… until I stopped using anything.

Smash cut to today. I want to reestablish the self-discipline of keeping a daily ledger. But the software I have experience with is no longer available. And the few ledger software that are available are subscription-based or exist as some online fee-based service. Bleh.

Many folks post within [another thread in this forum](https://community.clark.com/t/do-you-use-a-computer-program-to-track-spending/5412/11) their preference to use a spreadsheet for oversight of their income and expenses. I’ve imported and parsed end-of-month credit card csv files into Excel plenty of times. But this isn’t the same as the general ledger functionality found in the apps I mentioned. I simply prefer a form-based UI front-end while the spreadsheety stuff happens invisibly in the background.

…plaintive sigh.

I suppose I am willing to try a spreadsheet. So where does one download an excellent, vetted personal finance general ledger spreadsheet XLS template file?

And…  
Do any single-license personal finance general ledger software exist nowadays?

Please share your experience with either.

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**Author:** ![ochotona](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex016/user_avatar/community.clark.com/ochotona/32/293_2.png) [@ochotona](https://community.clark.com/u/ochotona)\
**Post date:** [March 7, 2025, 6:23pm UTC](https://community.clark.com/t/personal-finances-ledger-software/7230/2 "2025-03-07T18:23:56Z")

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Honestly, in early January of each year, I just download the prior year’s transactions from my credit cards and banks, and just aggregate them into a giant spreadsheet. I ignore all of the internal transfers within my four walls, and only pay attention to inflows and outflows.

I sort this big spreadsheet by payee, assign a category to each payee, then do a pivot table and there I have it… last year’s actuals by category. That’s all I need.