Fashionable Money Management

Ok so money and management in the same sentence is not as appealing as maybe Manolo and Blahnik but its definitely just as important. For the longest time (college) I just went along blissfully ignorant as to what I was getting myself into as far as student loans, credit cards, and everything monetary. Yes, I used my banks online banking system to check my balances to make sure I never overdrafted ( one thing I can proudly say I've never done) but other then that I never really had a good picture of my finances. That is until Mint.com stepped into my life.

About a year ago when I started my quest for financial education I stumbled across an article about Mint on Kiplingers website. I had dabbled with Quicken and Microsoft Money in the past but unlike them, Mint is an amazing (and free!) money management site that's actually aesthetically pleasing. It gives you a real time look at your account balances (including credit cards, loans, and investment accounts), net worth, and even can compare your spending in different categories to mint users in different parts of the country and you don't have to manually enter a single transaction! The most important thing about Mint though was that it gave me a visual of what my spending really looked like (and it was ugly, like neon denim ugly).

Today while hitting all of my usual fashion and personal finance sites I stumbled upon Thrive. A site that is very similar to Mint but geared toward those just starting out. I love that it has the same user friendly interface, and it does all the work for me, but what I love even more is that unlike Mint, Thrive creates personal advice based off of your monthly transactions. You can even create goals to save for ( like a shopping trip, or a house) and it will tell you how much you need to save per month to hit that goal.

While I'm not certified to be doling out advise on either personal finance or fashion do two things for me tonight:

1. Sign up for one of these sites, I promise you will see the light after seeing all your money ( or debt) in one place.

2. Please do not buy neon denim, that is a trend that should be left to die in the 80's.