I need, need, need my finance management software. I like to know exactly where every penny is being spent and exactly how much liquidity/debt I have at any given moment. This is the accountant in me speaking. So to find out Microsoft Money was not available for Mac was very disappointing.

I’ve used Money to manage my finances ever since I bought my very first computer back in 1994. It was bundled with Microsoft Works (old school!) and I thought it was just the most useful little app this side of the Pacific Ocean. In more recent years, I’ve tried other programs, like Quicken, but in the end, I always turned back to Money.

Until I got my Mac.

I searched high and low for a Mac version of Money but the only thing I found was a disclaimer that Money was not available for Mac. What was I to do? How would I manage my finances? I needed a replacement app and I needed it fast.

I tried Quicken for Mac but it was totally foreign to me. Perhaps all those years of Money had tainted my view of any other finance software but I didn’t like the taste Quicken left in my mouth. I tried to find other apps (most notably Cha-Ching, which didn’t meet my needs) But because there was nothing else available, I begrudgingly accepted Quicken to by my finance app of choice for the Mac. That is, until I found Moneydance.

Personal finance manager for Mac.

Moneydance is everything I need in a finance management application. It has all the good stuff I like from Money and it is much easier to use than Quicken or Cha-Ching. The interface also looks a helluva lot nicer. I can manage all my accounts (chequing, savings, credit cards, RRSPs, mutual funds, etc.), print cheques, reconcile statements, and track my (liquidity-based) net worth. And because I’m in the phase of my life where I am looking at purchasing my first home, the budgeting part of Moneydance will be extremely useful.

Graphics and pie-charts! Hurrah for pictures and colours!

Don’t forget to pay your bills.

If you’re like me and relied heavily on Microsoft Money during your PC days and are now on the Apple team, I urge you to download Moneydance and give it a chance. Even if you don’t use a Mac, download this app because it comes in PC flavour as well. Heck, they even give Linux some love. The demo doesn’t have any features crippled but is limited to just 100 transactions. However, I didn’t need to hit the 100-transaction limit before I welcomingly put down $39.99 for this gem of a software. And when I made that payment on my credit card, I used Moneydance to record the transaction.

Images obtained from the Moneydance website.