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By Dustin, September 17, 2010 4:57 am

I’ve added nearly 400 new icons to choose from. You should now be able to find a unique icon for all your custom envelopes.

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By Dustin, September 13, 2010 2:29 pm

Heather writes:

I love the idea you’ve come up with on this product.

How do I create a budget for next month when I haven’t gotten paid yet? Everything seems to be based on having cash in the bank BEFORE you fund the envelopes. Am I talking two different things here? A budget and an envelop system?

Curious.

Thanks!

Hi Heather,

This is an interesting question. I guess I have been doing this for so long that I haven’t really thought about the difference between budget and envelope system. Thanks for the fresh eyes. I’ll try to explain it.

With Inzolo, you can’t budget money you don’t have yet (well, technically you can, so it might be better to say you shouldn’t). So you are right, this system is based on having money in the bank BEFORE funding envelopes. Each envelope has a monthly goal amount that you can edit on the allocation view, or by clicking an envelope and the the edit envelop budget. There is a report that shows all your goal amounts. You could say this is your average monthly budget.

But, we all know there is no such thing as an average month. Every month is different. With Inzolo, as soon as you get paid, you move that payment into the unallocated income box, then allocate that money into your various virtual envelopes. The idea is is to allocate your money before you spend it. If you overspend in one category and go in the red (negative), you should then move money from another envelope into the one you spent in to bring that envelope category to zero or a positive number.

I hope this makes sense. Let me know if you have questions on how to do any of the things I explained above.

If you are just getting started it may take a while to get the hang of it. It can be a bit of a paradigm shift. But once you start telling your money where to go before you spend it, you find you’ll start to get a buffer and it will get easier. For example, when I first started I would get paid twice monthly. Depending on which paycheck it was, the way I funded my envelopes was very different from the first paycheck in the month to the second. I had two different allocation plans for each paycheck. Now I just have one allocation plan where I allocate 50% of each goal amount each paycheck, then make adjustments as needed. If I overspend I have an emergency fund to pick up the slack.

I hope this helps.

Thanks,
Dustin

http://inzolo.com

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By Dustin, September 8, 2010 7:57 am

I got an email this morning from Zander Insurance – my identity theft plan where I pay $12.50 a month for my whole family.

They provided great information and a reminder on how to check my credit report for free 3 times per year. Here is a portion of that email:

As a member of the Zander Insurance ID Experts Identity Theft Plan, we want to remind you that you should check your credit report from one of the three major credit bureaus. Accessing your credit report throughout the year may help detect identity theft issues. Federal Law provides that each credit bureau must provide you a copy of your credit report once a year at no charge. Please order one report at a time so that you can access your free credit report three times annually. Your spouse is eligible for the same protective services and checking both of your reports, if applicable, is highly recommended.

You can place your request at www.annualcreditreport.com. To request a copy in writing, please complete the Annual Credit Report Request Form and mail to:

Annual Credit Report Request Service
PO BOX 105281
Atlanta, GA 30348-5281

You may request a child’s report by completing this form as well; you cannot request a minor’s report online. Be aware that most minor children will not have a credit file on record with the credit bureaus. You may also complete your requests via phone by calling 877-322-8228.

Please remember that www.annualcreditreport.com is the only authorized website to provide free annual credit reports and that none of the additional services offered at www.annualcreditreport.com. are necessary to retrieve your free report. When requesting your information online, you will need to identify your state and then click “request report”. Complete all required fields and select the credit bureau you would like to access and follow each step. We recommend declining the option to purchase your credit score. You will then have access to view and print your report.

I highly recommend everyone do this. Put it on your calendar to check your report every four months.

Today I checked Equifax. Everything looked accurate, but I found two old accounts that were still open, one from 2005 and one from 2000!

The one from 2005 was a local furniture store. It was easy to close. All it took was a 5 minute phone call. The phone number was listed on the credit report.

The one from 2000 is from when I used to bank at First Security Bank. I had a Credit Card with them. They were bought out by Wells Fargo and shortly after that I closed my account with them. Apparently they didn’t close the credit card account.

I tried calling the number listed on the credit report, but I just get some kind of busy signal as if the phone number no longer exists. I will try calling Wells Fargo and if I don’t get anywhere with them, there is a link on my credit report to submit an online dispute. I’ll go that route.

In any case, I would recommend checking your credit and cleaning it up. It’s likely not as much hassle as you would fear it to be.

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By Dustin, August 9, 2010 9:30 am

Fred writes:

Hi,
I signed up for Inzolo after reading a facebook post you made talking about the benefits of inzolo over mvelopes. All the things you said you disliked about mvelopes are also things I dislike, so Inzolo sounds right up my alley. My problem so far is that I cannot auto get transactions from Bank of America ..the error says my account is not enabled for this. After researching, it seems that I would need to enable quicken direct connect access on my account for $9.99/mo with BoA. Is there any way to auto get transactions similar to the way Mvleopes works? Mvelopes didn’t require me to sign up for anything extra with BoA.
Or is manually adding my only way?
Thanks,
Fred

Hi Fred,

I believe Mvelopes uses a 3rd party account agregator provided by Yodlee. This is what my credit union told me anyway. I once met an Mvelopes employee (before I created Inzolo) and he denied it and said they built all their account aggregation services themselves. I don’t know if I believe him though. Several companies use Yodlee (such as Mint.com & Thrive.com). I have spoken with Yodlee about their services and they charge and arm and a leg – first just to get started, then per user. It just wasn’t feasible if I wanted to make a low cost service. Plus, I don’t have or want the big financial backing that Mint & Thrive have. (Note: Mint.com was purchased my Intuit for $170 million – I’m guessing Intuit will replace Yodlee with their own account aggregation if they have not already done so).

So that left me to figure out how to make use of the Open Financial Exchange (OFX) protocol to import transactions. It works great once you get it set up. Unfortunately, it is not supported very well from all banks. I’m fortunate to have an awesome credit union that implements it very well.

So, I guess the if you don’t want to pay for the direct connect access fee (which is ridiculous to charge for IMHO), then your best bet is to download transactions in OFX format (MS Money) and import them into Inzolo.

I hope this helps.

Dustin

http://inzolo.com

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By Dustin, July 16, 2010 7:50 am

I began writing a comment on the GSR’s blog post: Ask the Readers: Which Credit Cards Do You Use — and Why?. After a few paragraphs I decided I might as well post my comments here.

I can’t say that I ever got burned with Credit Cards, but when I jumped on the Dave Ramsey wagon I did so with both feet. I drank the Kool-Aid. I got rid of all my credit cards… well, except one, but I never used it.

My main problem with debt could probably be more of an issue with cars. We made some dumb decisions in the earlier years of our marriage that really set us back. I have been married 10 years and if my count is correct we are on vehicles #11 & #12.

I have credit card that I’ve had for years with my local credit Union. It has been about 3-4 years since it has even been used or carried a balance. I suppose I keep it just because it has a lower rate than any other card I’ve seen. I don’t know if I’ll ever use it, but I just haven’t felt the need or desire to cancel it.

I guess when I started actually using credit cards again was after a recommendation from a friend. He was spending thousands of dollars each month on Google Adwords for his internet marketing campaigns. Obviously he was making more than he was spending. He told me that with his American Express Gold card he gets rewards and he can’t remember the last time he paid for an airline ticket.

I got an AMEX Gold to use for all my business expenses. I don’t spend nearly as much in Adwords, but I do have expenses that I have to pay each month. I pay for hosting, domain renewals, advertising, online services, etc. I’ve seen that unless you are really spending a lot, it is not going to make much of a difference. I haven’t gotten any airline tickets, but I have redeemed my points for a few Home Depot gift cards which has helped with some remodeling projects around the house.

With Inzolo I can easily keep track of my spending and make sure I only spend money that I have available. I pay off the balance of the card every month.

After doing this for a year in my business and enjoying the small benefit of the rewards, I finally decided to get an American Express card for personal use. We got the American Express card through Costco because we shop their regularly and my wife always fills up our SUV there. It makes it more convenient in that when you shop at Costco or get gas you only have to get out one card. Plus, we get a higher cash back bonus on our Executive membership and we get cash back on gasoline. You also get a higher cash back for travel and restaurants. So now I pretty much use my American express everywhere and pay off the balance each month. Because I pay off the balance and essentially use it like a debit card tracking every expenditure in Inzolo, I don’t think I overspend as Dave Ramsey often points to those type of studies.

Now I’m not really recommending this for everyone – or anyone really. I’ve become a total nerd when it comes to tracking the budget and I have goals I want to reach. Without such a plan I think credit cards can be a real problem.

About 8 or 9 years ago a couple of my friends got GM cards and told me of their great plan to use it for everything to get great deal on their next car. I did the same thing. Looking back, I know I overspent on that and it got to the point where I couldn’t pay the balance back on it. Once I actually read the terms of the deal and found that I could only use $2000 worth of earnings toward a new car, I could see what a stupid deal it was. $2000 wouldn’t make much of a dent in the purchase of a new car. On top of that I would likely never buy a new car – and if I did, I doubt I would want a GM car. On top of that I’m sure if I were to buy a new car from GM, I could negotiate $2000 off the top of the price anyway.

Live & learn.

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By Dustin, June 17, 2010 4:58 am

Sometimes when friends ask me about Inzolo I will say it is a virtual envelope budget system. Often, the response is, what is and envelope budget?

This concept has been around for probably as long as cash and envelopes have been. Basically, with and envelope budget, when you get a paycheck, you cash it, and divide the money into different labeled envelopes representing spending categories. Then as a bill comes due, or you go to get groceries, you spend money from its assigned envelope. When the money runs out, you’re done spending, or you choose to sacrifice from another envelope. It’s really that simple.

Below is a video from the No Credit Needed blog showing the envelope budget using monopoly money.

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By Dustin, March 15, 2010 3:27 pm

Angel writes:

I downloaded ATM cash transactions.   How do I transfer this cash transaction from the Checking account to my  Generic bank account that I have set up as a cash spending account?
And how do I input into envelopes when I spend  cash out of this Generic bank account?

You can track your cash just as any other account, but you will have to do it all manually. First, if you haven’t done so, add a new account. Here is the settings I used to create a cash account:

Now, let’s say you withdrew $100 from your checking account. You would likely see a withdrawal from your checking account if you are downloading transactions via OFX direct connect, or if you are importing transactions from a file. To add that $100 to your cash account, simply click the Add Transaction button:

You would now add a deposit to your Cash account of $100.

Now, you can budget your cash into envelopes as you do you other accounts. Whenever you spend cash, you can simply add addition transactions just as above but your transactions will be withdrawals rather than deposits.

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By Dustin, February 19, 2010 8:18 am

I was checking out my stats and noticed a spike in traffic and registrations yesterday. I couldn’t see where they were coming from though. I went digging and then discovered a posted in the forums of MyTMMO.com.

“marinparents” had some kinds works to say that I would like to share:

I have been looking and looking for a budgeting program that is reasonably priced, follows the DR plan, is EASY to use, and has help available for questions. I FINALLY FOUND IT!

3 years ago I started our first budget with paper & pencil (and a lot of erasers.) That worked great, but I got tired of adding up the numbers on the calculator, so I moved to a spreadsheet on the computer. This worked out so much better, but I found that it was still taking up too much of my time making one entry in the budget & making one entry in the check register for every transaction. I thought there must be a simpler way to do this budgeting stuff, so I started doing some research on this forum and the internet.

After all of my research, I decided to go with Inzolo. I am so glad I did! This budgeting program is very easy to use, is only $30 per year (you can also go with the FREE version,) has great customer service, and follows the DR plan. In fact, it is so close to the DR plan, I’d almost think he came up with it! It wasn’t DR though, it was Dustin, a fellow TMMO member.

Thank you Dustin for coming up with this program. I love it and it has made my life so much easier when it comes to budgeting. I have one for my personal budget and one for my business budget and I couldn’t be happier.

If you are looking for a budgeting program that really works, you’ll want to check out Inzolo!

While I was searching to forum I found a few other shout outs. One other I would like to share, “morgensmummy” said:

I recently started using virtual envelopes. I have taken all of our monthly bills and broken them up into how much I need to put in my “envelope” each week. I have started using inzolo.com for this. For whatever reason that site has helped me “see” where my money is going easier. I have a savings account for our BEF but then everything else for my “envelopes” stays in the checking account.

ETA: inzolo does cost a bit for their Pro, but they have a basic that is free.

Thank you for the kind words!

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By Dustin, February 5, 2010 12:03 am

I got the following email from an Inzolo user. I thought it might be good to respond publicly:

[A competing envelope budget tool] transfer monies to a credit card envelope from a specific envelope category once a credit card transaction has been made. Then you know you have the money set aside to pay the credit card.

How does this work for Inzolo?

I’m familiar with how [this competing envelope budget tool] handles credit card transactions. I always found it overly complicated and confusing. I don’t think you need the special envelope. If you allocate the money you have received and only spend what you have allocated to your envelopes, it doesn’t matter if you spend it using your credit card or debit card.

For example, say you have $1000 in your checking account. Of that you allocate $100 to gasoline and $300 to Groceries. We’ll say the other $600 is allocated elsewhere. Say you go to Costco and use an American Express card to purchase $50 in gas and $200 in groceries. That leaves you with $50 in your gasoline budget and $100 in your grocery budget. Your envelope total is now $750. Your checking account balance is still at $1000 and your AMEX account balance is now at -$250. When it comes time to pay your credit card bill you just pay it. I personally have an envelope for AMEX which I use simply to put my transaction records. When I pay my bill, I get two transactions: 1) -$250 from my checking account and 2) +$250 in my AMEX account. I put those both in my AMEX envelope and it balances out to zero. My envelopt total remains at $750 and my AMEX account is back to zero.

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By Dustin, February 1, 2010 6:12 am

From the Desk of Dustin Davis

I thought I would turn over a new leaf in 2010 by offering monthly newsletters to keep you up to date on changes and feature updates to Inzolo. Generally I post updates on the blog, but I know you don’t all have time to visit the blog, so I will summarize in each newsletter.

I will also let you know of upcoming features to Inzolo so you can get an idea of what’s to come.

Here are the updates made to the site in January:

• Added a report to show total of monthly goals. Also added totals of columns on the allocation screen.
• Fixed bug when ofx & qif transaction import files had trailing spaces after transaction amounts
• Started on the creation of an API. This will enable the creation of mobile apps and other tools for creative users.
• Fixed the look of error pages. Yeah, sometimes things go wrong. We might as well look good when we fail
• Modified scripts on the allocation screen to better handle Javascript floating point number issues.
• I created a view to show all past transactions. There is not a link on the site to this page because it needs to be enhanced and cleaned up. I threw it up quickly because I needed it to prepare my taxes.

Video Tip of the Month

There are a number of undocumented features in Inzolo that I have created for my personal use. Perhaps you have happened upon some of them. In this area of the newsletter I will be sharing them with you each month, but for now, let’s start with the basics.

I notice that a number of people join but then don’t actually set up a bank account and import their transactions. This video will show you how to get started. I decided to only show how to start using manual transaction uploads as I’m finding many banks and credit unions don’t support OFX direct connect.

If there is an aspect of the site that you would like to see featured on video tip of the month, please contact us.