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It is not like you haven’t tried …

• You have gathered all your receipts in the shoebox
• Your have tried to use spreadsheet to track your expenses
• You have attended those conferences on “how to manage your finances”
• You have asked your family or friend to help you

… Still you have not been able to do it.

What is wrong?

While there are so many reasons why people fail to manage their finances, I must say lack of time and skills is the biggest factor. Consider the following example:

Example1

Jenny and John have three kids all of under ten years of age. Jenny works for a local real estate company and John owns home based small business. Together they have a mortgage, two cars, investment and income from their respective jobs.

They would like to setup a system to manage their finances.

What is the problem?

Alghough both parents are  good at computers, they are extremely busy and don't have the time to learn a new software in order to setup their books.

Example2

Bob and Jacqueline don’t have children but very busy couple. For years they have been thinking of getting their financial books straighten but never gotten around to doing it.

What is the problem?

Bob and Jacqueline are not computer savvy so they stayed away from computer programs and instead they kept their books the old fashion way – using pen and paper. While their paper based bookkeeping is ok, but they have never been able to run reports or queries to determine their financial status at a given time. So recently decided to do something about it and attended a conference on personal financial management and bought a software that the conference presenter recommended them.

The challenge this couple faced was that they need to learn a bit about computer in order to use their new bookkeeping software. They bought a few books on computer basics and spent hours reading them but still they haven’t learned enough to be able to use their software.

Do these two stories similar to yours?

If your answer is yes, let me take this chance and introduce you to simple but very effective personal and small business financial planning software called Quicken. I have been using Quicken for many years and I know what it can do for you.

Let me ask you this….

Would like to see all your expenses, savings, loans, investment, mortgages and virtually any personal financial activities on one screen by clicking one button? I don’t know about you but I do!

What about if you can:

• Calculate your finances and plan our retirement
• Generate reports to help you rack your cash flows, summarize spending by categories, review investment performance
• Setup your tax, brokerage accounts, buy and sell securities
• Track your credit cards, bank accounts and see where your money is going
• Control your business personal expenses in one place
• Monitor how well your business is doing

I want to make a few point clear about Quicken before I tell you how this software will make your life much easier by helping you manage your finances.

I told you what Quicken does for you but you need to know what it will not do for you.

Quicken is not:

• A true accounting program. The Home & Small Business edition will help you do certain accounting functions such as generate invoices, account receivables and payrolls
• Quicken doesn’t offer true double – entry accounting. Meaning it doesn’t record general journal entry where debit and credit is automatically registered. This function is left for Quicken’s other sibling - QuickBooks.
• It Doesn’t have standard chart of accounts, inventory control, and other financial reports
• If you have organized your business as a partnership, you can’t use Quicken because the partnership functions are not built in to Quicken.

Now that I have cleared up what Quicken can and cannot do, let’s talk about how you can start using Quicken.

At the beginning of this article, I said setting up a personal financial plan is not an easy project. Well, I have been there myself and I can understand how you feel about it. After years of struggling to sort out my financial plan, I finally perfected it a few years ago. I can safely say – relax and allow me to help you!

If you call me today, I will tell you or show you the easiest way to setup the perfect financial plan that you have always dreamed of. Here is how I will do it:

• Help you setup Quicken the correct way so you will never have do it again
• Show you how to manage your financial affairs efficiently
• Help you generate reports and charts
• Show you how to manage your investment
• Show you how you can easily manage and monitor credit card use
• Show you how to track mortgages, loans and other debts
• Show you how to track tax and plan for tax time
• Show you how run your home businesses efficiently