Last Updated on October 7, 2021
Mint, by Intuit (think Turbotax, Quickbooks, Credit Karma) is a website and app that brings all of your finances together.
The previous apps I have reviewed (Every Dollar, Goodbudget, You Need a Budget) have focused solely on helping you to succeed with your monthly budget.
Mint differs in that the budget is a part of the process, but you are really seeing a much more comprehensive picture of your financial situation.
Contents
- 1 How do you use Mint?
- 2 How To: Mint Overview Tab
- 3 How To: Transactions Tab
- 4 How To: Goals Tab
- 5 How To: Credit Score Tab
- 6 How To: Bills Tab
- 7 How To: Budgets Tab
- 8 How To: Trends Tab
- 9 How To: Investments Tab
- 10 How To: Ways to Save Tab
- 11 What is great about Mint App?
- 12 What challenges might you face with Mint?
- 13 What’s the bottom line?
- 14 What questions should I consider before determining if Mint is right for me?
How do you use Mint?
Visit the website mint.intuit.com or download the Mint: Budget & Expense Tracker app to set up an account for free. There is no buy-in on this app ever (it’s free!) – which is a plus for many people.
Mint is much more focused on using your current accounts to keep itself as accurate as possible. For this reason, the first step in opening an account is to sync one (or more) of them to Mint.
You cannot proceed further in this app without syncing an account, so it is important that you feel comfortable doing so, or you will not get the program’s benefits. This is a major difference from other budgeting apps where syncing was an option but not mandatory.
Once you have synced your account, you will be taken to an overview page, and the program will proceed with a guided tour.
There are many facets to Mint, so it may be beneficial to take the time to look through what is available for you to use (I will give a brief overview below). You may want to set aside time to do a deep dive and choose how much or little information you want to share with Mint.
Mint will guide you through their tabs which include detailed information and processing for you about the following:
- your transactions,
- goals,
- credit score,
- bills,
- budgets,
- trends,
- investments, and
- ways to save.
You may start to notice right away that there are advertisements throughout. These may be specified to you, but it is still in your best interest to be picky about which ones you choose to pursue. X them out if they become too distracting.
I will now break down each tab and how it is beneficial to your financial overview.
How To: Mint Overview Tab
The Overview page, which you will be taken to when you sign in, is a great resource for quickly viewing what your overall financial situation entails. You are able to see your accounts, bills, insights, goals, spending, trends, credit score, budget, investments, and ways to save all on one page.
While this just tells you what is going on, you can click on the tabs at the top to look more in detail or make adjustments to any one category.
The top of each screen, where you can navigate through the pages.
As you will start to notice, there is always a green help tab on the right side of any page you are currently viewing. Use it to answer any further questions you may have about this or any other tab.
How To: Transactions Tab
This tab displays your accounts and the transactions made within them. At the top of the main area, you can add more accounts and search through your transactions if you so choose. Here you should also see your total cash versus your total debts (your net worth).
You can get detailed information about the transactions you search, such as how many transactions you made at a retailer, how much you spent in total, and details about each specific transaction at that retailer.
This is located at the top right, next to All Cash & Credit Accounts. For example, I could search “Target” and see that I made multiple transactions within the time period that I selected. I could also get detailed information about each transaction, the average and total I’ve spent at Target during the time period.
On the right side of the Transactions page, I can also see a graph that shows how much I have spent at Target during each of the last three months. To customize your transactions to your specifications, click on the Category Column arrows.
Here you can change which category you spent from for each transaction. This will be reflected in your budget. To be even more specific, by clicking below a transaction, you can edit it – i.e., tag it with specific labels such as “reimbursable” or “tax-related,” or you can leave notes about the transaction.
On the left column, there are many additional options. These are mostly ways to view the transactions – by just the type of purchase they were, their accounts, or by tags you have given them. Overall this tab helps you to be as organized as possible.
I appreciated that my personal bank would not update unless it was verified every time I logged in – it’s an extra step, but one that was worth it to me. This makes me feel as though the program is very secure and would be hard to hack into and get information from.
How To: Goals Tab
Setting goals in your financial life (and all aspects of your life, frankly) is incredibly important to staying focused, motivated, and finding success. Mint seems to take that seriously by devoting a tab to this. In order to complete this step, simply click on the + Add a Goal button at the top right of the page and fill out the information necessary.
Mint will give you suggestions for financial goals and will then determine how much you should save per month, for how many months and when you will reach your goal. Ideally, you should set 3-5 short-term and 3-5 long-term goals.
If you are drawing a blank, consider saving for a rainy day (emergencies) or paying off debt (listed at the top of the suggested goals), which are a great place to start.
Even if it seems overwhelming to you at first, starting to think about these goals and adding them to your overall financial picture will help you to be more successful overall!
How To: Credit Score Tab
Mint gives you the option to have your credit score updated on their platform. You do have to enter personal information, and it advises you that your score won’t be affected because of that process. This will also not cost you any money.
Americans can view their credit score weekly free during the pandemic – therefore, you could update your Mint score that often if you choose.
Choosing to link your credit score to Mint can help you be more aware of how your spending and financial situation is impacted by it.
It may be beneficial to you to use this information to attempt to raise your credit score. Here is an article I wrote recently about how to help your credit score improve over time. Using Mint to remain informed and aware of it could be a great motivational tool, depending on your situation.
How To: Bills Tab
Mint gives you the option to link your bills to the account. You are able to link a bill or payment to a specific account, add it as an offline bill or as a property.
You can add a date that you will pay, and there is a button that you can select that will mark it as paid or set it as an autopay bill. On each bill, you can go into more settings to add more and eventually pay for all your bills in one spot.
The great thing about Mint is that it will help you stay more organized with your finances if this is one of your weak points. Keeping track of your bills in the same place as your goals is a great way to stay motivated.
There is even the option to set a goal for debt on the right side of this page! The more information you are comfortable keeping in one place, the more efficient you will become at working through many financial situations.
How To: Budgets Tab
The budgets tab gives you the opportunity to create a budget, which is truly important for anyone in any financial situation. Begin by entering your income to get started.
There are some preset tabs already listed, such as Gas & Fuel, Groceries, and Clothing. They will most likely use your previous/current spending (that they see in your linked account) to figure out a budget for you, but that can (and should) be adjusted. You can also add more categories by clicking on the light grey + Create a Budget button under the month and year on the top left.
You are able to customize your budget by hovering over the category and either clicking on it or a specific area to change the amount. If you click on the title of the category, it will take you to the transactions it has linked to it thus far.
If you are unhappy with where it placed this transaction, you have the option of changing that category to what you feel is more appropriate. You can also set the categories in your Transactions Tab.
If you hover over the amount, it will allow you to add or subtract an amount from the budgeted amount. For example, if you had originally budgeted $300 for Gas & Fuel, by hovering, you could raise or lower that amount to better reflect the month’s spending.
Below the colored bar, you can click ‘Edit Details,’ and it will take you to a screen where you can make more adjustments if you choose. This includes how often you will update this amount and whether or not you want leftover money to carry over to the next month.
Below all the “budgeted,” you will see an everything else category; here, you can expand and see how they will fit this into a specific budgeted category for you to keep track of. If you decide, you can use the + Create a Budget tab to make these into regular budget items.
On the right side, you will see a graphic that keeps you up to date on how much you have spent and how much you have left – this is really beneficial for making sure that you do not overspend in any area of your budget.
At the bottom, you can see savings for any goals that you are currently trying to meet. This is very helpful because it allows the amount you are saving per month to be included in the budget, and you can easily click to see the progress you have made on that budget so far.
How To: Trends Tab
The trends tab displays informational graphics that show your spending, income, assets, debts, etc.
One of the many graphics you can view as part of the Trends Tab.
This is a great tool that can be used motivationally to remain aware of how much of your money is going to a specific place – especially since you may be trying to cut down in certain areas – like eating out, gas, etc.
On most of these graphics, you can hover over a line or section of the chart to see more information. You can also look at all of these graphics in differing amounts of time, like months, weeks, or years.
Check out all the graphics to see what is most beneficial and/or motivating for you in your current financial situation!
How To: Investments Tab
In keeping with having all your financial information in one spot, the investments tab allows you to link and track all the investments in your portfolio. If you don’t have any investments, you can also begin investing through this tab, but I would highly suggest you do a little research to determine what type of investment is best for you.
The suggestions are often ads and may not necessarily be in your best interest.
It is highly recommended to begin investing as soon as possible; just make sure to research the best investment strategy for you.
How To: Ways to Save Tab
The final Mint section includes offers to “help” you do the most with your money. Of course, in my opinion, this is only “help” if it applies and is in line with your specific financial situation and financial goals. You will see ways to save on credit cards, personal loans, home loans, investments, banking, student loans, and insurance.
Do your research to determine if the deals offered are the best for you.
Many of the deals offered are great but may not apply to your current state depending on the goals you have set for yourself.
Look through them and do your research (compare rates, check-in with your current companies to see if they will offer you a better deal, etc.), then use the ones that help you meet your financial goals faster.
You could also just bookmark them for later use – when the time is right for you!
What is great about Mint App?
Mint is a wonderful tool to help you keep track of your entire overall financial picture. There are many positive aspects of this site, such as helping you to not only budget but also set goals, track investments and keep a record of your credit score.
Mint is also free! This means that you can have many of the same facets of other budgeting tools (and more) without paying extra – a win-win, in my opinion.
Mint is incredibly user-friendly, as it offers help for multiple financial products and both an app and a website. It also seems to have the desire for you to find success with your finances while using this product.
What challenges might you face with Mint?
A challenge you may face with Mint is being comfortable allowing it to store much of your personal information in one place. Because you are required to link your account in order to participate, you have to be comfortable sharing that information.
Mint guarantees that it is safe, however, so this decision is really in your hands.
Another challenge of Mint is that it can be much more than a budgeting tool – which may be overwhelming to some people who are just starting on their budgeting and financial journey.
If this is the case, you may just start out by using the budgeting tab to determine if this is something you like, and then add more information and learn more about the app as time goes on.
This may not be as important to everyone, but Mint does not offer extended financial education unlike other budgeting programs.
This is just something that could potentially increase the value of the program – specifically for beginners, but of course, these resources are available in other places as well.
What’s the bottom line?
In my opinion, this is a great, free resource for anyone looking to get all of their financial life working in one place.
As long as you are comfortable sharing your information, you will be able to hold yourself accountable and easily view your net worth at any point in time. This is a great way to see and make major financial changes to your future.
What questions should I consider before determining if Mint is right for me?
I believe that everyone can benefit from using Mint if you are open to sharing login information with the program. Saying that, Mint says this about its security:
Mint also gives detailed directions about how to keep your account more secure with tips such as change your password often and enabling two-step verification.
If you are unsure of whether or not this is the program for you, however, here are some things to consider before deciding to start:
- Do I currently budget? Would my system be improved by using Mint instead if I currently am?
- If I am not currently budgeting, would the Mint format inspire me to do so?
- Do I have the time it takes to ensure that all of my transactions (automatically synced in the budget app) are listed correctly to ensure I stay on budget?
- Will I commit to using Mint in order to keep my financial life on track?
- If I do not use this app, how will I ensure that I practice positive financial habits such as spending less than I make and striving to reach my financial goals?
Consider these questions on your own and then with a spouse or accountability partner. Figuring out the best method for budgeting for you is the best way to make sure that you will follow through with any budgeting program you begin.
Remember that there are other budgeting apps available, such as Every Dollar, GoodBudget, and You Need a Budget.
In conclusion, Mint is yet another great option to consider when looking at how to track your budget – and also see your financial life in one space. It is a free program, motivates you to look at your finances as a whole picture (not just how your monthly budget is going), allows you to link many accounts – such as banking and investment, and is as detailed as you’d like it to be. Many people could truly benefit from learning more about Mint and committing to using it to help them with their finances!