The Best Apps in Australia on Personal Finance
Personal financial management should be taught in schools as a vital school. Honestly, this is one of the core skills that people need to know our education system yet somehow has neglected it. Not to worry, though, as they say, learning never stops. In this age of technology, we have got personal financial management applications that can help us manage our finances without having much knowledge of personal financial management strategies.
For this reason, we have come up with a list of the best personal finance applications that Australians can use to manage their personal finance in a better manner.
Credit Health
Knowing your credit score is an important part of personal financial management because your credit score will be used by banks and other lenders whenever you seek a new loan. It may be used for your mortgage, auto loan or personal loan. Therefore keeping track of your credit score is vital. Most Australians are not aware about their credit score because this isn`t something that is publicly available.
The credit health app allows Australians to track their credit score for free. This is the first credit score tracking and comparing app in Australia, and it allows users not only to track their score, but it also offers advice on improving their credit score and sends notifications when their credit score goes up or down.
Read More: Best Personal Finance Software in Australia
Pocketbook
Pocket is a free personal expenditure management app, that is compatible with most Australian banks. You simply have to download the app, make an account and connect your bank accounts and then the app will automatically track your expenditure. Pocketbook will categorize your expenditure into different categories and give you statistics on where you are spending your money the most. Based on this analysis, you can then shape your expenditure and manage your personal finance. The app also allows users to set reminders bill payments and spending limits on different categories of expenditures.
Raiz
Raiz is a smart micro-investment app. Budgeting and saving are the first two steps of personal financial management, whereas investing is an important third step that most people do not take very seriously. Raiz allows people to invest their savings, and it does this my automatically depositing your spare change into its portfolios. The portfolios held by Raiz are diversified portfolios and this means that the users who invest their savings, get to do so at very low risk.
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The way Raiz works is very simple. Whatever you spend is rounded up by Raiz, and the difference between your spending and the rounded figure is invested. For instance, if you bought an item for $19.5 then the app will round it off to $20 and invest the $0.5 difference. This, therefore, is your saving that is converted into investment. Yes, it looks like nothing but when you accumulate this figure over a year, then it`ll grow up to be a sizeable figure that`ll be earning money on its own in the form of profit.
Money Brilliant
Money brilliant is another personal financial management and budgeting app. Money Brilliant is similar to Pocketbook in its function, but it can connect to a higher number of banks and it can also sync with other financial management apps, giving it an edge over Pocketbook. Money Brilliant offers a basic free plan and a paid premium plan.
The free plan allows users to link up their bank accounts, categorize their expenditures, budget the expenses and set spending limits. Reminders can be set for bill payments. The premium plan offers these features, but in addition, it also allows users to categorize the expenditure according to tax deduction criteria. The premium plan also allows users to calculate their net worth and it also offers financial management tips to paid users.
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Goodbudget
Goodbudget is a budgeting app that allows users to set up limits for up to 10 different expenditure categories. Goodbudget can track expenditure by syncing it up with your account. The app can also sync with multiple accounts, so those who are married or living as partners can also sync their accounts to keep track of their expenditure. The app also allows users to analyze their expenditures and then, based on this data take decisions to shape their expenditure and increase or decrease their saving rate. Data from the app can also be exported to MS Excel for detailed analysis.
Finch
Finch is a new app and in the brief time that it has been around it has already won 2 awards for being the best personal finance app in Australia. This is an all-in-one app that allows users to track their expenditures and the app also offers advice to users to manage their finance in a better manner and increase their savings rate. But the unique selling point of this app is its social sharing feature.
The social sharing feature allows users to send and receive payments to their friends and family members. This app can track group expenses as well. The app can be used to send and share payments in restaurants or while travelling etc. This group’s bills and payments can be split in an easy and convenient manner. The downside is that the other person also needs to have the app.
Word of Caution!
These are some of the top personal financial management applications, specifically for Australians. Word of caution, though, before using any application, make sure that you carry out proper due diligence, especially before using applications that require your personal data, because while there are some genuinely good applications.
There are also some bogus fraudulent applications that are waiting to grab your personal data for malicious reasons; therefore, always carry out your own due diligence for applications, including the ones we have discussed in this article, as it is always better to take precautions and be safe rather than sorry. Â
