Managing personal finances can be a trying experience for most people but having the right tool can help make it less challenging. While Excel is often used to prepare and track a budget, manually updating a spreadsheet with the latest transactions can be a very time-consuming process. Microsoft recognizes this and offers the Money in Excel add-in to help make managing your personal budget a seamless experience.
Money in Excel is a dynamic, smart template that allows you to securely connect your bank, credit card, investment, and loan accounts to Excel and automatically import your transaction and account information into an Excel spreadsheet so you can organize your finances all in one place. You can view transactions across multiple accounts, explore a monthly snapshot to understand your spending trends, and customize your money workbook with its available templates.
To get started, Microsoft 365 Personal and Family U.S. subscribers can download Money in Excel with any web browser. Once downloaded, open the Excel template and follow the on-screen prompts to connect your financial accounts using a secure third-party plugin supported by Plaid (Plaid currently supports most major U.S. financial institutions).
Once your financial accounts are connected, Money in Excel will automatically import your transaction information from all of your accounts into this workbook. You no longer need to spend hours manually setting up and maintaining a personal finance spreadsheet from scratch — Money in Excel does it for you with just a few clicks. When you want to update your workbook with the latest transactions, just click the “Update” button and get the latest snapshot of your transactions and accounts without ever leaving Excel.
Once your transaction information is imported into Excel, it’s easy to track your spending habits to help stay on course and get closer to your financial goals. With the help of easy-to-read graphs, you can quickly track how your spending compares month to month. And to help ensure you are not caught unaware of any unexpected transactions, Money in Excel will alert you to increases in your subscription fees, changes in bank and overdraft charges, or any big purchases that were posted during the month.
So start off the new year by building better financial habits in managing your money by downloading Money in Excel today!
