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I have been doing this for years, but for me the biggest downside is the lack of API at my financial institutions to pull data , which leads to a big time suck

I have been doing this for years, but for me the biggest downside is the lack of API at my financial institutions to pull data , which leads to a big time suck weekly/monthly logging into sites , navigating their poor UI to download CSVs. Otherwise there is a great ecosystem of tools (and I have automated a lot of my own with Python) for parsing, classification, and import of data into the plain text ledgers.

Jtsummers 6y ago
I found that ledger worked best if you made it a daily habit to go in and record transactions. Also, since I recorded mine in org-mode files I could use something like Beorg to edit it while away from the computer.
akerl_ 6y ago
I’ve ended up using Plaid to solve this. I’ve got some scripts that talk to Plaid to pull transaction data and emit it in ledger format.
sundarurfriend 6y ago
ledger-autosync [1] tries to solve this problem, by pulling the data for you from supporting banks. If I understand things correctly, this [2] is the list of banks it can successfully pull data from. [1] https://github.com/egh/ledger-autosync https://github.com/egh/ledger-autosync [2] http://www.ofxhome.com/index.php/home/directory/successfulRequests http://www.ofxhome.com/index.php/home/directory/successfulRe...
- nanna 6y ago
  Looks US-only?
nimih 6y ago
I've ended up automating most of the data pulling with Puppeteer and a pile of poorly-written JavaScript; every once in a while one of the scripts breaks, but it's pretty rare and easy enough to repair.
mcshicks 6y ago
Yes this is exactly my experience which is why I still use Quicken. My other concern is if something happened to me it would be much harder for my spouse to figure out than Quicken. However I have used beancount, fava and python to do my own financial planning i.e. what will my income, expenses, and taxes be in future, and being able to have different inflation assumptions for say medical care vs say food or transportation, as well as to have different return assumptions for index funds, vs bonds or savings. They are really great tools.

Jtsummers 6y ago

I found that ledger worked best if you made it a daily habit to go in and record transactions. Also, since I recorded mine in org-mode files I could use something like Beorg to edit it while away from the computer.

akerl_ 6y ago

I’ve ended up using Plaid to solve this. I’ve got some scripts that talk to Plaid to pull transaction data and emit it in ledger format.

sundarurfriend 6y ago

ledger-autosync [1] tries to solve this problem, by pulling the data for you from supporting banks. If I understand things correctly, this [2] is the list of banks it can successfully pull data from. [1] https://github.com/egh/ledger-autosync https://github.com/egh/ledger-autosync [2] http://www.ofxhome.com/index.php/home/directory/successfulRequests http://www.ofxhome.com/index.php/home/directory/successfulRe...

nanna 6y ago
Looks US-only?

nimih 6y ago

I've ended up automating most of the data pulling with Puppeteer and a pile of poorly-written JavaScript; every once in a while one of the scripts breaks, but it's pretty rare and easy enough to repair.

mcshicks 6y ago

Yes this is exactly my experience which is why I still use Quicken. My other concern is if something happened to me it would be much harder for my spouse to figure out than Quicken. However I have used beancount, fava and python to do my own financial planning i.e. what will my income, expenses, and taxes be in future, and being able to have different inflation assumptions for say medical care vs say food or transportation, as well as to have different return assumptions for index funds, vs bonds or savings. They are really great tools.