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Author Topic: How often do you check your accounts (checking, credit cards, etc.)?  (Read 2536 times)

DaveNeedsHelp

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How often do you check your accounts (checking, credit cards, etc.)?
« on: May 13, 2019, 06:19:19 AM »
Hi everyone,

I did a search for this first and did not find anything. As I was looking over my checking account for the 40th time this week, I wondered. How often do other people (who are financially stable and proactive) check their accounts? I feel that checking my credit card accounts so frequently can be slightly misleading because of the pending not yet posted charges that I forget. This then goes hand in hand with my checking my checking account when I make payments. Curious to see what others say and what basis they have for doing so.

I guess also, how do others remember their actual spending rather than checking it all the time on their cards?

Thanks!
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FIPurpose

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Re: How often do you check your accounts (checking, credit cards, etc.)?
« Reply #1 on: May 13, 2019, 06:22:26 AM »
It seems pretty normal early on to check somewhat frequently. After you make it further along, your income starts becoming less and less important to your net worth and you become more comfortable with your budget, you'll start looking at it less.

I think for me, it was filling a lot of my hobby time when I was in between projects. So if you want to look at it less, find a hobby or something else to do. I look at my mint page maybe once every 1.5 months or so now.
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RWD

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Re: How often do you check your accounts (checking, credit cards, etc.)?
« Reply #2 on: May 13, 2019, 06:33:50 AM »
I log in to all my accounts every other week.
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Metalcat

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Re: How often do you check your accounts (checking, credit cards, etc.)?
« Reply #3 on: May 13, 2019, 06:40:13 AM »
I check about once a month, mostly just to make sure that there are no fraudulent charges. Otherwise, I pay very little attention to my numbers.
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nereo

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Re: How often do you check your accounts (checking, credit cards, etc.)?
« Reply #4 on: May 13, 2019, 06:44:32 AM »
I check my accounts ~2x/month: Once after my monthly statement posts to review charges (mid-month) and once on its due date to make sure payment went through (I auto-pay 2 days before the due date). Occasionally I'll check a third time if we made some non-standard large purchase - mostly to verify which billing cycle it will fall on.

I've never seen a reason to check more frequently - 40x/week (5-6x every day) seems to be overkill and possibly counter-productive to a healthy financial mindset.
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Philociraptor

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Re: How often do you check your accounts (checking, credit cards, etc.)?
« Reply #5 on: May 13, 2019, 06:56:07 AM »
Mint daily (bank and credit card accounts): categorizing prior day's charges and keeping an eye out for fraud

Personal Capital monthly (investment accounts): monthly net worth tally
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Zola.

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Re: How often do you check your accounts (checking, credit cards, etc.)?
« Reply #6 on: May 13, 2019, 07:03:38 AM »
I do a check about every other day, I log all our joint account expenses in a google sheet for analysis and to look at areas of optimising, improving, tracking progress etc.
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mountain mustache

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Re: How often do you check your accounts (checking, credit cards, etc.)?
« Reply #7 on: May 13, 2019, 07:06:44 AM »
I check everything every day. I like doing this because I can see incremental progress, and also stop myself if I seem to be on a bit of a "spending" spree. Sometimes I will have a day where I buy a few little unnecessary things, and it's not a big deal, but when I log in to Mint the next morning and see how it affects my budget it helps me to not repeat that any other times that month. I'm sure it will be less of a big deal later on when I am closer to my goals, but right now I don't have a lot of wiggle room so I try to keep a tight budget, and stay on top of every dollar that is leaving.
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DadJokes

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Re: How often do you check your accounts (checking, credit cards, etc.)?
« Reply #8 on: May 13, 2019, 07:16:17 AM »
I check everything daily as well. Partly because I am a control freak and like to know everything that is happening, and partly because I am bored at work 2/3 of the year and therefore spend that time tinkering with my spreadsheets.

When I am busier, I will still check the credit cards daily, just to ensure no fraudulent activity occurs.
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Bracken_Joy

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Re: How often do you check your accounts (checking, credit cards, etc.)?
« Reply #9 on: May 13, 2019, 07:36:40 AM »
Quote from: Philociraptor on May 13, 2019, 06:56:07 AM
Mint daily (bank and credit card accounts): categorizing prior day's charges and keeping an eye out for fraud

Personal Capital monthly (investment accounts): monthly net worth tally

Basically this, but it's not PC for monthly investments. Values all tally in Mint except one 401k, so I manually aggregate those in my tracking spreadsheet. Same frequencies and idea though. I've caught fraudulent charges because of Mint now 3 times in the years I've used it.
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Sibley

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Re: How often do you check your accounts (checking, credit cards, etc.)?
« Reply #10 on: May 13, 2019, 07:45:49 AM »
I do my "banking" weekly, and update net worth monthly. Banking entails paying bills, checking activity, reconciling, updating everything, whatever needs to be done that week. I typically don't check things in between.
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2sk22

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Re: How often do you check your accounts (checking, credit cards, etc.)?
« Reply #11 on: May 13, 2019, 08:00:54 AM »
Quote from: Sibley on May 13, 2019, 07:45:49 AM
I do my "banking" weekly, and update net worth monthly. Banking entails paying bills, checking activity, reconciling, updating everything, whatever needs to be done that week. I typically don't check things in between.

Exactly my approach as well. Saturday morning is bank/investment/bills time for me.
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Lan Mandragoran

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Re: How often do you check your accounts (checking, credit cards, etc.)?
« Reply #12 on: May 13, 2019, 08:22:25 AM »
Personal Capital far to often :P.
Used to try to budget, but I don't spend the day2day money in our house, so that's kind of fruitless.
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Enigma

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Re: How often do you check your accounts (checking, credit cards, etc.)?
« Reply #13 on: May 13, 2019, 09:39:24 AM »
I have a computer/desk job.  I check my accounts daily.  I have a networth spreadsheet that I update about 2 times a week.  But I have to finalize my networth at the last day or first day of the month.  That way I see how well I did for the month.

But mine is an addiction that is probably not too healthy.  Then again I am bored at work.  I like the hobby idea.  It would help if I had more to do at work.  Good luck!
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John Galt incarnate!

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Re: How often do you check your accounts (checking, credit cards, etc.)?
« Reply #14 on: May 13, 2019, 11:06:30 AM »
Quote from: Malkynn on May 13, 2019, 06:40:13 AM
I check about once a month, mostly just to make sure that there are no fraudulent charges. Otherwise, I pay very little attention to my numbers.


Same for me.
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TVRodriguez

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Re: How often do you check your accounts (checking, credit cards, etc.)?
« Reply #15 on: May 13, 2019, 11:12:02 AM »
I check most accounts daily.  We've experienced fraud, and there are time limits on when banks must reverse certain charges, and I have zero interest in paying for something that I didn't actually buy.  I guess I'm a bit compulsive about it, but it doesn't affect my life negatively that I can see, so I shall carry on this way.
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FireHiker

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Re: How often do you check your accounts (checking, credit cards, etc.)?
« Reply #16 on: May 13, 2019, 12:08:32 PM »
Quote from: Enigma on May 13, 2019, 09:39:24 AM
I have a computer/desk job.  I check my accounts daily.  I have a networth spreadsheet that I update about 2 times a week.  But I have to finalize my networth at the last day or first day of the month.  That way I see how well I did for the month.

But mine is an addiction that is probably not too healthy.  Then again I am bored at work.  I like the hobby idea.  It would help if I had more to do at work.  Good luck!

Same here. I only update my networth monthly, but I look at the spreadsheets frequently Monday-Friday. Even when I'm not bored at work, though, I'll still log on and check my accounts and spreadsheets more often than is probably typical. It keeps me motivated and on track. I'm probably a little compulsive about it as well, but it certainly doesn't interfere with my effectiveness at work and keeps me more disciplined with my spending so I see it as more of a positive than a negative for now.
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nwa-non

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Re: How often do you check your accounts (checking, credit cards, etc.)?
« Reply #17 on: May 13, 2019, 12:27:10 PM »
Check all accounts at least once a week, more like every other day.

Update net worth once a month.
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Villanelle

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Re: How often do you check your accounts (checking, credit cards, etc.)?
« Reply #18 on: May 13, 2019, 12:40:49 PM »
Once a month.  Occasionally, I forget, which I know is a bad thing as I need to make sure all charges are correct.  We keep enough float in our checking account that there's just no need to know day to day what the exact balance is. 

Our investment accounts are probably twice a year, and even then I'm mostly just mindlessly typing numbers into a spreadsheet and looking at the percentages that it auto-populates, to make sure our AA is still in tact.
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FIRE Artist

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Re: How often do you check your accounts (checking, credit cards, etc.)?
« Reply #19 on: May 13, 2019, 01:06:39 PM »
Daily or every few days.  I like to keep a close eye on charges and withdrawals.

Retirement accounts not attached to my bank get checked twice a year when I update my net worth calculations.
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Samuel

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Re: How often do you check your accounts (checking, credit cards, etc.)?
« Reply #20 on: May 13, 2019, 01:36:38 PM »
Every 2-3 weeks I take 10 minutes to check the bank balance and zero out the credit cards. Maybe once every 2-3 months I'll check all the accounts and total up my net worth. I'm still a ways from FI so I just set it and forget it and go live my life. I always keep a 2-3k buffer in the checking account so I don't have to manage transactions very closely. I'm not 100% optimized but oh well.

For me a huge benefit of learning to live so far below my means is the freedom to not think about money all the time, like I did when I was poor.
« Last Edit: May 13, 2019, 01:39:25 PM by Samuel »
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YK-Phil

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Re: How often do you check your accounts (checking, credit cards, etc.)?
« Reply #21 on: May 13, 2019, 01:38:44 PM »
Investment accounts, once a month.

Credit cards charges and bank accounts withdrawals, payments, etc. used to be checked daily through Mint, but the one credit card I use for most financial transactions no longer supports Mint access, so it screws up the monitoring of my budgets and trends. I am now down to once a week for those accounts.
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soccerluvof4

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Re: How often do you check your accounts (checking, credit cards, etc.)?
« Reply #22 on: May 13, 2019, 02:39:04 PM »
I use Mint and have everything tied in with it so check every morning. Part of this is because we have a budget so I categorize what was spent the day before. I dont read much more into it than that though
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HPstache

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Re: How often do you check your accounts (checking, credit cards, etc.)?
« Reply #23 on: May 13, 2019, 02:50:57 PM »
Daily or every other day.  Just a part of my morning routine... but admittedly, totally not necessary.
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Fomerly known as something

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Re: How often do you check your accounts (checking, credit cards, etc.)?
« Reply #24 on: May 13, 2019, 05:03:42 PM »
I check almost daily, in part to detect if there is any fraud.  So I check my checking account and credit cards basically.  I check my investment accounts less often.
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Zikoris

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Re: How often do you check your accounts (checking, credit cards, etc.)?
« Reply #25 on: May 13, 2019, 08:38:44 PM »
I look over all my accounts in Mint daily. It takes, like, a minute or two. Just making sure everything looks normal and there's nothing weird going on. We average about 40-50 transactions per month between the two of us, so there's not exactly a huge volume of stuff to go through.
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frogstomp81

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How often do you check your accounts (checking, credit cards, etc.)?
« Reply #26 on: May 13, 2019, 09:08:50 PM »
I'll check every week or so, especially if there's been a big move in the market as it's fun to see how much it goes up, or  if it goes down, how much more my next auto-investments will be able to buy. I check at month end for monthly net worth tally regardless.



Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
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HBFIRE

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Re: How often do you check your accounts (checking, credit cards, etc.)?
« Reply #27 on: May 13, 2019, 09:45:49 PM »
I have everything tied into personal capital, so I log in once a day just to make sure no weird CC charges or fraud. 
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SotI

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Re: How often do you check your accounts (checking, credit cards, etc.)?
« Reply #28 on: May 13, 2019, 10:55:09 PM »
Quote from: Sibley on May 13, 2019, 07:45:49 AM
I do my "banking" weekly, and update net worth monthly. Banking entails paying bills, checking activity, reconciling, updating everything, whatever needs to be done that week.

This is my approach, as well. With the exception of extra cashflow analysis when I have had some unplanned extra expenses. Then I check my spreadsheets if the current account is sufficient to cover the expense w/o overdraft - otherwise I will transfer some funds prior to my weekly reconciliation.

I used to be more laissez-faire about it in the past, as I considered it small stuff (a couple of hundred bucks here or there). However, since I found out about MMM last year, I am on top of all accounts pretty much all of the time.

Mind you, I have always done cashflow tracking (I plan it in December itemized in bi-weekly payment schedule for the full next year based on fixed installments, direct debit plans, averages. Then I adjust it along the year when something changes). I just wasn't as strict on avoiding overdrafts as I am nowadays.
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