Finding the right investments can be hard, but so can tracking their performance over time. I’d really like to hear how you are tracking your investment portfolio.
Are you using a software program like Quicken or MS Money?
Do you use online apps like Mint or Adaptu?
What about an online portfolio management site like Google Finance Portfolio, Yahoo Finance, or Daily Finance?
Do you keep it in Excel or maybe Google Docs?
What about old school – paper statements only?
I’d love to hear how you are tracking you positions and why you like what you use! Share, and I will post a round-up next week highlighting your favorites!
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This post was written by...
Robert – who has written 317 posts on The College Investor.
Robert is the founder and editor of The College Investor, a personal finance site dedicated to young adult and college student finances. You can learn more about him here and connect with him on Twitter or Facebook.
{ 27 comments… read them below or add one }
We use Quicken for everything financial including our investments. I really like it. It is easy to use and you can print great reports from it. It also is integrated with different tax software which is really handy when that time of the year comes.
I do like the reports that Quicken offers at tax time. It makes calculating capital gains very easy.
Thanks for mentioning Adaptu!
I use yodlee.com. It’s the same as mint
I’ve used the Yahoo! Finance my portfolios feature for years. As far as dealing with the day to day checking on my accounts it’s great. I have my stock shopping lists set up there as well.
For tracking all the trades, dividends, profit and loss, throughout the year, my broker has some great tools I use for tracking it all. All the info is easily downloadable in spreadsheet form come tax time.
I forgot that many brokers are offering great tools these days.
My bank actually does it for me to a certain degree online right on their website even if the account is not owned by them. I also track my net worth using Excel each month and can compare it easily to the previous months.
Yes, many banks now offer you to link external accounts. This can be pretty helpful!
I use 3 main tools: 1) Vanguard’s Portfolio tracking tools that are built-into their brokerage and mutual fund accounts. It lets me aggregate my positions with other brokers and my 401k plan so I can view all of my exposures in one place. 2) My own excel spreadsheets which link to my budget and long-term financial plan.
Also, e-trade offers a pretty good portfolio aggregation tool, but I have not been using it lately.
More Excel! Interesting to see several people still using it for tracking finances.
I keep the actual portfolio on Yahoo and i have a spredsheet witht he portfolio detail.
I really enjoy your ask the readers posts. Great idea.
I use a Google Docs spreadsheet and update the value of each of my index mutual fund holdings 1x per month to calculate my asset allocation levels. I then rebalance if needed (which is generally only needed 1 or 2 times a year).
There is a lot of excel and Google Docs. What keeps you from using software or an online app?
Good question. Since tracking my index fund values simply involves logging in to Vanguard once a month and entering the values, I just do it manually. I guess I could see if Mint would do this for me, but I feel like I have more control to analyze the asset allocation levels in Excel.
Mint does a good job, but Quicken is great about asset allocation. It downloads it and you can see your entire portfolio. I’ve also used Morningstar’s X-Ray screener before, but you can’t keep your portfolio there.
That’s a good tip! Is Quicken free? If not, is it worth the cost you think for my application?
I only use an excel sheet….very untech savvy:).
I personally prefer excel. I use it because I enjoy customizing it exactly how I want it (with fancy formulas and all) and I can also force myself to add everything up by hand. This means it “hurts” a little more when I do the budget each month instead of just seeing the figures.
What Excel customizations are you using? I’d be interested to hear. Are you using Macro’s to pull the data?
I use Mint.com but it has a problem with double counting my investments (at USAA I import all my account data and so Mint.com ends up counting my stock portfolio once from Fidelity and once again from USAA. Mint doesn’t track the actual investment returns from the USAA account and I haven’t figured out how to get it to ignore it yet).
I started experimenting with Wiki Invest last week. I like the layout and ease of use so far but I still want to explore it more before rendering a final verdict.
I’ve had issues with Mint doubling my accounts in the past as well.
Terribly old fashioned with Excel spreadsheets. For tracking portfolios and stock watch lists, I use a combination of Yahoo Finance and spreadsheets.
@ Robert – Nice! I might have to check out Quicken then. What version of that software do you find is best? Deluxe? home and Business?
And just to confirm – does Quicken give individual index mutual fund level specifics within each account, or does it just give the overall account balance?
I use Quicken Home and Business to keep track of everything, but I’ve found Premier to be just as good if you use Quickbooks or another accounting program.
As for the actual accounts, it will show each mutual fund, cost basis, and you can click and see allocations, as well as portfolio level allocations.
I’m sold on giving Home and Business a try then. I noticed on ebay that the 2011 version is only like $5. Do you think that will work just fine? The 2012 version is out, but is like $70.
- I started off with Excel sheets – found it too cumbersome.
- Then came along mint.com. It’s great for budgeting and keeping track of the categories where I spend money. Interface is awesome. It learns quickly about my habits too. Mostly bugfree and no server downtimes. Main sore point about mint is that when it comes to investments, it can not seem to understand their category and hence not reliable source for keeping track of portfolio.
- Have just started on adaptu; let me see if it can better mint.com
No harm in using both adaptu and mint
It is not free, but I find it to be very worth it for tracking investments and other accounts. Plus, it makes tax time a breeze.