Quicken Deluxe 2011: Reviewed.
Posted: May 23rd, 2011 | Author: Joe | Filed under: Reviews | Tags: Quicken, Reviews, Software | 1 Comment »Intuit, the makers of TurboTax, have released this year’s version of their popular personal finance software: Quicken.
Here’s a review of Quicken Deluxe 2011, available in stores and download from Amazon
The many flavors of Quicken.
I’ve been a fairly heavy user of Quicken for about 6 years now. I’ve only ever used the Deluxe version, though the product comes in many different flavors (Deluxe, Premier, Home & Business, Essentials and now there’s even a Rental Property Manager!). I’ve only ever used the Deluxe version and when I was researching the 2011 version I discovered that the majority of people who buy Quicken buy the Deluxe version anyway. Some 85+% of shoppers buy Quicken Deluxe. So, that made it easy to review since my product choice also happens to be the choice of most shoppers.
But if your situation is more specialized (i.e. you have rental property or a home business) then you may want to investigate the other flavors that Intuit has to offer.
As for the Deluxe version, here’s what it features:
- Money management and budgeting tools that enable you to track your spending and increase your savings.
- Save time categorizing your spending with auto-categorization.
- Download your financial data and manage all your accounts together in one place.
- Helps you stay on top of bills and create a budget.
2011 vs 2010.
What’s new.
One of the nicest features of Quicken since I’ve been using it has been the ability to download your account transactions online – right from the Quicken program itself. They call it “One-Click Update” and if your financial institutes allows for it (i.e. they’ve partnered with Quicken) then you get your transactions automatically downloaded to the correct account in Quicken – retirements accounts, bank accounts, credit card activity, auto loans and more.
This has at times been a draw back for me if my financial institution was small and not partnered with Intuit. With the 2011 version, Quicken Deluxe now automatically downloads transactions from over 12,000 banks, brokerages and other financial institutions–including PayPal.
The “guided setup” wizard has also been revamped, in an attempt to make learning to use the features of Quicken a bit easier too.
Intuit has also worked to increase the integration between Quicken and their other popular product: TurboTax Your financial information in Quicken can be imported into Turbo Tax, making tax time preparation a bit less painful. This ability has been around for a few years now, and I haven’t tried it myself yet. My taxes just haven’t been that complicated to begin with, though I think I may be giving it a try next year.
Perhaps due to pressure from online competitors, Intuit has made Quicken 2011 more “socialable” by integrating Quicken Live Community, an online forum for advice and interaction with other quicken users. This new community forum is integrated seamlessly into the program itself (you can view the online community from right inside Quicken).
Quicken 2011 does a better job of categorizing your spending automatically, and it’s much quicker for situations where you need to enter the category yourself. Often times, simply typing the first few letters of the category is enough to accurately select the proper category. This alone can be a major time saver.
They’ve done a nice job redesigning the cash flow feature, improving the graphing and making it easier to project your future savings or shortfalls.
The layout of the program has been redesigned in an attempt to make commonly used features easier to access. This will likely be helpful for most people, but may be annoying if your most commonly used features don’t match what “most people” commonly use.
They claim that transaction updates for account downloads are faster, though I didn’t see a noticeable difference. That could be dependent on your connection or your institution’s connection speed as well.
System requirements
Here are the system requirements to run Quicken Deluxe 2011:
Processor: 1 GHz
Operating System: Windows XP SP2+, Vista, Windows 7 (32- and 64-bit)
Memory: 1 GB
Hard Disk Space: Up to 450 MB free space; up to 1 GB if .NET not installed
Display: 1024×768 or higher resolution
CD-ROM Drive: Required
Internet: 56 Kbps (broadband recommended for online services)
Printer: Any printer compatible with Windows XP SP2 or later
Additional Software (included in Quicken installer): Microsoft .NET 2.0 or later;
Windows Installer 3.1;
Internet Explorer 6.0 or later
Why buy.
As I write this, you can buy Quicken Deluxe 2011
Good personal finance software can help you create a budget and stick to it. It can help you set goals and meet them. After all, if you don’t know where your money is going and you wonder why there isn’t much left of your paycheck at the month’s end, how can you save for the future?
Beside the basics, good personal finance software can help you find extra savings or eliminate expenses you forgot you had. It can help you manage your money more effectively and help to pay off debt quicker or save for the big things like retirement or a new home or a new car.
Is Quicken Deluxe the best personal finance program out there? That depends on how you use it and what you’re using it for.
I honestly can’t tell you how it stacks up against online sites like Mint because quite frankly the idea of putting all of my personally identifiable financial information out on the web frightens me a little. But I know millions of people don’t have a problem with it. That’s your call.
Also, I’ve been using Quicken for years now, and I don’t particularly like the idea of re-entering my information and starting over with a new product.
Bottom line: Quicken Deluxe is a great program if you are looking for personal finance software that is not web-based, or you’re looking to replace Microsoft Money.
Why not to buy.
So those are the reasons you may want to buy Quicken Deluxe. Here are some of the downsides (or why you might not want to buy it).
Intuit has made the unfortunate choice to include advertisements in their product for their partners as well as other Intuit products. Advertising for your other products is nothing new, but the way in which Intuit does this in their Quicken products can become tiresome, at best. It is possible to ignore the banner-ad style product placement for Quicken Loans, Free Credit Reports and the like but it’s frustrating to have to do so in a retail product.
If you’re a Quicken 2010 or even a Quicken 2009 user you may not want to upgrade just yet. Many of the improvements are relatively minor and may not be worth the full price of the 2011 version.
I am still in the dark ages with V 2007. The information from the writer is very interesting and would apply to a version for the MacIntosh.
Thanks for the evaluation of the newest version.