#109 - Don't Make These Common YNAB Mistakes!
02/12/25 • 64 min
YNAB is an incredible tool for learning to love how you spend, but it does come with a learning curve. Ben and Ernie have taught thousands of folks how to use YNAB, and throughout their years working with newcomers a handful of common mistakes occur again and again. In today's episode, Ben and Ernie outline seven mistakes people make in YNAB, and how to avoid them.
Resources mentioned in this episode:
https://www.ynab.com/blog/common-money-mistakes
Get your tickets to YNAB Fan Fest 2025! Coming to San Diego, Minneapolis, and NYC. Tickets are ON SALE NOW:
Follow Budget Nerds on YouTube
Budget Nerds Livestreams: https://www.youtube.com/@YNABofficial/streams
Budget Nerds Episodes: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCuIUGmbCDklkDCDm-cQqv2g
Share your YNAB wins with Ben and Ernie!
Get your tickets to YNAB Fan Fest 2025! Coming to San Diego, Minneapolis, and NYC. Tickets are ON SALE NOW:
YNAB is an incredible tool for learning to love how you spend, but it does come with a learning curve. Ben and Ernie have taught thousands of folks how to use YNAB, and throughout their years working with newcomers a handful of common mistakes occur again and again. In today's episode, Ben and Ernie outline seven mistakes people make in YNAB, and how to avoid them.
Resources mentioned in this episode:
https://www.ynab.com/blog/common-money-mistakes
Get your tickets to YNAB Fan Fest 2025! Coming to San Diego, Minneapolis, and NYC. Tickets are ON SALE NOW:
Follow Budget Nerds on YouTube
Budget Nerds Livestreams: https://www.youtube.com/@YNABofficial/streams
Budget Nerds Episodes: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCuIUGmbCDklkDCDm-cQqv2g
Share your YNAB wins with Ben and Ernie!
Get your tickets to YNAB Fan Fest 2025! Coming to San Diego, Minneapolis, and NYC. Tickets are ON SALE NOW:
Previous Episode
#108 - Spendfulness: The Word We've Been Looking For All Along with YNAB Dave
In today's episode, Ben and Ernie are joined by Dave from YNAB, a YNAB teacher and contributor to many YNAB articles and blogs and a master of money analogies! Dave discovered YNAB while deeply in debt and making a move across the Atlantic. He saw the wisdom and value of the YNAB method quickly, however, and steadily worked himself out of debt over an eight year period. Along the way, he learend many lessons about sustainability and resilience -- learning to balance his priorities of enjoying life now and becoming debt free, while creating a buffer for unexpected expenses so they didn't put him further in debt. Two steps forward, three steps back, as Dave says.
When the YNAB team landed on the word "spendfulness" to describe this state of alignment with your money, it instantly struck a chord for Dave. The YNAB method, which for many years was represented by four rules, always really boiled down to one rule, the first one: give every dollar a job. There was always something special about Rule One, he points out. The problem was, the rules didn't fully explain the method in and of themselves. When Dave would run workshops, "embrace your true expenses" (Rule Two) was typically followed by the quesiton: what's a true expense? After spending so much time explaining and clarifying the rules, it became clear that YNAB needed a different way to explain what made it different from traditional budgeting advice.
Dave explains why spendfulness is such an important concept, and how the Four Rules have been transformed into 5 Questions which clarify the only rule that ever mattered: giving every dollar a job.
Follow Budget Nerds on YouTube
Budget Nerds Livestreams: https://www.youtube.com/@YNABofficial/streams
Budget Nerds Episodes: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCuIUGmbCDklkDCDm-cQqv2g
Share your YNAB wins with Ben and Ernie!
Get your tickets to YNAB Fan Fest 2025! Coming to San Diego, Minneapolis, and NYC. Tickets are ON SALE NOW:
Next Episode
#110 - Is YNAB Worth It?
It's a common question for those not already committed to YNAB: is it really worth it? I mean, paying for a budgeting software? It's a legitimate question, and you can probably guess where Ben and Ernie land on answering it (of course!). Today Ben and Ernie don't want to offer their opinions on why YNAB is worth it, they want to share some cold hard facts from a recent study the YNAB marketing team conducted on YNAB user behavior.
What they found was a clear quantitative reason to sign up for YNAB: the average user saves $600 in their first month of using the YNAB. That's nearly six times the annual cost of YNAB, saved in just the first month. The numerical arguments for using YNAB are some of the least convincing, however. The qualitative benefits of using YNAB are positively inspiring! Ben and Ernie walk through a number of statistics demonstrating how YNAB'ers have improved their quality of life, from feeling less stressed, arguing less with their spouse, and actually feeling good about spending their money.
Try YNAB FREE for 34 days, and start working on that $600 savings:
Follow Budget Nerds on YouTube
Budget Nerds Livestreams: https://www.youtube.com/@YNABofficial/streams
Budget Nerds Episodes: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCuIUGmbCDklkDCDm-cQqv2g
Share your YNAB wins with Ben and Ernie!
Get your tickets to YNAB Fan Fest 2025! Coming to San Diego, Minneapolis, and NYC. Tickets are ON SALE NOW:
If you like this episode you’ll love
Episode Comments
Generate a badge
Get a badge for your website that links back to this episode
<a href="https://goodpods.com/podcasts/budget-nerds-381305/109-dont-make-these-common-ynab-mistakes-84065448"> <img src="https://storage.googleapis.com/goodpods-images-bucket/badges/generic-badge-1.svg" alt="listen to #109 - don't make these common ynab mistakes! on goodpods" style="width: 225px" /> </a>
Copy