I’ve been fortunate enough to have the YNAB methodology in full force in my life since April of 2003. We’ve never lived paycheck to paycheck, always lived within our means, planned for larger purchases, and stuck with our budget over time. As a result of the methodology, our money situation has always been just fine, and, more importantly, we’ve been on the same page with our financial goals.

We never had a mountain of debt to conquer, retirement plan contributions to “catch up” to, or a kid that’s suddenly in need of tuition (and books, and fees, and food, and gas money, etc.).

But I’d venture a guess that most people who highly recommend YNAB as budgeting software have had at least one of the aforementioned challenges — probably several at a time.

So what makes someone highly recommend budgeting software? Why do people recommend the You Need A Budget software?

Not a day goes by where I’m not asked the question in an email (or two, or three, or four) about the possibility of YNAB having this or that feature: Does it forecast? (sort of) Will it automatically download transactions to my bank, or will I have to download the file myself? (no and yes) Will it amortize my mortgage for me? (no) Can I use it for my business? (yes) Does it support online bill pay, where I can just write the bill from within the program? (no). Of course, this is all at the time of writing.

I’ll be square with you, and possibly scare a few off, but YNAB is budgeting software. It’s built to help you budget. It helps you manage your cash flow. It only comes highly recommended as budgeting software, not as an all-in-one-all-the-bells-and-whistles-and-upgrade-fees software package like Quicken or MS Money. YNAB cannot be all things to all people, and will never make the attempt. YNAB is budgeting software.

With a piece of software doing just one thing it’s a wonder why it nails things on the review circuit the way it does. Thankfully, I think the reviewers have recognized YNAB for what it is, and what it is not. But I’ve noticed one thing with software, and budgeting software is no exception: When it does one thing really well, that gets noticed.

And YNAB does budgeting very, very well.

But to go a bit further, the real reason, when you get down to it, why YNAB comes highly recommended is not because of the software. Anyone can build an application that clicks and shines, etc. That’s not where the power of YNAB lies (not even with its übersimple interface that I love and adore). The power of YNAB goes back to the beginning of this article. The power of YNAB is its methodology. And one thing I’ve discovered in my accidental journey of YNAB, is the fact that software will be recommended highly when it changes someone’s life for the better. And that is exactly what this budgeting software does.

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