Buxfer is an online application that allows you to maintain and manage your financial stability, along with monitoring any debts that you owe or are owed. The layout is appealing and Buxfer’s competition could soon be struggling. Following a recent alliance with the Apple iPhone, you can take advantage of what Buxfer has to offer, straight from your iPhone. This will allow you to access all of your transactions, tags, charts and even report transactions while you are on the go. Yes, you can access your bank account from your iPhone as well, but Buxfer offers more and has a simple, iPhone compatible layout enabling a more readable text size.

Venturebeat recently released a favorable article, claiming that Buxfer is giving Mint a run for its money. That is a strong statement considering that Mint was part of the Techcrunch 40 startup companies. However, I agree that Buxfer is an excellent new money management tools and seems to offer everything that its competitors offer, plus more. In addition, its super-fresh interface has much to do usability. Signing up is a breeze and importing bank information is as simple (and safe) as logging in.

TechCrunch calls Buxfer the “half brother of Billmonk” because of the product similarities. However, Buxfer does offer much more than Billmonk. TechCrunch explains that, “Buxfer is deeper than Billmonk, letting you track and tag out your expenses with friends and groups over time. Buxfer goes further, letting you analyze you expenses over time through a Google finance-style pie chart with adjustable time frame.” In my opinion, Buxfer does offer quite a lot of flexibility and even offers a peer to peer payment service. Backed by Amazon, you can collaborate with Buxfer to get the money back that your friends owe you in easy, flexible payments. While other private services are beginning to offer this, Buxfer is a well-rounded site that focuses on managing your money, income and debts as a whole.

Buxfer users are enabled to setup automatic bill reminders and repeating transactions. This is helpful for those who bookmark several bill paying sites in order to manually check bill due dates each month. Buxfer will keep track for the individual every bill that is entered into the private Buxfer account; reoccurring bills such as mortgage payments, electric bills and automobile payments.

NetBanker points out a weakness of Buxfer, claiming it has “no support for transactions”. When I signed up for the service, I did notice that I had to do a lot of manual data entering. NetBanker explains, “Other than being able to import transaction files that have been previously downloaded from banks and card issuers, it’s all manual data entry. Helper tools such as “copy”, “repeat entry” and “auto-tagging” help a bit, but to be an effective tool the service needs to integrate more closely with the actual bill and the payment.” I know that if the service is too cumbersome, then it will slowly decrease individual usage.

Overall, Buxfer made an excellent choice by making itself compatible with the iPhone. With the world’s current economic status, it is about time to take responsibility for our finances.

iPhone Fully Loaded

Debt Cures “They” Don’t Want You to Know About