Prospects for Mac1.2.8

I've been using Prospects to manage my finances for years and found it was the least intrusive when it came to entering and editing transactions. The reports gave a lot of useful information about spending versus income and budget tracking. Version 1.2.8 runs fine for me under Lion after turning off the remember application windows option. That said there were a number of little, annoying bugs that could easily have been fixed to make it an even better app. Unfortunately, the developer seems to have abandoned the app as it hasn't been updated in over a year and the Prospects website has also been neglected by the developer.

The developers lack of updates would prevent any purchase from me.

Wow, finally, after searching the hills for some decent Mac banking software...I find this! Having switched to a (UK) bank that at least offers downloadable statements, I tried about a dozen different apps to manage them. Mileage varied from weird to hateful, especially for the official App Store offerings. Arguably, the last "Big Crash" happened because people struggle to look after their money. So why is is so difficult (in UK) to get your own financial data and look after it?! Prospects appears to work for me, a few days in. Great UI, potentially great reporting, no niggles, recognises categories straightaway, very Mac-like. Shares/stocks not an option, but having seen the hoops iBank wants me to jump through for holding a mixed GBP/USD portfolio, kind of a relief. I've created a Savings account and will input monthly yields. I don't often write reviews, but this hidden gem clearly needs some light shining on it. The Mac banking software sector is essentially a joke, save for this. Gave 4.5 because the demo-license system was broken, which coupled with the fairly infrequent updating, makes a new purchaser a tad reluctant... Received an email from the developer acknowledging the demo-license problem, but no actual demo-license...! The upside, very available at an excellent price from http://www.themacbundles.com/ (to whom I am in no way affiliated).

I've been using Prospects since the end of 2008. I tried all the others at the time, and still regularly look at other releases (including Moneywell, iBank, Quicken Essentials, YNAB, Squirrel, you name it) and still feel this comes up trumps. It was designed by someone who was unsatisfied with what else was out there at the time; not a big software company out to make a lot of money. Because of this, there has been very little marketing of Prospects, so most people seem to find it only after doing a bit of searching. Data entry is simple, budgeting, transfers, reconciling, scheduled transactions with reminders are all adequate. But the thing that makes it stand out - GUI and charts - is in a class of its own. The GUI is very customisable, and the main screen can show up to 3 charts at once, which gives a good grasp of your financial situation. The "My Prospects" summary screen is also rich with data. During 2009 updates were few and far between, and some thought the product had been abandoned. This did not really concern me as it was already doing most of what I needed, with one exception - ability to mine data for reporting. But 1.2.8 brings the addition of a custom "search" report. This gets over the 12 month limitation of some of the charts. It brings fully customisable reporting, and includes the option of a chart in the report, a nice touch. I don't want to sound like the Prospects/Motimotion marketing department, but since they seem to lack one, I'm happy to blow their trumpet. Check out the free trial, the full version is reasonably priced too. It's a pleasure to support indie software developers, especially when they really get something right.

I'm sorry you had problems importing 3 years of data. If you have a minute, could you describe the problem (i.e. did Prospects crash or import it incorrectly)? If you'd like, you can email support or reply here - thanks! Mike

Have just tried to import 3 years worth of accounts from Moneydance using qif. Prospects doesn't seem to be able to handle it.

It appears that the app is dead at this point.

Prospects is the best financial application out right now for Mac. Like many others, I must have downloaded the the trial versions of every Mac financial app out there including Cha-Ching, iBank, Moneywell, Squirrel, Money, Moneydance and even the beta for Quicken Financial Life. None of these quite did it for me, and could not combine at-your-finger-tip information, and ease of use in the same way Prospects does. Budgeting features tend to turn me off many of the apps, where either they weren't intuitive or not attractive in their presentation. Prospects budget manager was nice in that it can be toggled on or off, and even swapped out with more detailed segmented information like individual spending per category, balance tracking, and monthly summaries. The charts tend to be robust with drop down submenus, and multiple methods of sorting through data. This makes it easy to track and compare spending and saving habits in side by side segments. The Prospects home page is a series of easy to read charts tracking total assets versus liabilities, and a month by month breakdown of how your total net worth has changed over time. All of these graphs are quite visual and can be viewed at any time without the need to run them as reports. Importing OFX, QFX, and QIF from my banks has gone smoothly, although there currently is no automated "connect to bank" feature in the program. I've had no problems with any of the calculations, and all of the features that are in, seem to work. Currently, there is no support for investment data, no direct-connect, and no bill pay so be careful if those are "deal breaker" features for you in a financial application. I've found that what Prospects does do, it does very well however. I look forward to many solid releases to come.

I've purchased a number of the financial apps available for the Mac; looking for something that fits. They either have too many features, not enough features, are overly complex, look hideous or are unstable. For a first release product, which is being fairly rapidly developed this is a great application. It almost meets my requirements exactly, but, will meet them within a short space of time based on where development is going. The developer seems friendly and responsive person, which is a great reason to support an application and help shape it's future with suggestions that have a chance of being heard and seriously considered. I've used the application for about a week and have made the move in my mind from iBank. I've also used Moneydance which is nice but doesn't feel like a Mac application. Moneywell is a nice application but it doesn't fit the way I work. Prospects is a good application with a greater future I think! Well worth consideration as your main financial application.

How is this different or better than MoneyWell?

Ok, update from the last comment: The developer replied to my issue & I gave it another shot. It took 20 minutes but the file finally imported on my 10.5.6 Mini. Another reimport was needed to resolve duplicate issues with the Moneywell export, and then the good stuff started. Prospects has a configurable learning aspect which is customisable, meaning the more you use the program the more time you save on input and readjustments. So after 3 days it's as easy as any program I've ever used before, and easier than most. But the main thing (at least for me, a non-expert finance recorder) is the breadth of feedback and the ease of instigating it - click on any account or category and the graphing instantly changes; drag the graph sliders for an easy time-scale; make a report, easy to set up & an instant summary with it. The feedback is what I've been missing since giving up on the spinning wheel buggy iBank a month or two back. There are issues (including for me at well as others currency recognition & flexibility) but the developer is truly responsive and I've no doubt they'll all be resolved over further updates. For me Prospects is worth using right now and I happily registered today. (And no, I don't work for the guy. ;) I'd like to give it a 4 and a half star right now but I'm pretty sure it'll hit the 5 in a while. Anyway, a real lift after some of the other turkeys I've used & paid for. Moneywell is fine too - I just needed broader feedback, and here it is.

Yes, interesting. But then I downloaded the trial license after trying the 100 record demo & tried to import a qif from Moneywell - so, it's a 6 year record including daily cash expenses, but Moneywell's ok with that - and Prospects hung on each attempt, even when trying just a cash import (the main bit for me regarding budgeting). Looking forward though to further developments. Looks very interesting indeed for input & feedback.

Interesting. I wasn't aware of this app. It looks interesting. I took a read of the developers blog http://blog.motimotion.com/ and found that he is communicative with his customers. The UI looks clean (which is tougher than it sounds) and right now this is a part time endeavour. I think with financial applications that are still in their infancy you have to approach them with caution. Expecting them to offer every feature or operate like a well oiled machine is probably unlikely. This appears to be an app to watch. I bet by version 2.0 many people will be impressed with the app. As of right now get in while it's good $30 for a financial app is chickenfeed IMO.

Another failure financial application for OS X that falls short of all the PC financial apps.I had high hopes but now I wished I never purchased this application. The developer does not even update the application. I am sorely disappointed and do not recommend this application.

My earlier review was based on a few weeks' experience, and was positive. I've now used this software longer, and can no longer recommend it at all. First, QIF imports from my other financial program (which had always worked perfectly up till then) suddenly started going haywire and Prospects started crashing on import, even though the QIF's were in as plain a text as you can get. That exporting app (Checkbook) continues to work flawlessly to this day with 10 accounts containing many thousands of transactions. I worked with the Prospects developer for several weeks to try to resolve these crashing and import problems, even providing the crash data and actual QIF samples. He couldn't find the problem no matter what we did. So I decided to take the app off my computer, including its preference file (these were the only two files concerning it that I could find) and restarted with a fresh download of the same version (1.1.3) from the developer. THIS IS EVEN WORSE! I put in a single cash account that has an active balance of about $9,300, but the QIF was over 4,600 items long. Prospects only found 2,469 of them and reports that my balance is -$2,624.29 as of 26 March 2054! It lists hundreds of transactions spaced over the years from 2008 up to 2054! However, it also says that my current balance is $22,602.02. Can this product announce its uselessness any more clearly? SAVE YOUR MONEY, DON'T BUY THIS.

Sick and tired of LiquidLedger I've come across Prospects... only to find that it doesn't offer multi currency support. And at least on my PowerBook the app does crash a lot.

Over the years, I've used most of the financial applications available on Macintosh--and there sure are a lot of them. This is probably the most complete and sophisticated I've ever seen for this early a release. More important, it gets right a number of critical things. I have ten different income and investment accounts and occasionally transfer data between them. I have four years of data with many thousands of transactions. Using QIF, after registering I was able to import all of them correctly to the penny into Prospects. I was able to update them with new data and only add the new...and it was accurate. The completeness and ease of custom reporting is far better than I remember of Quicken for Mac or Windows (both of which started forgetting reconciled transactions after a couple of years). Prospects provides an exceptional view of your financial status. Even with all the data I've put in it, it remains extremely quick, something I can't say for iBank, but can for Splasm's Checkbook. This application is not quite complete yet--it doesn't display reconciled data yet, so I'll keep using Checkbook despite its minimal report displays as my primary tool and exporting QIFs to Prospects till I have this. It's clear that the developer plans to add it as it's in the instructions already, but the column for it isn't in place yet. It also doesn't have a separate password to lock it, so you have to rely on your encrypted drive and password for that to keep your data safe. But Prospects can slice and dice your data better and easier than anything I've seen yet, and most important of all, can handle very large volumes of data accurately and quickly. Terrific product!

After looking for a personal money manager for a while I came across Prospects. For the person like myself who likes a straight no-nonsense type of money manager,with the features that one needs to get a good grasp on their financial picture, this product fits the bill perfectly. Sure there may be some little bugs here and there but the developer listens and reacts quickly. Personally now I use MoneyWell for my budget needs and Prospects will become my day to day money tracker. I give this 2 thumbs up!

This app, although in its infancy, shows great promise! Although it has some bugs and quirks, it is amazingly feature rich for a 1.0x version.

Just downloaded this. Looks very interesting - will this be the perfect money management package I've been seeking for years? Good online help too. Unfortunately I've got to work now, so little time to play with it at the moment. But one suggestion - would it be possible to include a sample file? It would be nice to see what it's capable of without having to enter lots of data.