tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-79878065741439396192024-02-08T04:50:34.021-08:00Tracking Investments with Google DocsPeter Fleischmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14509716554058104536noreply@blogger.comBlogger1125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7987806574143939619.post-102210837247952212014-04-04T04:40:00.001-07:002014-04-29T00:53:57.164-07:00<b>Tracking Investment Portfolios in Real Time - Story from a Long Time Quicken User</b><br />
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I have all my investments recorded in Quicken. It gives me easy access to my portfolio, unrealized gains, investment returns, and other information - but only when I am at my laptop or desktop PC. I want this same information to be available wherever I am. If all your investments are in one account, or with one brokerage firm, that firm's website probably gives you everything you need. However, if you have multiple accounts, like I do, that approach doesn't work.<br />
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You might ask, "why have mutliple accounts?". Part of the answer is "legacy" - each one came from a different employer or a broker/salesman that I liked. The other part is my belief that you never put all your eggs in one basket.<br />
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I searched the web for solutions, and found many, but they seemed to all have one attribute that I was unwilling to live with - they wanted all my account passwords so that they could aggregate my data. With all the reports of data losses by major retailers, and all the reports of identify theft, I didn't want to leave myself open to the possibility that one of these aggregators wasn't totally honest or just not competent enough to safeguard this information.<br />
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There are a few solutions that don't require you to give up your passwords - such as Yahoo Finance. These types of solutions come with different attributes that I didn't like: manually updating the portfolio to reflect buys, sells, and dividend reinvestments was a real pain. And, none of them had sufficiently flexible reporting.<br />
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Quicken has a mobile solution, but I didn't think it was robust enough for my needs, primarily because it does not support investment accounts. Most people have a majority of their assets in investment accounts, so it is incredible to me that Quicken Mobile ignores these accounts altogether.<br />
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So, I built my own solution with Google Docs using their online spreadsheet. This approach had several advantages:<br />
<ul>
<li>Google Docs runs virtually everywhere: desktops, laptops, Macs, PC's, IOS, Android, etc.</li>
<li>Google Sheets has some pretty sophisticated financial functions and very complete analysis capabilties</li>
<li>Sheets is similar enough to Excel that it was easy to learn</li>
<li>Sheets will update itself every 5 minutes or so to make the spreadsheets show near real time pricing in all the reports and charts</li>
<li>Sheets has an import function that could be adapted to read some of the not so pretty Quicken export formats so that I wouldn't have to re-key the data</li>
</ul>
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If you're interested in getting a copy of what I created (either the version that accepts Quicken input or the one that allows you to type your own data), please send me an email at <u><span style="color: blue;">PGFLLC@gmail.com</span></u> and I'll send you a link. What I ask in return is that you give me honest feedback about what you think of it and ideas for how to improve it.</div>
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Thank you!</div>
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Peter<br />
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<i>Recommended prerequisites for use of this package:</i><br />
<ol>
<li><i>Understanding of Excel principles. Experience with Google Docs is helpful.</i></li>
<li><i>Basic understanding of security types, pricing, terminology.</i></li>
<li><i>Intermediate to advanced Quicken skills if using the Quicken import version of the tracking tool.</i></li>
<li><i>Advanced Excel skills if you are planning to add reports or charts yourself.</i></li>
</ol>
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Peter Fleischmanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14509716554058104536noreply@blogger.com0