Dear reader,
Sunday mornings updating Mint with a cup of coffee became a habit for me. Open the app, input my transactions from last week, check the charts, see if I'm on budget, take a sip. It wasn't particularly exciting, but this ritual kept me in tuned and connected with my spending.
When Intuit shut down Mint in early 2024, I was disappointed, but figured I'd find something else to replace it. I didn't.
I tried everything. YNAB felt like studying for an exam. Copilot felt more modern than most, but was built almost entirely around US customers. Monarch was promising — but like most apps, it relied on Plaid to pull your transactions, which meant handing your bank credentials to a third party; it didn't feel safe, and often times the transactions imported were still inaccurate. The big banks' had their own apps, but always felt like they hadn't been touched since 2009.
I ended up back in a spreadsheet. The manual entry part was fine, because this actually helped me understand my finances better, helped me keep track of things. The problem was figuring out the deeper insights, having the analyze everything manually. Charts, budgets, month-over-month comparisons — all manual. And nothing talked to each other. A transaction in one tab didn't flow through to the budget, the net worth tracker, the category summary. This took too much time and I eventually stopped doing any analysis at all.
So I kept waiting. Surely someone would build the obvious thing: you enter your transactions, and the app handles the rest. A clear monthly view. Insights that surface without you having to ask. Useful tools to help you meet your financial goals. No Plaid, no bank login, no data sold.
Eighteen months went by. Nobody did.
So I built it myself.
Aurum is the app I use now on Sunday mornings. You enter your transactions, and everything else is automatic. The visualization builds itself. Insights and trends surface automatically. One entry acts as the ledger to your budget. Your net worth, savings goals , registered account contributions, monthly subscriptions all reference those transactions; you don't have to wire anything together. You never have to give us your bank credentials, and nothing is sold to anyone. This was a deliberate trade-off I made when designing the app: to give up a little convenience for peace of mind. Canada is planning to implement Open Banking APIs within the next year or two, and when that happens, I will happily intergate secure APIs so your transactions can be automated securely.
I also chose to forgo a free cut down version of the app because whenever an app is free, you are the product. Companies sell your data to recoup the cost, and that's not something I want to do. Instead, I chose to make the app more affordable with a month-long free trial so you understand what you're getting into before paying.
I wanted to make something that felt worth opening — not another tool designed to maximize your time in it. Something actually useful that can help you gain visibility into your financial life. And most of all, something that I would personally use every day.
When an app is free, you are the product.
Canada has always been treated as a footnote by personal finance software. The apps that win "best of the year" roundups assume you're American — it uses the wrong currency, doesn't support Canadian banks, and you pay for the app in USD. Aurum defaults to CAD, tracks contributions to registered accounts like TFSAs, RRSPs, and FHSAs, and was built by a Canadian thinking about Canadian finances from day one.
It's what I open now, Sunday mornings, with coffee.
Welcome to Aurum.