About DonkeyBucks

How it started

Mint shut down in January 2024 and left millions of people without a free budgeting option. The alternatives were either expensive ($10-15/mo), required serious philosophical commitment (YNAB), or upsold wealth management to people who just wanted to know where their money was going.

DonkeyBucks was built out of that frustration: a tool that just tells you what you can actually change about your spending, with none of the guilt and none of the upsell. Built independently, with a bias toward shipping over polishing.

The philosophy

Most budgeting apps lecture. They show you what you spent on restaurants and imply you should feel bad about it. DonkeyBucks does not do that.

Instead, it asks a more useful question: of everything you spent this month, how much was genuinely flexible? Your rent is fixed. Your Netflix is a choice. Your groceries are essential but variable. That one impulse purchase is discretionary and one-time. Knowing the difference tells you where you actually have room to maneuver.

Personality in the margins, sobriety in the numbers. The app should have some warmth and humor without obscuring the actual data.

Costs are transparent. The Free tier is genuinely free: CSV import, manual entry, full dashboard, budgets. Pro is $4.99/mo (or $49/yr) and adds Plaid bank sync, AI categorization, recurring detection, and the rules engine. Every new account gets 30 days of Pro free, no credit card required. When the trial ends, you drop to Free and keep all your data. We email before anything ever charges. No surprise billing.

What makes it different

• Spending flexibility tiers: Not just categories. Every transaction is classified as Fixed Essential, Variable Essential, Discretionary Recurring, or Discretionary One-Time. You see what you can change, not just what you spent.
• Bank sync via Plaid on Pro, or not at all: The Free tier runs entirely on CSV import and manual entry. Pro adds live bank sync through Plaid, which covers thousands of US banks, credit unions, and investment accounts. At most banks, credentials go to your bank via OAuth, not to us.
• CSV-first: No bank connection required to get value. Import from any institution via CSV with full column mapping.
• AI categorization with real cost controls: We learned the hard way what happens without them. User-triggered, rate-limited, and honest about what it sends where.

Where it is now

DonkeyBucks is in early access, pre-launch. All seven feature phases are implemented: transaction management, spending tiers, category groups, transfer detection, recurring expense detection, rules engine, and budget framework. The foundation is solid. The polish is ongoing. If you are an early adopter type, this is the right time to try it.