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What You Can Do With Kanso

TL;DR: Check your financial health in 5 minutes per month. See where your money goes, spot trends before they become problems, and make confident decisions about your finances.

Monthly Financial Check-Ins Made Easy

Most personal finance tools overwhelm you with daily notifications, complex budgeting rules, and endless transaction categorization. Kanso takes a different approach: calm, monthly check-ins that give you the insights you need without the anxiety.

What Problems Does Kanso Solve?

1. "Am I on Track?" Anxiety

The Pain: You're earning, spending, saving... but have no idea if you're making progress or falling behind.

The Solution: Net worth tracking shows your financial trajectory at a glance. See if wealth is growing month-over-month and year-over-year.

Real Example: Notice net worth dropped 5% last month → Check expense breakdown → Realize one-time car repair was the cause → No panic needed, it's temporary.

2. Spending Blind Spots

The Pain: Money disappears from your account, but you can't pinpoint where.

The Solution: Expense analysis by merchant and category reveals patterns. See which merchants take most of your money, compare year-over-year spending.

Real Example: Discover 30% of expenses go to food delivery → Decide to cook more → Save €200/month without feeling deprived.

3. Spreadsheet Fatigue

The Pain: Managing finances in Google Sheets works... until you need to calculate trends, create charts, and track ratios manually.

The Solution: Keep your data in Google Sheets (easy to edit), but visualize everything in Kanso. No manual calculations, no chart formatting, no formula debugging.

Real Example: Update expenses in Google Sheets on your phone → Refresh Kanso dashboard → See updated charts and metrics instantly.

4. Financial Data Privacy Concerns

The Pain: Cloud finance apps read your transactions, sell your data, require linking bank accounts.

The Solution: Self-hosted on your infrastructure. Your data never leaves your control. No bank connections required, you input what you want to track.

Real Example: Run Kanso on your home server or VPS. Google Sheets integration uses your own API credentials, not ours.

Who Is Kanso For?

✅ You'll Love Kanso If...

  • You manually track finances in spreadsheets already
  • You want visibility without complexity (no 50-category budgets)
  • You prefer monthly reviews over daily transaction tracking
  • You value data ownership and self-hosting
  • You're tech-comfortable enough to run Docker

❌ Kanso Might Not Be For You If...

  • You need automatic bank sync (we don't connect to banks)
  • You want envelope budgeting or detailed category limits
  • You prefer mobile-first native apps (we're web-based, mobile-responsive)
  • You want set-and-forget automation (Kanso requires monthly data entry)

Core Capabilities

📈 Financial Health Dashboard

What You Get: 4 key metrics that answer "Am I doing okay?"

  • Net Worth: Total wealth (assets - liabilities)
  • Month-over-Month Change: Are you growing or shrinking?
  • Year-over-Year Change: Compare to same month last year
  • Savings Ratio: What % of income you're keeping

Why It Matters: Answers the #1 question ("Am I on track?") in 10 seconds.

Dashboard Deep Dive

💰 Net Worth Tracking

What You Get: Stacked bar chart showing assets and liabilities evolution over time, broken down by type (cash, investments, property, loans, etc.)

Why It Matters: See wealth accumulation trends. Notice if one asset class is growing while another stagnates. Spot liability payoff progress.

Net Worth Details

💸 Expense Analysis

What You Get: - Year-over-year comparison (with forecast) - Spending by merchant (top contributors + "Other") - Spending by type (recurring vs one-time) - Full transaction history

Why It Matters: Understand spending patterns without drowning in detail. Focus on what moves the needle.

Expense Breakdown

📊 Cash Flow Insights

What You Get: Income vs expenses over time, with automatic savings ratio calculation.

Why It Matters: See the relationship between earning and spending. Know immediately if you're living beyond your means.

How It Works

graph LR
    A[Google Sheets] -->|Your Data| B[Kanso Dashboard]
    B -->|Charts & Insights| C[You]
    C -->|Update Monthly| A
  1. Keep your data in Google Sheets (easy to edit, familiar interface)
  2. Kanso reads and visualizes (automatic calculations, interactive charts)
  3. You make decisions based on clear insights (no more guessing)

Technical Foundation

Why Self-Hosted Matters: - Your financial data stays on your infrastructure - No subscription fees forever - Customize and extend as needed - No company can shut down your access

Why Google Sheets: - Edit from any device (phone, tablet, desktop) - Familiar interface, no learning curve - Easy backup and export - Can switch tools anytime (no lock-in)

What's Next?

Ready to see your finances clearly?