Answers to the parts of Stewardly that aren't obvious from the interface alone. If something you're wondering about isn't here, reach out at coatsdr@icloud.com.
SimpleFIN Bridge is a separate service that handles the actual bank connection for you — Stewardly never sees or stores your online banking username or password. You connect your bank once through SimpleFIN Bridge, then paste the setup token it gives you back into Stewardly to link it.
See the step-by-step connection guide for exactly what that looks like.
That covers the cost of maintaining a live connection to your bank through SimpleFIN. It's an optional add-on — Stewardly works fine without a connected bank, with everything (income, fixed expenses, budgets) entered and tracked manually instead.
Connected accounts sync automatically on their own. You can also trigger a sync any time using the "Sync now" button in Admin.
It's a transaction your bank has authorized but hasn't fully posted yet — the amount, payee, or category can still shift slightly before it settles. Pending transactions already count toward your spending totals so nothing gets missed while you wait.
You won't be able to auto-sync that account, but you can still track everything else — income sources and fixed expenses can be entered manually as recurring monthly amounts even without a live bank connection.
A recurring default (set in Admin) is the amount that applies automatically every month going forward. What you see on the Budgets page for a specific month is either that default showing up as-is, or an explicit override if you've changed the amount for just that one month.
No — editing an amount on the Budgets page only overrides that one month. Your recurring default in Admin stays exactly the same until you change it there directly.
Either it has no recurring default and wasn't specifically added for that month, or it was explicitly excluded from that month. Use "Add existing source" on the Budgets page to bring a defaulted item back into a given month.
Income tends to be predictable — the amount you enter is trusted as-is, without a separate planned-vs-actual comparison. Spending still gets tracked against budget in full, since that's where actual-vs-planned actually matters day to day.
It means nobody set up a plan or recurring default for that income source. The amount shown is the total of whatever real transactions got categorized to it this month — not a figure someone typed in.
A category is the bucket itself — Groceries, Dining, and so on. A rule tells Stewardly to automatically put transactions from a specific payee into a specific category from then on, so you don't have to categorize the same recurring payee by hand every time it shows up.
Splitting a transaction divides it across more than one category — a Target run that's part groceries, part household, for example. The transaction's total stays the same, but each portion counts toward its own category's spending. Edit or remove a split from the same split dialog it was created in, not by changing the category on the transaction as a whole.
Moving money between your own accounts — credit card payments, savings transfers — isn't real income or spending, so counting it would inflate both sides. Transfer transactions are still visible and filterable on the Transactions page; they're just left out of budget and income totals.
It's a required second layer of protection for every new account, since Stewardly holds real financial data. It only has to be set up once — there's nothing to redo on later logins.
A passkey uses your device's own fingerprint, face, or PIN — Face ID, Windows Hello, a security key — instead of a typed code, so it's faster and harder to phish. An authenticator app works too; it just needs you to enter a 6-digit code each time.
Use one of your saved recovery codes to sign in, then set up a new passkey or authenticator from Admin > People & security. If you don't have your recovery codes either, contact coatsdr@icloud.com for help recovering the account.
They're shown only once, at the moment you first set up an authenticator app — save them somewhere safe right then. They can't be viewed again after that; if you've lost them, disable and re-enable two-factor authentication in Admin > People & security to get a fresh set, or switch to a passkey instead, which doesn't use recovery codes at all.
Yes — the household admin can invite other people, each with their own login. Everyone in a household shares the same accounts, budgets, and transaction data.
Non-admin members see and manage the same day-to-day budgeting — transactions, budgets, categories — as the admin. Household-wide settings like billing, bank connections, and other people's access are admin-only.
The base subscription covers the app itself — budgets, categories, manual tracking, multiple household members. Connecting a live bank account for automatic transaction syncing is the separate $1.50/month ($15/year) add-on on top of that.
Nothing is deleted just for lapsing. You can still see everything, but the household loses the ability to add or edit anything until it's resubscribed.
Net worth is built from your connected accounts' balance history — it fills in as syncs accumulate over time, so a newly connected account won't have much history yet. Check back after a few more syncs.
A savings goal only tracks progress once it's linked to a specific account. Money just sitting in an unlinked account doesn't count toward any goal until you make that connection.