Spreadsheet formulas for personal finance
I like XIRR to get an <i>actual</i> sense of what my annualized portfolio performance looks like.<p>Pretty much every bank, brokerage, or financial software I've used is "dumb" and will a) count deposits as growth<i>, b) show total lifetime growth, and/or c) ignore deposits.<p>XIRR allows me to better benchmark portfolio performance by accounting for when I deposit (or withdraw) money so I can clearly say, "I'm earning X% per year."<p></i> Schwab is terrible at this. "You gained 5% today!" No, I didn't, I deposited $1,000 into my brokerage account.