Setup with an AI Assistant

Setup with an AI Assistant

Setting up a plan is mostly answering questions and writing YAML, which an AI coding assistant (such as Claude Code) can do with you. The repository includes LLM_SETUP.md, a set of instructions the assistant follows.

Contents

• Before you start
• How to start
• What the assistant will do
• Your part
• Afterwards

Before you start

• The assistant reads your CSVs and your answers. Only use an assistant and account you trust with financial data. See Privacy and Safety.
• Have your CSV exports in the plan's data/ folder (or ready to put there).
• Useful to have at hand: take-home pay, Social Security estimates, pension estimates, retirement and 529 balances.

How to start

mkdir ~/MyFinancialPlan && cd ~/MyFinancialPlan
# start your assistant here, then say:

Read /path/to/financial_planner/LLM_SETUP.md and help me set up my financial plan in this folder.

What the assistant will do

1. Create the plan folder (financial_plan init).
2. Ask about the household: partners, children, pay, Social Security, pensions, accounts. It uses generic names and ages, and keeps account numbers and birthdates out.
3. Ask about savings, investments and a few assumptions.
4. Inspect each CSV layout (financial_plan inspect-csv) and write sources.yaml, checking the amount sign.
5. Set up categories and propose rules in small batches, asking about anything ambiguous (Venmo, checks, unfamiliar merchants).
6. Validate (financial_plan validate), check uncategorized rows (financial_plan categorize --unmatched), and start the app.

Your part

• Answer what you know; "skip" or "not sure" is fine (defaults are used).
• Review each batch of rules before it's written.
• Check the result in the app: the strip, the planner averages, and Settings › Categorize.

Afterwards

Everything the assistant wrote is plain YAML in config/. Keep refining in the Settings Editor or by hand.