I blanched when I saw the subject line, “Mint.com to be acquired by Intuit, maker of Quicken.” More like “Mint.com to be acquired by Intuit, makers of crap,” I thought. Judging by your comments, I don’t blanch alone.

Despite the emailed assurances of Mint’s CEO that the site will remain free, easy-to-use, and ever-improving, a number of Consumerist readers expressed low expectations for the outcome.

PhilFR: “Ugh. This is a sad day. Mint has made my personal finances infinitely more organized. The only question is which will happen first: will Quicken screw up the product, or start charging for it?”

Blueoysterjoe: “What, Intuit will buy Mint and suddenly have great ideas about how to run a personal finance website? No. Intuit will apply its crappy ideas to Mint and turn Mint into crap.”

calchip: “Long ago and far away, Intuit made a great little product called Quicken that sold for 10 bucks. Then they came out with Quickbooks, which in its original incarnation, sold for maybe 100 bucks and did everything.

More recently, Intuit has turned into a complete and total piece of sh*t company that gives you the privilege of paying $250 for a crappy, bloated, crippled piece of software that nags you every single time you use it to buy more of their overpriced crap, refuses to support a product that’s more than 2 years old, and basically makes a product that is almost unusuable unless you’re willing to pay hundreds of dollars a year for crap that you either don’t need or should have been (and was at one time) included in the basic product.

I wish the management of this company would shrivel up and die and be replaced by people that actually believe in *earning* a customer’s business rather than shoving services fees down their throats.

This can only be a bad, bad sign for mint.com. I wonder how long till they ruin it?”

Aaron Patzer, Mint.com founder and CEO, wrote customers last night:

Ready for the next Evolution
Thank you for being a part of what’s becoming a revolution in active personal financial management. I’m excited to say that Mint.com and Intuit are coming together to take personal finance to the next level. Mint.com has entered into an agreement to be purchased by Intuit. Once the acquisition closes, Mint.com will have the opportunity to spread that revolution to more people, more quickly, together with one of the world’s strongest software brands. The acquisition is expected to close by the end of 2009.

What’s not going to change
Mint.com will stay the way you like it: free, easy-to-use and constantly improving.

What will change
As outlined in today’s press release and my blog post, after the acquisition closes, the Mint.com team will contribute to improving the financial lives of tens of millions of consumers and small businesses. I’ll personally be taking on the role of GM of Intuit’s Personal Finance group responsible for online, desktop and mobile consumer personal finance offerings. Joining Intuit enables us to bring our vision of helping consumers understand and do more with their money to millions of Intuit customers. This is a compelling combination of our innovative product, technology, and industry leading user interface design with one of the most trusted brands in software.

I look forward to executing on that vision —- for you.
Thanks for your support,
Aaron Patzer
Founder and CEO

So, what are you abandoning Mint for? Personally, I’ll still be sticking with my trusty excel sheet. Or you can check out these eight other free personal finance management systems.

(Photo: Andreas Kollegger)

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