Background
Senti began as a personal frustration.
Most budgeting tools felt heavy, prescriptive, or stressful. They asked for full access up front, promised clarity, and then overwhelmed users with charts they didn’t fully trust.
The original goal was modest: build something calmer — a tool that helps people understand their money without feeling judged.
Early Assumptions
At first, Senti followed a familiar path.
If financial data could be pulled automatically, the rest would be straightforward: categorize it, summarize it, and surface insights.
In practice, access to clean, consistent data was far from guaranteed. Availability varied widely, and reliability was often outside the product’s control.
That gap forced a rethink.
The Real Challenge
The hardest part wasn’t budgeting logic or interface design.
It was trust.
For a financial tool, even small inconsistencies can undermine confidence. If numbers don’t line up, users stop believing everything else that follows.
Senti had to earn that trust before it could offer guidance.
A Change in Direction
Instead of optimizing for convenience, the focus shifted toward clarity.
Rather than hiding uncertainty or making assumptions, Senti now prioritizes helping users understand what their data represents — and where its limits are.
This made the product slower to build, but more honest.
Where Senti Is Today
Senti is still a work in progress.
It currently focuses on:
- Helping users reflect on past spending
- Making financial patterns easier to see
- Keeping the experience simple and non-punitive
It does not try to do everything at once. It does not claim to have perfect answers.
That restraint is intentional.
What This Project Has Reinforced
Building financial software isn’t about features. It’s about confidence.
Users don’t need more numbers — they need to feel safe relying on the ones they see.
Every decision in Senti so far has been shaped by that idea.
Why Keep Going
Money is emotional.
Most tools treat it as a purely technical problem. Senti is an attempt to approach it more carefully — acknowledging uncertainty instead of masking it, and progress instead of perfection.
Senti isn’t finished.
But it’s being built with patience, respect, and a clear understanding of what’s at stake.