Vitals

A few months ago, I realized something embarrassing: I had no idea whether my own financial situation was actually okay or not.

I could calculate a debt-to-income ratio. I knew what an emergency fund was. But I had no idea what my specific numbers meant for my actual life. Was a 38% DTI fine? A problem? I genuinely didn't know. When I looked for a tool to tell me, I found spending trackers that require bank connections and assume you already understand finance, and generic AI chatbots untethered from your actual numbers. Neither told me what my situation meant in plain English.

So I built Vitals.

What it does?

You enter rough monthly numbers, income, rent, debt payments, savings, expenses, and Vitals scores your financial health 0–100 across four metrics benchmarked against published industry standards (CFPB, HUD, Fidelity/Vanguard). It then streams a narrative explaining what those specific numbers mean for your life. Not generic advice, grounded in your actual inputs.

Don't know your exact numbers? Upload your bank statement PDF. Vitals reads your transactions, categorizes them, and fills the form for you. You review each category before anything gets submitted.

There's also a What-If simulator, progress tracking across months, a goal tracker with timeline selection, PDF export, and Vitals Chat. A finance-only AI assistant that talks like a financially savvy friend, not a compliance officer.

No bank connection. No signup. No API key, just open it and go.

Your data stays with you!

Vitals never stores your financial data on any server. The code is fully open source and you can read exactly what happens with your numbers. When you're done, you download a single .vit file that stays on your device. It's encrypted, not for financial-grade security, but to prevent accidental exposure if the file ends up somewhere unintended. Think of it as a basic safety net, not a vault.

Next time you come back, upload that file and your previous data pre-fills the form. One file, all your months, no account needed.

What happened when I launched

First launch was rough. Posted on Hacker News, 33 people visited, almost nobody got past the API key setup. I was asking non-technical users to bring their own Groq key before they could use the AI features. Classic mistake. Fixed it immediately, hosted key is now built in, zero setup required.

Moved off Streamlit Community Cloud to Railway. No more app sleeping after 2 minutes of inactivity.

Added a proper landing page after feedback that without one, people had no idea what the app did or whether to trust it with their financial numbers.

Added session analytics so I can actually see where people drop off. Who completes the form, who engages with chat, who saves a snapshot. No personal data, no messages, just funnel events.

The biggest insight so far: the people who actually get through the full flow engage properly. The problem is getting them through the form in the first place. The PDF importer was built specifically to solve that.

What's next?

The retention problem is what I'm thinking about most right now. Vitals is a monthly tool but almost nobody comes back for a second checkup. Building a calendar reminder feature so users can set a native reminder without needing an account. The goal tracker is partly an answer to this too. Someone with a 3-month goal has a reason to return.

Still free, still open source, still no bank connection required.

Two things I'd genuinely love to hear if you try it

1. Does the AI narrative actually help you understand your situation, or does it still feel confusing or generic?

2. What would make you come back next month?

And if you've figured out how to reach non-technical users who genuinely need a tool like this, I'd love to hear what worked.

Live here: myfinancevitals.app
Open source: github.com/PavanHebli/finance-vitals