When I was younger, I would always use 'rosebud' in Sims 1 and 'motherlode' in Sims 2... mostly because I was probably too young to actually understand the entire game's concept... lol I never wanted to wait until my Sims earned enough money from their jobs. So I would always use money cheats. The same goes for 'maxmotives' in Sims 2. I would always get sick and tired of constantly needing to keep up with their motives, so I would do that as well.
But when Sims 3 came around, I started to realize how much these cheats take the fun out of the overall gameplay experience. That's when I started to actually work my way up in The Sims (while also filling their needs like normal). And the gameplay got so much better and more fun!
I still occasionally use some cheats, but not very often... and I almost never use money cheats. I'll mostly use the 'fill needs' cheats if I'm just so desperate to get everyone's motives up. But that rarely happens.