Money Management & Budgeting

[Jjmorris]

If there is a thread on this, please merge.

I recently bought a house and while going wild on new purchases for said house has been fun, I am coming to the point where the funds are becoming limited.

I threw on my big boy pants and started looking into creating a budget and tracking spending so I know how much I can spend on my house a month. In doing so, I have a few questions.

1.) Do you use an excel template you found online to budget money and track spending or did you create your own? If not, what software do you use? Quicken?

2.) How do you budget expenses that do not occur monthly? As in car registration once a year, garbage quarterly, etc.. Do you just have the extra expense that month or do you somehow divide it out so month to month expenses stay similar.

3.) If you do budget, what are some tips you have learned to make the process easier?

Obviously this thread can be used for any money managing and budgeting talk, just hoping to get a few things answered.

 

[mikedean441]

Excel is my friend I have a template we were using however it was on my darn work computer when I got let go...im hoping beags has the copy I sent him. Has about every catagory of spending u can think of and then u just allocate money in advance to each catagory and track ur spending on it. The one off items go into misc unless u are saving for them monthky in anticipation of the expense.

Doing it this way is eye opening...seeing where ur spending is month in and month out...sticking to the budget is tough sometimes.

 

[Puttin4Bird]

You're going to do great at accounting bud.

1)

2)

4)

Haha!!

My wife is an accountant so she covers all this and tells me how broke we are.

 

[Jjmorris]

You're going to do great at accounting bud.

1)

2)

4)

Haha!!

My wife is an accountant so she covers all this and tells me how broke we are.

I took out my original 2.) and forgot to fix the 4.) to a 3.) Ha! Thanks for the help.

 

[MWard]

If there is a thread on this, please merge.

I recently bought a house and while going wild on new purchases for said house has been fun, I am coming to the point where the funds are becoming limited.

I threw on my big boy pants and started looking into creating a budget and tracking spending so I know how much I can spend on my house a month. In doing so, I have a few questions.

1.) Do you use an excel template you found online to budget money and track spending or did you create your own? If not, what software do you use? Quicken?

2.) How do you budget expenses that do not occur monthly? As in car registration once a year, garbage quarterly, etc.. Do you just have the extra expense that month or do you somehow divide it out so month to month expenses stay similar.

Car registration, put in your car expenses budget. Divide by 12 and add it in, that way you won't be surprised. If you have a garbage pickup service, put it under housing expenses like a utilities. It'll help keep you in check

 

[Jank]

I am very interested in this as well. I am fairly new to the "big boy" workforce (about 18 months), and it gets tough budgeting housing, insurance, utilities, etc. I am working on budgeting for joining a golf course, but it's tough. I try to pinch pennies where I can, so I really look forward to seeing any tips/advice some of you old guys have

 

[codybwallace]

I created my own spreadsheet that carrys my balance from month to month with my constant bills already in place. For instance, I know what I should have set aside at the end of the year based on my constant bills. For utilities, I budget for the highest bill I have experienced. This allows me to have a little extra money (dz golf balls) if my utilities are not as high as they have been. For my annual bills, I divide them between paychecks and have that money set aside for when the bill is due. Like Mike said, this is a very eye opening task. I know I was incredibly mad when I figured up how much I was spending on eating out for lunch and picking up a paisley Monster every morning. Ouch.

 

[Jjmorris]

Car registration, put in your car expenses budget. Divide by 12 and add it in, that way you won't be surprised. If you have a garbage pickup service, put it under housing expenses like a utilities. It'll help keep you in check

But if I divide it by 12 and add it in, what am I supposed to do then, pull out the cash and set it aside each month? I can't just give the DMV 1/12th of the registration fee every month. I guess i will probably just know that month I have an additional expense..

Also, I am not interested in doing the envelope approach where I pull money out and put it in envelopes, even though that is probably the best way to keep to a budget.

 

[mikedean441]

Beags found the sheet if anyone wants it pm me ur email addy

 

[MWard]

But if I divide it by 12 and add it in, what am I supposed to do then, pull out the cash and set it aside each month? I can't just give the DMV 1/12th of the registration fee every month. I guess i will probably just know that month I have an additional expense..

Also, I am not interested in doing the envelope approach where I pull money out and put it in envelopes, even though that is probably the best way to keep to a budget.

It's a budget, how you keep the money separated is all up to the user. Whatever you can do to keep from spending it by accident!

 

[codybwallace]

But if I divide it by 12 and add it in, what am I supposed to do then, pull out the cash and set it aside each month? I can't just give the DMV 1/12th of the registration fee every month. I guess i will probably just know that month I have an additional expense..

Also, I am not interested in doing the envelope approach where I pull money out and put it in envelopes, even though that is probably the best way to keep to a budget.

It may not be the best, but I actually have two accounts. I have an active checking account that I pay bills out of and a savings account that I can transfer money from if needed. This really helps me keep an eye on my active balance. I would keep my money for the end of year bills in my savings account and transfer that money when the bill is due.

 

[Rhyno]

I pretty much live paycheck to paycheck. It's not a good life, but it's what I've always done, what my parents did, and so I just got use to it. Thanks for the thread I'm interested in it.

~Joseph~
Via Tapatalk

 

[tequila4kapp]

Beags found the sheet if anyone wants it pm me ur email addy

I do something similar in Excel. I just sent JM an offer to share the spreadsheet. The same offer applies to others, just PM me your email address.

 

[mikedean441]

email sent to everyone

 

[fracisco]

I've used Quicken for more than a decade (currently running Quicken 2013 on my Mac inside Parallels). It has really good budget building tools, and we find it very useful to account for where our money goes. Easy to build reports, as well as sync with your bank to download transactions if you don't want to enter them manually. It's usually 50% off the list price 6 months after release, and is good for 3 years or more before upgrading.

 

[MaryC]

I've used Quicken for more than a decade (currently running Quicken 2013 on my Mac inside Parallels). It has really good budget building tools, and we find it very useful to account for where our money goes. Easy to build reports, as well as sync with your bank to download transactions if you don't want to enter them manually. It's usually 50% off the list price 6 months after release, and is good for 3 years or more before upgrading.

This! I've been using Quicken since it came out and when combined with TurboTax in April makes my financial planning easy. I use the deluxe version because of investments and the online/mobile app (which because I travel a lot for business helps keep track of expenses when I'm on the road) I've also heard good things about Mint (Mint.com) if you want to do the open software approach.

Regardless of if you use excel as some do, Quicken, Mint, or some other form of budget/money management, huge kudos to you for getting started on this. It is scary at first because you will see where all the silly money you spend every week/month goes and how quick that $1.50 you spend here and there adds up. BUT, in the long run, you'll find that you actually have more money and have a little nest egg too.

Good luck!

 

[One-T]

Check out mint.com

My wife and I are not spreadsheet type of people, this can actually track your spending through your checking account. Yes, its very secure. It is made by Intuit which owns quickbooks. It literally tracks your account and puts the things in categories for you. I think its free for basic help and understanding. It will help you get on your feet with budgeting rather quickly. The best part is...you dont have to fill in your own spread sheet.

 

[Jjmorris]

Huge thanks to those that have reached out so far, I went from LOST to LEGEND when it comes to budgeting thanks to THP.

 

[Jjmorris]

Check out mint.com

My wife and I are not spreadsheet type of people, this can actually track your spending through your checking account. Yes, its very secure. It is made by Intuit which owns quickbooks. It literally tracks your account and puts the things in categories for you. I think its free for basic help and understanding. It will help you get on your feet with budgeting rather quickly. The best part is...you dont have to fill in your own spread sheet.

Used Mint before but I never spent the time to set it all up. May look into it again.

 

[tequila4kapp]

A word to the younger guys, especially:

IMHO using a tool like this should be virtually mandatory. As younger people we were carefree and mostly oblivious to the boring details of our finances. We worked and made some money and kind of paid attention but that was about it. Then one day we woke up and realized we were in 5 digit debt. At which point I devised the tracking / management approach for us described above. With substantial dedication the debt was resolved in less than a year and ongoing debt (i.e., CC) has been nonexistant ever since. It isn't necessarily fun to stay on top of it like this but ultimately it is the right thing to do. Until I win the lottery that is Anyway, good on you guys who are asking about this - you won't make the same mistakes we made.

 

[One-T]

also, our checking account is setup to take $1 from checking and put it to savings every time a transaction is posted on our account. When we were broke it really helped us out a ton. We were able to save money that quite frankly you dont miss. Next thing you know, you have a few grand in savings. We setup 2 savings accounts, a normal and our $1 account. That way our normal savings isnt tied with the one that gets $1 at a time. Makes it fun to see how many dollars you can get in that biatch

 

[One-T]

Used Mint before but I never spent the time to set it all up. May look into it again.

Its VERY effective if you go through and budget. It tells you how much each month you have left to spend. I actually found it to be fun.

 

[ddec]

also, our checking account is setup to take $1 from checking and put it to savings every time a transaction is posted on our account. When we were broke it really helped us out a ton. We were able to save money that quite frankly you dont miss. Next thing you know, you have a few grand in savings. We setup 2 savings accounts, a normal and our $1 account. That way our normal savings isnt tied with the one that gets $1 at a time. Makes it fun to see how many dollars you can get in that biatch

I like this idea a ton. I hate tracking money. I'm awful at it.

 

[RoundersRob]

Budgeting, and sticking to your budget, are two different things. Both require discipline. Sometimes that's hard when you wanna spend $$ on golf stuff.

my only advice is this...

One thing to always keep in mind when you own your own home is that there will always be expenses that you do not expect that can easily wreak havoc on any budget. Be sure to have a reserve set aside for such things.

 

[One-T]

A word to the younger guys, especially:

IMHO using a tool like this should be virtually mandatory. As younger people we were carefree and mostly oblivious to the boring details of our finances. We worked and made some money and kind of paid attention but that was about it. Then one day we woke up and realized we were in 5 digit debt. At which point I devised the tracking / management approach for us described above. With substantial dedication the debt was resolved in less than a year and ongoing debt (i.e., CC) has been nonexistant ever since. It isn't necessarily fun to stay on top of it like this but ultimately it is the right thing to do. Until I win the lottery that is Anyway, good on you guys who are asking about this - you won't make the same mistakes we made.

I agree with CC debt. I got into it once for about 12K and will never do that again. I use it for things that I may need to dispute charges. Just pay it off each month. I have always had a car payment, but I am hoping this care will be my last for a long time.