Best Online Loans Advice

After identifying your financial goals and establishing a plan to achieve those goals, you can establish a budget to save the money you need.  You might think that you don’t need a budget and can save money without one, but everyone can benefit from a budget.

Are you worried about rising expenses that are burning a big hole in your pocket every month? Don’t worry, just make a personal budget worksheet to keep a tab on your expenses and you will be able to cut down on your extra expenses.

Before making the personal budget worksheet, it is very important to prioritize the list – home rent/loan, utilities, transportation, insurance, debts, food and family expenses – under which you spend the money every month.

Effective budgeting starts with knowing how much cash is left to spend and evaluating your current spending trends. moneyStrands categorizes your transactions automatically, then charts and graphs it, so you can easily spot the problem areas. It even lets you compare with your peers anonymously to see how much they typically spend in any given category, so you can decide how much to budget more easily. moneyStrands has a flexible approach to personal budget worksheet where you can set both monthly and annual goals and track them separately.

A great feature in the Table View Dashboard and the monthly detail reports is visual alerts. When your income falls short or your expenses exceed your budget, the cell for that month and category turns red. If you are within your budgeted parameters, the cell is green. This allows you to view problem areas quickly without having to dig deep into the reports.

If you are suddenly living on less money, there’s a good chance you’ll need to significantly reduce your expenses. That means, there will be times when you’ll need to choose not to purchase one thing so you can have another thing that is higher on your priority list. Getting your priorities in line will help you to separate your needs (you need to keep a roof over your head) from your wants (you want a new magazine).

If you do not have access to Excel or any other major spreadsheet program you can use our online template to help plan your personal budget. It does work just as well as my Excel version, the only downside of this calculator is that you won’t be able to save your Financial Data, so before leaving you may want to print it for future use.