Trying to setup a monthly budget. Any software recommendations?

[dxkj]

Yeah, I know, pen and paper work too. But Im looking for something to keep track of it on the puta. Just got married and still in school so you can imagine things are going to be tight


If there was a form type I could use in Excel that would probably work too.


Thanks in advance.

 

[efript]

quicken?

 

[Electric Amish]

Either setup something in Excel or buy Quicken.

amish

 

[Yossarian]

MS Money

 

[conjur]

Originally posted by: Electric Amish
Either setup something in Excel or buy Quicken.

amish

Pick up a copy of Financial Peace by Dave Ramsey, too.

 

[brigden]

Create your own tables, charts, etc. using Excel.

 

[beer]

Originally posted by: brigden
Create your own tables, charts, etc. using Excel.

for the $30 that quicken or MS money cost...it'd be too complicated to do in Excel.

 

[Encryptic]

Originally posted by: dxkj
Yeah, I know, pen and paper work too. But Im looking for something to keep track of it on the puta.

If you just got married and you need a spreadsheet to keep track of the money you spend on hookers, I think you've got serious problems.

 

[Booster]

I keep track of all my finances in my head. It's too dangerous to risk letting anyone know about it (about how small my finances are).

 

[conjur]

Originally posted by: Elemental007

Originally posted by: brigden
Create your own tables, charts, etc. using Excel.

for the $30 that quicken or MS money cost...it'd be too complicated to do in Excel.

Pffft.

It's a piece of cake:

Do something along the lines of what's below and do it for each pay period (every 2 weeks for me). And, carry over the Net Income into the next pay period's total.

Column A             Column B (put amounts in here)
Income
Salary
Interest

Total Income


Expenses
Rent
Food
Car Payment
Car Ins.
Electric
Gas
Water
Cable/Satellite
Internet
Gas
etc.

Total Expense
Net Income


Oh, obviously, the expenses for the 2nd occurrence of the Column A will be different. Just plan at what time of the month you pay certain bills and extrapolate this out to the right in Excel for as far into the future as you want. You'll notice, though, that a couple of times per year you'll need to adjust if you are on a bi-weekly pay period as you end up with 13 "months" instead of 12.

 

[Booster]

Expenses
Rent
Food
Car Payment
Car Ins.
Electric
Gas
Water
Cable/Satellite
Internet
Gas
etc.

It seems to me your forgot beer, women and lots of other things people spend their money on.

 

[conjur]

That's what the "etc." is for

 

[newbiepcuser]

If you're going to use any of the online features, check what your back supports Quicken or MS Money. Its really convient to download bank statements, etc.

Excel is pretty cool for a basic setup. Like everybody says, its not that hard to setup.


I use Quicken myself, pretty easy and not much of hassle to keep track of things such as gas, rent, etc.

 

[beer]

yea but MS money has a lot of features. I haven't used quicken, but I've heard it's better, so it's more than just an electronic register....if that's all you use it for, then I guess you're OK with Excel, but Money does a lot of things for me that would be difficult to do in Excel. Well not so much difficult as time consuming. It's like my lab writeups, computing all the statistics is easy but it's a pain to set up and get it all formatted right...

 

[rpberry123]

Forget it.

The woman is gonna get all the cash anyway, just get used to it.....

 

[KingNothing]

There's two ways to set up a budget. The way I do it is to buy as little consumable items as possible (read: don't eat out) and buy quality items if you're buying something that will last.

The other way is to write down all of your expenses, making sure to include entertainment, religiously keep track of everything you spend money on in a 2-3 month period, and then adjust your budget as necessary.

BTW, my dad's method of budget keeping included using the "extra" paychecks (if you're paid bi-weekly but live off a monthly budget you'll have two extra paychecks at the end of the year) for Christmas presents and other non-necessary stuff.

 

[wyvrn]

I tried to use Money but it ended up taking too much time to keep accurate. So I setup a couple of Excel spreadsheets that keep track of expenses and receipts and makes a nice graph for me by category. The graph is the best part as you can visually tell where you money is going. I was buying too much impulse stuff and have saved quite a few bucks since setting it up.