My Money Worksheets...what are they and why?

I keep getting asked what money worksheets I use.

Do I use budgeting software?

I could and probably should but I don’t. There are many good ones out there, it’s just that I’m stubborn.

You see, I like to keep things as simple as possible. I probably will use a budgeting software at some point, but in the meantime, I only use two basic tools to keep track of my money.

One of my money worksheets - the first one - almost cost me my marriage.

At first, my wife just saw it and twisted her head as if to say “Al, you got to be kidding me” (I wish)…her comment was something with the words “freezing over”.

But, after really insisting on it, I convinced her to give it a try.

Now, she is better at it than I am. My wife knows exactly where all of her money goes to – every penny.

So what is the benefit of that?

The benefit has been huge: before she invests her money on something, she knows she’ll have to record it on the worksheet.

This pause gives her the opportunity to rate how important it is. I do the same thing.

Don’t get me wrong – we still buy non-important stuff sometimes, but not at the same rate as we used to. This money worksheet has forced us to think before we buy – that’s why I call it the Smartsheet.

At the end of our pay cycle, we summarize it by category and record it accordingly.

This Smartsheet is only used for non bills – everyday expenses – not the phone bill for example.

All of our bills (phone, utilities, mortgage, etc.) are recorded on the second money worksheet. This sheet I call the Cashflowsheet. If the smartsheet is details, the cashflowsheet is the summary.

You can see from the example that categories from the cashflow sheet are summarized by month here.

By rows, you can see the buckets that are important to us. By columns are where the tracking occurs.

It’s important for you to know that this is just our example. You can move stuff around, add stuff in, etc. Use this only as an example template and put in when and what bills are due.

That’s the outgoing dollars…then put in the incoming dollars and you should bold what’s left over.

That’s the amount that’s gravy - you may want to add that to whatever goal you want to reach (savings, other investments, holiday gifts, a vacation, etc.)

These money worksheets are what I use to help me keep track…it’s the system I use…what about you?