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Anonymous
01/23/20 at 3:23PM UTC
in
Money

Spending Habits

Help! Any good articles or tips on how to manage a budget or decide how budgets should be broken down?

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Hope Angel Williams
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86
VP Sales at Data Tech Company in NYC/remote
01/31/20 at 8:45PM UTC
My current combination is: Personal Capital (easy-to-use money management, which I prefer over Mint) and Excel/Sheets to visualize how I'm pacing toward my goals on a regular basis At it's simplest: keep track of what money is coming in (income) and going out (expenses) then try to shift your investments into less liabilities (costs you money) toward more assets (makes you money). Personally, my time and energy have become more valuable than saving a buck here and there so I now start making my decisions with those factors considered to for the short- and long-term benefit. From working hard and smart, I've been able to budget for donations which may seem silly to some, but to me it's a privileged priority that I'm happy to contribute to regularly. That being said, I also leverage my trusted network and cautiously research everything before doing so that I can stay informed of opportunities to make more output (time, energy, resources) with less input.
Francesca Vanderwall
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610
01/29/20 at 2:21PM UTC
I'd suggest starting with your spending over the past 3 months. Look at it, understand it, but don't judge it. Once you know that, you can start figuring out where to improve. It takes a lot of discipline, practice, and time. Let us know how we can help!
Maggie B
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983
Business and Data Analysis Consultant
01/28/20 at 7:19PM UTC
I have a friend who doesn't carry any cards on her, and instead takes out cash on pay day and uses that as her discretionary food/snacks/movies/entertainment fund. Smart!
Kelseyannb
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53
Communications-oriented professional.
01/28/20 at 6:58PM UTC
The basics of how I do it are as follows: 1. I call it a "spending plan" versus a budget. 2. I create a "fixed" column with monthly bills that don't really change much month over month and a "variable" column with things that do change. In each group, I then create a "projected" column for how much I think it's going to cost and then an "actual" column for how much it did cost. I have a template and create a new sheet in google docs each month to compare those two. 3. In a separate place, I list my income and also which day auto things come out. This is just one idea for how to track and consider your expenses.
Ruzana Glaeser
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950
Co-founder of brightmeetsbrave.com
01/23/20 at 6:23PM UTC
The first and most important thing in any change of behavior is acknowledgement, meaning you need to understand what your current spending is like. You don't need to go any farther than Excel to get this going. Sit down and make different categories of expenditures you incur. For example, for us it's: mortgage, natural gas, electricity, city, waste, internet, cellular, fuel, child/care, car insurance (etc), food, clothes (for each person), medical, gym membership, eating out, movies, netflix, spending money, etc. You need to get down to the details of what are all your bills you must bay (insurance, utilities, mortgage, etc), and then you need to understand how much you have that is discretionary (clothing, entertainment) and then you can dial on what discretionary is. We then take cash out for any discretionary spending and work off cash system, because it's easy to put things on the card and run up that bill, but if your cash is running out, then you will notice how your behavior shifts and all of a sudden you aren't grabbing everything at Target, or running through Starbucks. Obviously, you will need to have Income and then just start subtracting as you have the bills. We have a bi-weekly budget, because that's what works for us. Good luck!
Jackie Ghedine
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5.76k
Coach for Gen X Women | Jack Russell of Humans
01/28/20 at 2:51PM UTC
I agree with Ruzana and would add two things to this. One, write every single thing down that you spend money on, from a pack of gum to a bottle of water to the movie ticket. If you don't feel like taking out your phone to track it, it may not be worth buying. Secondly, while paying in cash is great (and I believe in it), it sometimes becomes hard with the online world we live in. If you do any shopping online, put what you are considering in the basket and don't buy it. Leave it in your cart and sleep on it. When we think about buying something, before we even purchase it we get a dopamine rush in our brain. This chemical feels good, encouraging us to spend money. However, just going through the act of purchasing the items without purchasing the items can become just as satisfying with the right training and habit building.
brideytracy
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216
01/23/20 at 5:44PM UTC
There is a great app called "Mint" that budgets your money and sends reminders for upcoming bills. Super helpful if you're looking for a personal budget!
User deleted comment on 01/23/20 at 3:54PM UTC
Amy Dalton
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184
Experienced UX Designer in New Orleans.
01/23/20 at 3:50PM UTC
personal or business budgets?

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