Comments on: Free Budget Spreadsheets: Over 60 to Choose From

By: anonymous

anonymous — Sat, 03 Oct 2009 04:19:25 +0000

Personally, I use Excel for the household finances. I’ve been using Excel for 3 years. I can create my own template that suits my needs.

By: Michael - The Fat Loss Authority

Michael - The Fat Loss Authority — Sat, 12 Sep 2009 01:55:51 +0000

Damn, I really could’ve used some of these five years ago. The importance of tracking and measuring your budget cannot be under estimated.

Do it once and your learn invaluable things about your spending habits.

Mike

By: Erica Douglass

Erica Douglass — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 14:01:11 +0000

Thanks for the link! I was hoping you’d find mine. I still use that system; it’s worked quite well for me.

Whatever people choose, I just hope they choose something. Any budgeting system that helps you understand where your money is going is better than nothing at all.

-Erica

By: NatalieMac

NatalieMac — Fri, 28 Aug 2009 17:53:26 +0000

I made up an Excel budget worksheet based on a paper one that’s included in the book “On My Own Two Feet” by Manisha Thakor and Sharon Kedar.

It’s divided into three main categories: Future, Foundation and Fun, and then many subcategories inside each of those, including taxes, retirement savings, housing expenses, transporation expenses, utilities, etc. It’s done monthly and spans a one year period. It has worked out really well for me – I’ve never been so on top of my finances.

And this budget of mine? It’s sexy as all get out.

By: Lazy Man

Lazy Man — Fri, 28 Aug 2009 16:43:39 +0000

Hell’s no!

By: J. Money

J. Money — Fri, 28 Aug 2009 15:58:42 +0000

So you’re agreeing that budgets, are, indeed sexy yes?

By: ChristianPF

ChristianPF — Fri, 28 Aug 2009 15:19:16 +0000

Thanks Lazy – with all these options, no one should have an excuse for not having a tool to budget with!

By: Joseph Sangl

Joseph Sangl — Fri, 28 Aug 2009 13:15:55 +0000

There are over 75 free financial tools including budgets on my team’s site – http://www.josephsangl.com/tools

By: Lazy Man

Lazy Man — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 18:54:14 +0000

I would love to post it up. I don’t think I ever got an early version, but I may have missed it.

If I post it maybe others will spiff it up for you like open source software.

By: mod20mayhem

mod20mayhem — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 18:22:11 +0000

Nice overview of spreadsheets. I should probably post mine up for people to use. Over the years I have distributed it to a number of my friends/family. What I like most about mine is that I take into account State and Federal tax into my budgeting (the IRS doesn’t really accept the excuse “I didn’t budget for taxes this year” if you don’t pay), as well as call out special one time expenses that I don’t like to put into my reoccurring budget as first class citizens (because it makes it hard to do year over year comparisons). Also, I attempt to budget not just for the current year, but I create estimated budgets that go 3-4 years out. This allows me to paint a financial picture over time and make smarter decisions not just for today, but for the longer term. Doing this also allows me to create different scenarios (what if I buy a big house vs. buy a little house or what will my budget look like if we have another child). Lazyman, if I ever get around to spiffing up my budget worksheet, would you post it for your users? I think you have seen early versions of it at one time or another.