What To Do When

Now, hopefully your curiosity has been sparked and you want to see how you measure up. Click on one of the blank budgets below and print the form to get started.

Paper and Pencil Budget Form

Microsoft Excel Budget Form

Don’t get too upset if you don’t have exact numbers on every item. Just make an educated estimate and then go back and update your budget when you get more accurate information.

Gather These Items

·         Last Pay Stub

·         Last three months check registers for all accounts

·         Last three statements for all credit cards 

·         Loan statements

·         Pencil & Eraser

Budget Instructions –

This budget is going to be a based on an average month. Any individual month may vary from this average. For example your utility bills in July may be a lot higher then your utility bills in October. It simplifies things to first calculate an average month, then fine tune later on by creating a precise budget for each month.

Income Section

• Start with a current pay stub. Your last pay stub of the prior year and your last year’s W2 or 1099 could also be helpful. If you have commissioned-based pay a yearly commission report is best.

• If you are paid a fixed salary it is easy to determine what gross pay to use, all you have to do is look at your current pay stub. If you are paid hourly you will need to estimate how many hours you work in an average pay period. If you are confident you will get overtime pay, you can add this in. If you are unsure, you should leave it out. Your last pay stub from the prior year or your W2 from the prior year could help answer that question. If you have commission or bonuses as part or all of your pay you have the toughest job. Do your best to come up with a realistic average monthly amount. If you estimate too high, it could cause you to spend more then you earn.

• Fill in your gross income and all deductions. Multiply your income by 4.33 if you are paid weekly, 2.166 if you are paid bi-weekly, and 2.0 if you are paid twice a month.

Expense Section

Use your checkbook and credit card statements to determine what you spend in an average month.

• For those items that you pay once a month like your telephone bill you will fill in the monthly column, using an average month.

• For the items that you pay weekly, like your grocery bill, you should fill in the weekly amount and then multiply by the number of weeks in a month, which is 4.33, to get your monthly amount.

• On the items that you pay periodically, such as auto maintenance, estimate how much you spend in a year, and then divide that number by 12 months to come up with your monthly amount.

• Total the expenses in each category

Determining What Percent of Your Income Goes to each Category

Take the total category cost and divide it by your total net income. Then move the decimal over two places to get your percent. 

• Category Total ÷ Net Income 

• Move Decimal Over Two Places

Now that you know what percent of your income goes for each of the expense categories, you should compare your percent to the recommended percent.

 This is usually a very eye opening experience. The problem categories should be popping out at you and you can focus your efforts on them.

Although the recommended percents are good rules of thumb, everyone’s situation is different and you may not be able to get to the recommended percent in every category. If you can’t, you will have to make up the amount by coming in lower then required in another category.  For example: a family of eight will have much higher grocery bills then a family of two.