Part 2: Setting up a Monthly Budget
>> Friday, September 25, 2009
I left you with some homework last week. To gather all the bills and income you have as well as writing down all the money you spend. Did you do it? If you did not-then work on it this week! If you did-awesome you can move on to step 2 in the process of making a budget.
I hope that you have gathered all your other expenses as well in your notebook.
This week we are focusing on your fixed expenses and flexible expenses. I have prepared a spreadsheet for you to enter your info into. This is on Google documents called Monthly Expenses. This is where your expenses from the past week go. You should be able to edit it and copy it into your own google documents account via gmail. If that doesn't work, let me know and I will try to help you another way.
1. Fixed Expenses: figure out from your list of expenses what is fixed. Rent, car insurance, cell phone bill, membership dues, etc. These are the items that don't change in amount due. Add these items up.
2. Flexible Expenses figure out from your expenses how much you spend weekly on flexible expenses: gas, groceries, clothes, eating out, entertainment etc. Tally up these expenses. You can then multiply this by four to get your monthly flexible expenses.
3. What is your monthly income after taxes? Include part time work if you earn that regularly a month.
4. Do your fixed expenses and flexible expenses cost more than your monthly income?
If your flexible/fixed expenses are more than your income, you need to work on cutting out some of your flexible expenses so that you have movement in your budget without drowning in further debt.
Next time we will put everything into a spreadsheet.
Remember to let me know if you are working along with the steps so that you are eligable for a giveaway. You must comment on the blog to be eligable.
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I hope that you have gathered all your other expenses as well in your notebook.
This week we are focusing on your fixed expenses and flexible expenses. I have prepared a spreadsheet for you to enter your info into. This is on Google documents called Monthly Expenses. This is where your expenses from the past week go. You should be able to edit it and copy it into your own google documents account via gmail. If that doesn't work, let me know and I will try to help you another way.
1. Fixed Expenses: figure out from your list of expenses what is fixed. Rent, car insurance, cell phone bill, membership dues, etc. These are the items that don't change in amount due. Add these items up.
2. Flexible Expenses figure out from your expenses how much you spend weekly on flexible expenses: gas, groceries, clothes, eating out, entertainment etc. Tally up these expenses. You can then multiply this by four to get your monthly flexible expenses.
3. What is your monthly income after taxes? Include part time work if you earn that regularly a month.
4. Do your fixed expenses and flexible expenses cost more than your monthly income?
If your flexible/fixed expenses are more than your income, you need to work on cutting out some of your flexible expenses so that you have movement in your budget without drowning in further debt.
Next time we will put everything into a spreadsheet.
Remember to let me know if you are working along with the steps so that you are eligable for a giveaway. You must comment on the blog to be eligable.
