This post may contain affiliate links, please read my Disclosure policy.
Simple ways to organize your money with Excel, Money trackers and Free apps
Keeping tabs and tracking your spending are often the foundations for organizing your personal finances.
Tracking is a way to see your entire spending for a period like a week, a month or a quarter.
You want to appreciate how you’re using your money, develop new habits and then stop the use of these trackers.
You can also see how you can cut or substitute expenditures, when possible.
If you’re creating a budget, you’ll need to have a tally of your expenses first.
For many, tracking can be a tedious task. However, these simple methods make your mission a lot easier.
Using these trackers and Apps you can categorize expenses and get an idea of your purchasing practices.
Then take a look at these practices and decide what you need to change.
Even though the exercise of writing your expenses helps to track your cash outs in order to note patterns, you don’t have to be exact.
You can also estimate your expenses as accurate as possible.
When selecting a method for keeping track of your expenses and creating a budget, keep these in mind;
- Choose the best method for you
- Record your expenses consistently
- Look for opportunities to save
- Use the opportunity to focus on learning about your habits, rather than to be a perfect tracker or organizer.
- Once you have a handle on your money and are confident, you should stop doing the detailed tracking.
Related Content
- 11 Sites like Amazon to shop on a Budget
- Best Ways to buy college textbooks on a budget
- 17 Ways to get free stuff online – no surveys
Keep a Printable Expense Tracker
Writing down expenses may sound a bit antiquated, but for many this is a method that works. This involves simply recording your expenses, writing a description and adding it up.
This free Daily, Weekly and Monthly expense trackers will help you manage your expenses and track your spending habits until you become a pro.
Use a Budget Planner
Using a budget to manage your money is a good idea if you need a tool that helps you stick to a particular sums.
In order to create a budget you have to start backwards, this way you can see your spending habits.
So, you’ll start with your bank statement or a list of your expenses if you have it written down or in your mind.
You use this information to create your first budget and find out if you can adjust it.
Chances are you want to make some changes to your spending or maybe leave it alone, and instead look to increase your income.
If you’re starting a budget, this Budget Planner can help you with the detailed information you need to begin. Plus, it will assists you in developing new financial habits. You can use it to keep all your financial related information in one place.
Use an Excel Spreadsheet
An Excel sheet is an easy way to keep track of spendings, if all you want is simple and basic information.
You can start tracking your spending by category using this Excel Budget Sheet. Log in your cash ins and cash outs by month. Download the spreadsheet and use it as a print out on digitally.
Alternatively, you can use Google Sheet to track your expenses and create a simple budget.
Download a Personal Finance App
Personal finance or budget Apps are great for people who want additional analysis about their habits and spending behaviors.
By consistently listing expenses, you are able to note spending patterns and more importantly opportunities for savings.
These Apps have various functionalities. They can be used to simply input expenses and also to enter other financial information such as bank, retirement and investment assets.
Most of these Apps are free or offer some type of free version in them.
- Mint and Personal Capital – these Apps features include bill payments tracking and reminders, also interface with your retirement and saving accounts.
- Good Budget and Every Dollar – these Apps have less robust interfaces, but you can track your income and expenses.
Once you select your preferred Budget App, then you can input financial information or allow interface with your financial accounts.
Periodically, you should also take a look at the reports provided by he App to see where you stand.
Final Thoughts
Wether you’re looking to create a simple budget or want additional analysis of your spending behaviors, these trackers and Apps are great tools.
Which one should you pick? Depending on your level of commitment and your needs; a printed tracker, a digital spreadsheet or an App, you can choose one and use it consistently.
The Budget Apps and money trackers are only tools to help you stay organized and be confident. They are to be utilized for learning. Your aim should be to discover your habits, make changes and become confident managing your money.
Leave a Reply