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Then, zero out the sample Home (cell D31) and Paycheck (cell J29) amounts shown in the shaded Planned column.
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To start with a clean slate, adjust the starting balance in cell L8 from $1,000 to $0. Once you’ve made those changes, flip back to the Summary spreadsheet. Now, you’ll have 1,033 rows for transactions. That will be a problem if you have more than 33 transactions in a month, so click “Add 1000 more rows at bottom” to avoid any issues. Next, scroll down to the bottom of the Transactions spreadsheet. Then, click on Delete Values from the Edit drop-down menu. To delete the sample expenses for Rent and Paycheck, click on the number 5 to select that entire row. You can access it by clicking on the Transactions tab at the bottom of the screen. Let’s begin with the Transactions spreadsheet. Warning: If you don’t follow the instructions below, it may break the formulas in the spreadsheet. Next, you want to delete sample amounts on the Summary and Transactions spreadsheets. You’ll understand why that’s important later on in this article. In the upper-left corner, change the name of the spreadsheet from “Monthly budget” to “SAMPLE BUDGET TO COPY EVERY MONTH.” To start with a clean slate, you need to give the budget template a new name. If you don’t see a thumbnail for it, click on “Template Gallery” and find it under “Personal.” 2. When you open Google Sheets from a computer, look for the “Monthly Budget” spreadsheet located near the top of the screen. The first step is to find the Google Sheets budget template. Locate and Open the Google Sheets Monthly Budget Template
#Creating a budget spreadsheet how to
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Step 5: Input your budget numbers.Ĭreating a budget is nothing more than setting financial goals. You can also vertically sum all of your income and expense categories by using the SUM formula. You can figure the difference between your budgeted and actual income and expenses by subtracting the cell containing the “actual” amount from the cell containing the “budget” amount. Manually summing cells is time-consuming, but Google Sheets makes it easy with formulas. Step 4: Use simple formulas to minimize your time commitment. A column showing the difference between the two, so you can see a complete picture of your progress.A column for actual income and expenses.A column for your budgeted income and expenses.Regardless of the budget period, you’ll want to create three columns: They then extrapolate the budget out to a year.
#Creating a budget spreadsheet software
In fact, most budget apps and software track income and expenses by month. You can also use multiple budget periods simultaneously. How much time you want to spend updating your budget spreadsheet.How closely you want to monitor your finances.You may want to budget daily, weekly, bi-weekly, monthly, or yearly. This is especially helpful if you’re trying to reduce your expenses in a specific area of your finances. If you find that specificity helps you maintain better control of your finances, you may want to add subcategories to more closely track certain expenses. However, you want enough categories to encompass all your income and expenses without creating unnecessary complexity. There isn’t a “right” number of categories. Step 2: Create Income and Expense CategoriesĬategories are the backbone of a budget.
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