What Budgeting Tool Would You Recommend?

coffeemornings on 02/12/2018 - 19:50
Last edited 02/12/2018 - 20:09

Hi everyone,

I have been doing budgeting for quite a while. So far, I have been using this budgeting spreadsheet that I found online a long time ago (https://pearbudget.com/spreadsheet/). I have managed to personalise it. So, it has worked okay so far.

But, things have changed - mortgage, work got busier, etc. So, it has become harder to be using a spreadsheet to use as my budgeting tool.

What would you recommend as an easy to use budgeting tool? I don't have a whole lot of accounts and credit cards. I like to keep the credit cards I own to 2 at any point. The ones that I currently have are:
- Smart Access (used to separate out some immediate spending for the next few days);
- Offset (everything goes here)
- Home loan account (well all repayments go here)
- Low fee/low limit (4K) credit card (This was the card I have had since my student days. Even though I have been asked to increase my limit, I really don't see the point.)
- Another 14K limit credit card from another bank (I don't really use it. But, I got it initially as a backup credit card particularly for travelling. But, I might cancel it and see if I can find a no overseas fee card.)

I see YNAB recommended in another forum post. Here is how I typically plan my budget.

  • Saving one year ahead for compulsory expenditures (So, by end of December, I would have the compulsory expenditures for 2019 saved. Apart from mortgages, this is the next largest category of expenses which include - insurances, car servicing, gifts, body corp, rates, water rates).
  • Monthly savings from the salary are for meals, budgeted expenses, rainy day savings, mortgages, gym, mobile, internet, dental, doctor, electricity, gas, cleaning, groceries, subscriptions, other stuffs (clothes, haircut, etc), travel for the year.

I tend to save for each category of possible expenditure. If I don't use it, that's good, it goes to rainy day savings. But, if I need it, it is there and I don't have to worry I don't have the money for it. If I overspend, I try to take the money off another category that have some balances left.

But, it is really hard to keep track of all the spendings via a spreadsheet everyday or every week. So, I am looking for something that can help simplify, or at least let me key in spending on the go, and still allow me to have an overview of my budget.

Do you all think YNAB is suitable for this? Or, what budgeting tool would you recommend? (one that really allows me to track everything on the go.)

Any help is much appreciated.

Thanks! :)

Financial

Comments

  • Godric on 02/12/2018 - 20:47

    Excel

  • payton on 02/12/2018 - 20:50

    Looking at my bank balance (before buying something exxy), using cash for buying lunches (so you know how much you spend), and marking pay days works well enough for me

  • [Deactivated] on 02/12/2018 - 20:50

    I tried Pocketbook, it was great except it didn't link to my bank. Maybe you'll have better luck

    Also https://www.canstar.com.au/budgeting/2018-budgeting-savings-…

  • gidxg03 on 02/12/2018 - 20:50
    +1

    I used pocketbook and find it great and it has a good mobile app which is critical for my situation.

    Heres what I do:

    Create an annual budget setting spending limits. I do this in google docs so I can access from any computer anywhere. I categorise into 3 areas:

    1. needs: (everything from supermarket shopping to insurances) - all of this goes onto a coles MasterCard to reap flybuys benefit. These are all my direct debits and expected set and forget expenditure.

    2. Wants: budget for things like clothes and other discretionary spends. Generally these spends again go on the coles card but as below I tag them in pocketbook. In addition I setup a weekly direct debit to an ING card for free ATM withdrawals. This money is used for coffee, lunch etc. I don’t track any of this spend outside of the weekly amount transferred.

    3. Savings: this is what goes into the mortgage, extra mortgage payments (this is where all our savings go) and super. We try to keep this at about 10% of income in addition to minimum mortgage payments.

    Every other day I track spending via pocketbook on my phone. My coles and bank accounts are connected the the majority of transactions auto categorise such as good shopping, insurances and other direct debits. Then are the start of each month I update our annual budget with actual spends against budget to make sure we are on track. I do this by running the analysis tool on pocketbook to see how much we’ve spent in each category. I also put in all our income and then see if we’ve spent more or less than budgeted that month. I don’t panic if we have as some months you spend more in some areas than budgeted but so long as the over all year to date is in budget then we’re fine.

    I find this setup takes me about 30 mins a month to update the annual budget for the months spending and a few mins every few days to check pocketbook categories are correct.

  • DanMar on 02/12/2018 - 20:54

    You could take a look at Toshl and compare which suits you more. It revolves more around ongoing tracking expenses and income.

  • GangGang on 02/12/2018 - 20:56

    Use the small, half trolley when shopping.

  • gidxg03 on 02/12/2018 - 21:00

    Just one other point one of the benefits in having a controlled budget (we go off track but it’s better than it used to be) is that you can use a credit card for all your direct debits and planned spend with the key being pay this off in full each month. For us this means we keep our cash in the bank as long as possible to offset mortgage but we also get a load of flybuys each year which comes in handy at Xmas. We have $1500 of flybuy dollars to spend which helps with presents etc.

  • jjjaar on 02/12/2018 - 21:01

    I love using spreadsheets but have converted mine to google sheets so I can use them on the go too.

  • Diji1 on 02/12/2018 - 23:16

    Paying by cash.

    It's brilliant, you withdraw how much you want to spend for the week/fortnight/month and don't touch the bank again.

    Then, since spending has physical loss associated with it as you physically lose the money and because it's inconvenient you spend less money automatically.

    Bonus: there is less data collection. Probably none if you turn your phone radios off and don't volunteer the information yourself by swiping a loyalty card. Obviously data collection causes you to lose money so it isn't worthwhile.

  • relentless on 03/12/2018 - 00:07

    I downloaded an AMP budget planner Excel file a few years ago. I can't upload it on OzBargain as .xls is not allowed. Happy to upload it via another cloud service if you would like a copy.

  • ngengerous on 04/12/2018 - 17:43

    I use MoneyBrilliant, which links to my bank account and automatically shows me how much I spend in certain areas by scanning my statements. It's real handy for someone like me who's too lazy to sift through all my purchases myself.

    • coffeemornings on 04/12/2018 - 18:51

      Does moneybrilliant require a login of your bank account? I signed up for pocketbook a while ago, but stopped when it asked me to log on with my bank account and password.

      • ngengerous on 05/12/2018 - 08:43

        It does, which I was not 100% comfortable with, but I have had zero issues with their service so far. I believe if needed, you could sign in, import details, and then change your details (rinse and repeat for whenever you need to refresh your statements) but that might be pretty inefficient.

        • MitchyD1989 on 05/12/2018 - 15:09

          The main issue is it usually violates the TOS between you and your bank when you give your login details to another party, which gives the bank grounds to deny your claim if any fraudulent transactions are made from your account.

          Pocketbook has the ability to link with bank accounts/credit cards too but I just import the transactions once a week manually instead. A little extra effort but worth it for security IMO.

  • coffeemornings on 04/12/2018 - 18:50

    Thanks everyone. I’ll look into what everyone has suggested!

  • tellhimhesdreaming on 05/12/2018 - 13:16

    Honestly the way you current budget system works would Transfer to YNAB reasonably well. If you can prove you're a student, you get it for free. Or it has a trial for 30 something days.

    I find having the app on my phone, budgeting into categories for immediate and future, and also manually entering each transactions really helps my outlook when it comes to the financials.

    Can also track investment accounts etc to get a net worth figure if that's important to you.

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