As I try to become as much of an adult as possible, a budget was an absolute must so I could project at what point in my life I would hit certain goals. Some of those goals include vacationing, buying a new house, getting a pet, and of course the most common one: getting completely out of debt. This means no more student loans, credit cards, etc. It’s tough though, and I didn’t really start budgeting until 2019 when I took over a lot of the bills for my mom when she got laid off. I was living at home and finally had a job where I was able to really help. While she still covered the mortgage on the house, I picked up the little things; groceries, electricity, garbage, water, phone service, cable, internet, and anything else she needed help with. I felt this was a least I could do for letting me have a place to live.

Right after I graduated in 2017, my dad passed away. He had been sick for a few years and wasn’t working since 2014. At that time I got hired on full time and was bringing home around $1700 every 2 weeks. My dad was ecstatic when he found out because he knew since he couldn’t work, we’d still be taken care of, and I was happy to help. My parents spent my whole life giving me what they could and it’s only fitting that I return the favor.

In comes my budget sheet ! The version you see at the very bottom was months of iterations and development. It’s still not 100% done and there is more to do to make it easier to digest. I loved making it though, as I’m a huge Excel fan. A lot of my previous job was creating reports and analyzing data in Excel, so it only made it easier to create this for myself. I wanted to give a glimpse into what I use to budget each month. Last year during the pandemic I did switch jobs that provided a higher salary, so my income since November has been around $2400 every 2 weeks. This helps me pay down debt a little faster, eat out a little more, and take a small vacation here and there.

It’s important to note that even though someone says their base salary is high, even after taxes, insurance and other deductions, they may not take home what you expect. That’s totally fine though, as long as you can budget around what you have. You’ll hear a lot of folks say you can’t live off one source of income, and in some cases it’s true. I know on my current salary, trying to save for a house can take over 5 years if I choose to put a down payment by myself. My boyfriend’s income isn’t as high as mine either, though he does not have as much debt, so he’s able to help a little more when we eat out and take vacations. Plus he can potentially save faster than I could. I believe it just depends on how you budget.

So let’s jump in ! The sections below will automatically update each month, so what you see is always real time. I want to be transparent and show that I do also have debt and bills to pay, and that it’s not always easy to live on a budget.

Monthly Breakdown
Here you’ll see a monthly breakdown by category of what % my money is going to. My goal is to drop that credit card % down to less than 10%, and completely remove the loan %. I originally had 2 small Upstart loans to try and consolidate debt, but recently took out one larger Upgrade loan to pay off credit cards and the 2 Upstart loans so it was all under one loan only. This was an option I chose to take because I was drowning in credit card payments each month. It just wasn’t feasible for me to try and pay a little of each card each month. It’s much easier to manage now and I have a better handle on my credit card debt.

Goals
These are my vacation goals. My boyfriend and I have places we want to see and visit but of course need money to do so. I pulled the actual values based on what’s in my savings accounts only. As I add savings each month, we should get closer and closer to each goal. Current goals are $5000 for Vegas and $10000 each for both Disney World and Japan. It also automatically calculates at the beginning of each month.

Payments
This column lists all of the things I put money towards each month that are consistent. This includes your typical bills like internet, credit cards, and electricity, but also include savings, stock accounts, and any other miscellaneous things we use in life. This is set up to mimic the order in which bills are taken out each month. You’ll see the pay days are quite scattered because when I built the sheet, the timing of getting paid didn’t always end up after the same bill each month. This was adjusted to allow me to easily see if I’d have enough to cover the next portion of bills until I got paid again.

Months
These show each month and what is expected to be spent. This helps me project what my future balances will look like after bills are all paid. The light orange lines show items that are paid using my credit card. I do this so I can continue to build credit with small charges each month that I pay off. The yellow highlighted cells are an indicator to me that my TV and Internet bill will go up significantly in May or I’m making a larger than normal payment on my credit cards. The light green means it’s been paid and the money has been taken out of my account.

Planned vs. Actual
I calculate this to see how much extra I’m spending vs. what I expected to each month. Sometimes I end up with a little more if I pull some money from savings, sell something on eBay, receive a tax refund, etc. This allows the future months to be calculated based on what I input as my actual end of month total. It also helps make sure I have enough money to pay future month’s bills and can foresee any shortages.

Credit Cards
This section shows all the cards I currently have plus their limits and balances. I do this so I can budget how much money I want to put towards each card every month and how many months it will take to pay it off if I stick to that amount only. Of course I can put more money towards each one if I want, which is shown as I update throughout the month. Once the balance drops below 30% of the limit, it shifts to green. My goal is to stay below 30% utilization as suggested by the credit bureau. You can see my utilization % at the bottom.

Other Debt
This includes student loans, my car loan and Upgrade loan. My goal after getting out of credit card debt is to pay this entire section down. I’ve also summed my overall debt so I can have an easy comparison to what I plan to have on hand each month. This lets me see by what month I can completely pay off all my debt.

Savings
This shows all my current savings accounts and is what’s driving my goal bars at the top of my sheet.

Total on Hand
This includes what I have as my actual end of month calculation + total savings.

Credit Score
Each month I check it through Chase so I can try to hit my goal of 720 which will help my chances of getting a home loan in the future.

Phew ! It looks like a lot I know, and I’m happy to answer questions regarding the calculations if you leave a comment ! You’re budget sheet doesn’t have to look like mine either, but it’s super helpful to build one if you’re struggling at all. Please reach out in the comments if you need help taking that first step.

Below is the full sheet if you want to see everything together.

Happy budgeting (: