Use A Daily Planner to Overcome Budgeting Difficulties

As busy women, it is essential to stay organized – especially in the personal finance department. One tool that will help you stay on top of your money is to develop a budgeting system to prevent overspending and keep financial obligations paid.

One of the precursors to perfecting a personal budget is taking the time to actually track your spending. Without a complete visual of how you are spending your money, you are not going to be able to truly map out a sufficient and workable budget. Without seeing the amount of cash you are spending, it is hard to visual your spending habits. This can lead to continuous overspending and failed budget attempts.

What Money Tracking Means

Tracking your spending takes dedication. It involves consistent documentation of every penny you spend, when you spend it and what the purchase was for. Small things like your morning coffee are just as important as the bigger ticket merchandise you may buy in a month’s time.

It is best to record your spending for a full month to get enough information to construct a budget. Once the month is over, you should have the ability to categorize your spending in relevant groups such as entertainment, groceries, credit card debts, and gas/transportation. These categories are then used to create a workable budget for your monthly income.  You can use a budget worksheet to track your spending and categories over time.

Getting Into Good Habits

One of the reasons why people fail at successfully tracking every cent they spend is because a busy life can lead to bad habits. After a day of working behind a desk, it can be hard to convince yourself to sit down at your desk and work on your finances. By working on your finances once or twice a month, there is a strong likelihood you’ll forget things that matter within the 30 day time period.

A simple way to correct this forgetful tendency is to start using a daily planner to make all of your financial notes. A daily planner is an excellent tool to record how much you spent, where it was spent, and for what reason. You can make all the notes relevant to your budget and attach relevant receipts directly to the daily sheet.

The daily planner sheet is easy to drop into your work bag, purse, or vehicle. As you go through your day, start making it a priority to write down your information. If you carry the sheet with you at all times, you will soon adapt to documenting the details. Forget fancy notebooks and other organization systems that are complex and expensive. It is likely that the simplest tools are the easiest to incorporate into your daily lifestyle.

Added Advantages

Once you get acquainted with the daily habit of tracking and documenting your money matters, you have the added advantage of having detailed records of accounting you probably never had before. This can be highly beneficial at tax time when you need to list deductions from throughout the year.

Just because you have tracked a month’s worth of details and created a budget doesn’t mean you need to stop tracking how you are spending your money. As time goes on, you will still be able to use your tracking information to create a tighter budget and keep tabs on how you spend your income.  This is the key to effective money management – and how to get control over your finances over the long term.

While some may find it too difficult to go through the tedious work in their financial life, it is becoming a necessary evil that all consumers need to deal with. There are too many changes in the financial industry, the tax laws, and the nation’s economy to mismanage even a month’s worth of your income. Utilizing the daily planning method can help you start getting back in touch with your finances and become an essential tool in your overall financial planning life.

Tisha Tolar is a finance writer providing content for Vertex42.com – a site offering a large selection of free spreadsheet templates and financial calculators.

Andrea

Andrea is the Chief Chick of Smart Money Chicks. After filing BK twice (once because she panicked, second time because the pro messed the first time up), she realized that it all could have been avoided if she understood more about how her Finances worked and the options available. At that point, she wanted to help as many as she could never make the same mistakes again. Our Promise is that all the content you read on here is created or edited by Andrea