![]() ![]() ![]() It’s why property taxes can be a shock to the system or how we somehow forget the month where 6 of our friends have birthdays until it’s staring us in the face. We, meaning humans in general, are very, very good at remembering our weekly and monthly expenses and then forgetting the rest. You’ll know whether you should get takeout tonight-because you’ll be able to tell if you have money in your “Takeout” fund (or whatever you choose to call it-more on customization later! You make a plan when the money comes in, and then all you have to do is follow the plan. This is basically the envelope system in a nutshell: when money comes in, you give every single dollar a role.Įven if that role is a category called “Things I Forgot to Budget For” (which is totally valid – it’s YOUR budget!). Their entire system is built on 4 key principles: Obviously this system is much more convenient when your envelopes are digital as opposed to the paper kind! You Need a Budget is based on the envelope system-a cash-based system where any incoming money is doled out into labelled envelopes (gas, groceries, rent, etc) so that it’s there when you need it. We’ll look at the pros and cons, and we’ll compare YNAB with Mint, another top-rated budgeting platform.īy the time you’re finished reading, you’ll have an idea of whether YNAB is the budgeting app you’ve been waiting for. ![]() In this You Need a Budget review (or YNAB, pronounced why-nab), we’ll walk you through YNAB’s philosophy and features. That feels like a tall order, but with hundreds of thousands of raving fans, it’s possible that YNAB actually delivers. It’s tedious and difficult to maintain and just… it’s a one-way trip to the no fun zone.Īpps like You Need a Budget promise to keep you on track and make budgeting fun-ish. As you download/enter transactions, the amounts are deducted from their respective category balances.What’s one guaranteed way to kill a party? In either case, any inflow of money is tagged “to be budgeted” and from this sum you can allocate amounts to your spending and saving categories. You can choose to direct import transactions from your bank or enter them manually. YNAB makes it easy to live by these rules with its category-based interface. It’s a lofty goal, but as YNAB says it will keep you “living far, far away from the financial edge.” Ideally, you should shoot to live this month on last month’s income. YNAB allows you to be nimble and easily move money from a budgeted category to cover unbudgeted spending and stay out of the red.Ĥ) Age your money-Timing your bills with your paychecks is about as easy as aligning the planets. YNAB lets you allocate every dollar in hand to specific spending and saving categories.ģ) Roll with the punches-No matter how well you plan, your budget will inevitably run head first into unforeseen expenses. YNAB proposes you budget for these expenses monthly to even out your cash flow over the year and avoid taking big budget hits during certain months. What typically derails a budget are the less frequent ones, like annual insurance premiums and subscriptions, birthdays and holidays, and your kids’ seasonal sports fees. 2) Embrace your true expenses-It’s easy to see your monthly bills coming.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |