Budgeting

If making a budget is new to you then you might want to consider a monthly budget planner to help ease this task. Getting your finances organized can be difficult when you stop to think about everything that is involved, but being organized is an important part of the budgeting process.

Now if you are already an organized person your monthly budget may easily be written out with a pen or pencil on a piece of paper. If you aren't that organized and this is your first attempt at making a budget then a paper and pencil is till a good idea. The whole point is to get organized and writing down all your income and expenses can help get the process started.

If paper and pencil is not your idea of fun, or your ready to get a little more sophisticated you can use pre-printed budgeting sheets. These spreadsheets are very useful because they break everything into categories for you, making it easy to just take all your income and expense information and plug it into the right slot.

You can find these printed spreadsheets in book form at your local office supply store or you can find free printable versions on the internet. The only drawback to using the pre-printed budgeting sheet is trying to shoehorn some of your expenses into categories that don't really match. You may find yourself penciling in those things that don't have a match.

Many people create their own spreadsheets on their computer. This gives you a lot of flexibility to fully customize your monthly budget. The only minus to this approach is learning how to use spreadsheet software such as Microsoft's Excel. Although if you do learn how to use this type of software you can create a very detailed budget that does everything from tracking income and expenses to keeping track of investments and retirement accounts.

The nest step up on the budget making food chain is software made specifically for that purpose. There are any number of software budgeting programs available on the market today with the two biggest being Quicken and Microsoft Money. These programs have the power to do any type of financial tracking you need to have done. They can also help you plan where you want to be in your financial future and help create a program based on your budget to get you there.

No matter which option you choose a monthly budget planner will let you take back control of your cash flow. With out it you'll be hard pressed to build a financial future for you and your family.