Time is running short. You need to prepare now.  I know it seems like Christmas is a long way away.  But, it will not be long until Father Christmas is saddling up his reindeer.  Today is the day to decide to make 2009 a  debt free Christmas.  Bob even has 6 tips for a debt free Christmas.  In fact, you are more likely to get through Christmas without any new consumer debt if you set your Christmas budget now.

Step By Step Guide for Making Your Christmas Budget

1. Make a long list of everyone to whom you want to give a Christmas gift.

Be sure to include the following groups of people:

• Family – aunts, uncles, children, spouse, cousins, siblings, grandparents, and even the stray dog your brother-in-law adopted.  Include everyone you WANT to give a gift to.
• Co-workers – partners, bosses, co-workers, support staff
• Church friends – Bible school teachers, church staff, grandparent figures
• Community friends – neighbors, fellow volunteers, clerk at the grocery store
• Those who provide services – paperboy, mail man, pizza delivery boy, yard worker, pool cleaner, teachers
• Anyone else – feeling jovial?  Put them on the list.

2. Determine how much you can afford to spend on Christmas.

This calculation can be relatively simple.  How much money can you save between now and December 25th? How many of those dollars are you willing to dedicate towards Christmas gifts?

Christmas Spending Rule:

How much you can afford to spend must be an amount you save in CASH.  This is not an ‘if-I-were-rich-I-would-budget-this’ list. This is how much you actually have to give for Christmas.  If the number is low, that is fine.  Christmas is not about financially crippling yourself so someone can have a pair of socks that will go in the trash before January. Christmas is about expressing love and appreciation.  Both of which can be done without money.  Christmas can be enjoyed without money.  Be sure that your budget is reasonable in relationship to your income.  This can be done by making sure your total amount fits within recommended budget percentages.

3. Prioritize your list from step #1.  Make it a short list.

If married, before prioritizing the list, pray that God will give you the patience to work together – not against each other.

You might want to cut out your Great Aunt Sally, but your wife has given her a gift every year for two decades.  She might want to remove a business partner who doesn’t deserve anything, but you want to grease that relationship.  This process could be painful, so prayerfully get on the same page before you start.

At this stage you are just going to separate each name into three groups – paid gift, made gift, no gift. Since you know how much you can afford to give you will have a better sense of how many people can be on your paid gift list.  Knowing your time, available you can limit your made gift list. The others – no gift, but perhaps a Christmas card.

4. Assign and complete necessary preparations.

Paid Gift List:

Beside each name on the paid gift list, assign a budgeted amount.  For example, dad might get $50 and cousin Steve $25.  Be sure that total does not exceed the amount in Step #2.  The only rule here is you cannot overspend that amount on that person.  Here are 8 tips to save money on your Christmas shopping.

Made Gift List:

What will you make?  Cookies and other Christmas treats are a great idea for close friends, neighbors, and colleagues.  For family, a customized card with a picture of the kids will suffice.  Need some guidance?  Here is a list of 50 Personalized Christmas Gift Ideas.

No Gift:

If they made it on your first list you might just send them a personalized card.

Merry Christmas Uncle Joe.  We just wanted to let you know that you are a special part of our family.  Thanks for all the time and attention you give to our kids.  We’re blessed to have an uncle like you.

5. Make the budget work.

Don’t spend more than you budgeted.

If your budget is tight, you will need to capitalize on a free valuable resource – CREATIVITY.  Creativity must be combined with another necessary ingredient – TIME.

Time + Creativity = Awesome Valuable Christmas Presents for a Lower Price

How do you set your Christmas budget?  How soon do you start saving money for Christmas?

Photo by wOOkie.

Craig is a missionary who has spent over ten years working in various forms of Christian ministry. Currently, Craig lives with his family in Papua New Guinea. Relying on his ministry experience and background in Biblical Studies he writes daily personal finance articles from a Christian perspective. You can visit his site at www.MoneyHelpForChristians.com, on Twitter, or you can sign up to receive free daily email updates for his site.

This article was written by  Branden who regularly writes for his blog FaithFitnessFinance.com.

Finding the freedom to spend

When it comes to being frugal, paying off debt, saving for retirement, and actively pursuing long-term financial goals, I am a zealot. You see, I’m a big picture kind of guy. I have a natural propensity to create savings accounts for my savings accounts. My wife would tell you that I am the definition of frugal. I understand very well that I don’t need the video game I want and am able to see how not purchasing something today will enable me to purchase so much more later.

The problem, however, is that, for me, later never actually seems to come. I have been so focused on achieving our long term financial goals for so long that it is often difficult for me to live a little bit in the here and now. After all, isn’t the point of saving and working toward financial independence to allow you to buy the things you really want without the burden or guilt of debt?

When financial focus goes too far

In my household, this has recently reached a boiling point. I am definitely the budgeter in our marriage; my wife wants nothing to do with it. In fact, I think it is fun to play with spreadsheets, manipulate numbers, and run cash flow scenarios. Yep, I’m a financial geek.

Why is this such a problem? Well, to be blunt, my wife is normal and likes doing things. This is not to be read that she is an overspender. She doesn’t care how many pairs of shoes she has, doesn’t want to spend a lot of money on fancy clothing, and is more than happy to eat at home almost every night of every week.

Sure, I also like doing things, but I have noticed that, for me, there is a direct correlation between the cost of the activity and the amount of fun I have. The more the activity costs, the less enjoyment I typically receive. I blame this on the fact that the more money we spend on fun today, the less we have to pay off debt and spend on fun later.

Looking for a solution

Needless to say, my wife and I just weren’t seeing eye to eye on the situation. I thought that budgeting $15 per month on dining out was more than enough; she wanted to go to a restaurant that had waiters. I figured our subscription to Netflix provided more entertainment than we could ever need; she wanted to see a few movies a year before they came out on DVD. To anyone else, my wife’s requests would have been common sense.

If you’re familiar with Dave Ramsey, he mentions that there are typically two types of people in a marriage: the nerd and the free spirit. I’m guessing you won’t have any trouble determining what role my wife and I play here. No matter which person you might be in your relationship, it is essential that you find a way to work together to achieve financial unity for a happy and successful marriage.

Setting up a real budget

When all of this came to a head and I actually realized what I was doing to my wife (yes, I can be a little dense), I knew it was time to change something. In fact, I knew that, if something didn’t change, our marriage was going to encounter some really rough times in the very near future.

So, I got my wife to sit down with me and talk about budgeting for fun. It wasn’t an easy thing for either of us. Remember, she wants nothing to do with budgeting, and I want nothing to do with spending. But, we managed our way through it and have started allocating regular sums of money just for the purpose of spending.

The freedom to spend

In the very short time since we set up this new system, things have changed a lot. My wife no longer has to worry about my reaction to her spending a couple dollars on a magazine and I don’t have to worry about whether or not she is buying something we didn’t plan for. The feeling is truly one of freedom. My frugal instincts have served us well throughout the last year of financial difficulty, but we are now at a place where such rigidity is no longer necessary.

The reality is that I’m still not over my obsessive money habits. I still think it’s hard to spend money, even money we have specifically set aside to spend, but I’m getting better at it. I need to more often remind myself of the parable of the rich man told in Luke 12 and understand that hoarding my possessions brings neither life nor success. If you’re like me and have a really difficult time spending money, try something like this. I promise you won’t regret it.

Note from Bob: I love how Branden and his wife worked to find a solution to their problem. We have had similar situations that by working out seemingly small details, we were able to maintain martial harmony. I get just as encouraged seeing people like Branden working through his extreme frugality as I do spendaholics working through their excessive spending. We all have areas to improve on!

4 Steps To Help You Control Your Spending

Budgeting is essentially the process of asking: should I spend my money on this or that?  A person’s income represents the fixed dollars with which they have to spend.  When someone sets their budget they must decided (based on their preferences) what to spend on ‘this’ and what to spend on ‘that’.  The problem is that sometimes people prioritize the wrong things.  They buy ‘this’ when they should have bought ‘that’. Being able to control you is the difference between being frugal instead of cheap.  If you find yourself in a situation where you often buy things you regret then these four steps will help you focus your spending.

Step #1: Take a visual inventory of the stuff already in your home.

Have you ever helped someone move?  If you have you know that a question people often ask while moving is, “How did we get so much stuff (junk)?”  Every item in your home has been purchased with money you labored for.  As you walk around the house look at your items and ask:

• Does this item give me satisfaction?
• Did it end up being as useful as I wished?
• If I had to buy it again would I?
• Do I have more things than I know what to do with?

If you answered negatively more often than not, it is likely that you are having trouble directing your spending towards things you truly care about.  Perhaps you are purchasing impulsively.  Nevertheless, your spending is such that it brings more frustration than satisfaction.

“But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moth and rust do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal.” (Matthew 6:20 NIV)

Step #2: Ask your spouse a simple question – “What are some of your favorite memories?”

Our Experiences with Stuff Dulls Over Time

In the book Your Money and Your Brain author Jason Zweig writes:

“We get used to almost anything we are frequently exposed to.  That’s why the money we spend on big purchases gives us such a perishable pleasure.” (bold added.  pg 236)

Zweig goes on to use the example of a new car.  Remember that new car?  It “glistens like a gigantic jewel”.  However, the cycle of auto life requires that within months (or even days) there will be dings and scratches in your fine automobile.  After just a few short months, we are disillusioned because the car is not bringing as much satisfaction as we intended.  So before you know it you are on the market for another new car.  Regarding this tendency Zweig writes:

“Unfortunately, the vision pales by comparison when it collides with reality. … Instead of realizing that big spending will probably never make you happy, you conclude that you simply spent your bundle on the wrong thing.” (pg. 236-237)

Our Experiences with Memories Sharpen Over Time

Spending that brings satisfaction is spending that creates memories.  While some spending is pragmatic and functional (i.e. fridge and stove) we must ultimately remember their function.  I think about great time saving appliances like the dishwasher and the microwave.  That time void has not been filled with activities that create memories; instead it is filled with more activity.  Things like vacations actually leave a sweeter taste (assuming you pay cash!) as the days go by.

“The vacation in your photo album is more pleasant than the one you actually had, and that may skew your memory. … Your memories, then, are not just recollections.  They are also reconstructions” (Jason Zweig,  238).

Why not plan your spending in such a way that you spend a larger percentage of your money on things that are rewarding (like giving) and steer away from spending money on stuff that dulls over time?

Step #3: Have a ‘this’-and-‘that’ face off.

This really is a simple exercise.  It has been observed that hindsight is 20/20 so go ahead and use that clear vision of the past to guide your future spending.  Take a few items in your home and place them side by side and ask, “Right now which item am I happier that I purchased?”  Your answer will help guide your future spending.

Sample A: Luggage

Exhibit A                                                          Exhibit B

These two pictures of luggage have the same purpose – they help haul my useless junk around the world.  So far both of these items have accomplished the task with equal effectiveness.  Any time my junk does not arrive it is typically the fault of an airline, not the luggage itself.  There is one significant difference – cost.  The two bags in Exhibit A cost about $85 and the cost for Exhibit B was $5.  Using my 20/20 perspective I now know what a complete and absolute waste of money to pay $85 for something I can find for $5 at any used clothing store in America.  As a result, I have now decided that I’ll buy all my luggage second hand.

Sample B: The Vacation and the Fridge

You will notice that my fridge (which has only been used for less than three years) is rusting.  I’m finding that the type of a fridge does little to contribute to my spending satisfaction.  In the future I am going to think about functionality without any fancy bells and whistles.

I have a whole slew of vacation pictures I enjoy looking at.  Those great memories grow year after year.  Vacations always provide some special family times.  As a result, I enjoy spending money on vacations because I feel like they contribute something to my life’s satisfaction.

Step #4: Adjust your spending accordingly.

Take what you have learned about yourself and create a future where you spend your money wisely according to your values.  A budget is the best way to help direct your spending.  Don’t keep making bad money choices!  When setting amounts for your budget categories make sure they fit your personal preferences.

A final thought.

Try incorporating your gifts to people into the same evaluation.  I suspect you will find that there is a growing pleasure that comes from giving.

Let me leave you with one final quote from Jason Zweig:

“While the money you spend on acquisitions tend to feel more and more like a mistake as time passes, the money you spend on experiences is apt to grow in value as your memories grow warmer.”

How do you focus your spending to be sure you’re spending money wisely and not wasting too much on perishable stuff?

Craig is a missionary who has spent over ten years working in various forms of Christian ministry. Currently, Craig lives with his family in Papua New Guinea. Relying on his ministry experience and background in Biblical Studies he writes daily personal finance articles from a Christian perspective. You can visit his site at www.MoneyHelpForChristians.com, on Twitter, or you can sign up to receive free daily email updates for his site.

This article was written by Bryce Bartruff, senior director and COO of American Missionary Fellowship, which offers Fiscal Fitness workshops at churches and community organizations. To learn more call him at at 610-527-4439, x104 or email him.

Tracking Out-of-Pocket Expenses

I was speaking with my friend Chris last Thursday.  He expressed frustration over his use of cash.  He said that on Monday morning he checked his wallet to make sure he had enough money to buy gas on the way to work and was surprised to find he only had $10.00.  He asked his wife if she had borrowed anything from his wallet, and she said, “No.” She never goes into his wallet, and this weekend was no exception.  The nearly “cash free” wallet (that is, free from cash) seemed odd.  He remembered going to the ATM Friday after work on Friday and withdrawing a hundred dollars, and now, he couldn’t remember where it went.  He felt cheated, almost as if someone had stolen money from him. The crucial question is, “Where did he spend his money over the weekend?”

If he does not know where his money is going, how can he manage it?

After a short discussion with his wife, Chris remembered that Friday evening he treated the family to pizza.  Saturday morning, he went to the men’s breakfast at church, which cost him $10.00, and on the way home stopped at the grocery store to purchase some milk, bread, and soda for his wife.  Later, he bought some gas for the lawnmower and fertilizer for the yard.  They also bought some coffee while at the bookstore, where he purchased a small book on hiking.

The Monday morning cashless surprise is not uncommon.  Such a dilemma can, however, be frustrating. How can we designate the right amount money for various items in our budget if we are not sure of how much we are spending, where it is spent, and who is spending it?

Use a tool to track your expenses

Fortunately, there is a simple way to determine where our money goes.  When I teach workshops, I recommend using a form to track discretionary or “out of pocket” expenses.  The left-hand column is used to write the date a purchase is made, the middle column provides space to list the item purchased, and the right-hand column shows the amount spent.  Instead of this form, you can also use a small, portable notebook with the same columns on each page. Take the form or notebook wherever you go so you can record expenses immediately after paying.

While I don’t advocate using this form for the rest of your life, recording expenses on it for three to six months will provide a realistic understanding of where your money is spent.  Annually revisiting the form for a month or so helps to refine an existing budget and the spending process.   When trying to make an accurate budget, each family member will know exactly where all the out-of-pocket money went – how much went for groceries, gas, fast food, coffee, home repairs, etc.

A side benefit of using this form is that it often helps people save money. Writing down expenses provides the opportunity to think about what you are spending, an action that alters behavior and generally reduces the amount spent by 30% or more.  Individuals interested in streamlining their expenses will find that an accountability partner who reviews all expenses is a huge asset, especially when the spender and accountability partner review the sheet together and discuss whether each expense is rational and appropriate.

YNAB Pro

YNAB Pro budgeting software retails for $49.95 and was kindly donated for the giveaway by the folks at YouNeedABudget.com. “You Need A Budget” is a very thorough piece of budgeting software that allows users to do just about everything they need to related to their budget.

A few of the YNAB Features

• YNAB Pro imports OFX, QFX, QIF, and CSV files from virtually every banking institution available.
• It offers a virtual envelope system of budgeting.
• It allows you to schedule reoccurring transactions.
• It comes with a Debt Snowball software program to help you if you are following the debt snowball method to pay down your debts.
• Plenty of charts, graphs, and other pretty pictures to get a “visual” representation of how your finances are doing.

Free Budgeting Course

For those interested, YNAB offers a Free 10 day budgeting course that is definitely worth looking into for those who are just getting started budgeting. Even if you don’t plan on buying the software, it’s worth taking a look at.

The Giveaway

If you are interested in getting a free copy of YNAB budgeting software, then just head on over to the forums within the next week (by September 17th) and leave a comment.

Bob enjoys dark chocolate, paying off debt, giving, Foosball, loose-leaf tea, helping people succeed, learning, anything God created, playing guitar, doing things the "long" way, Philippians, excellence, Chick-Fil-A, and making his wife smile. He started ChristianPF in 2007 and has been having a blast ever since. Find him on Facebook & Twitter.

This article was written by Morgan who writes for TheDebtDance.com - a blog designed to help you get out of debt and start living your dreams.

Budgeting to get what you really, really want

Hate to budget? Most people do. They don’t like to figure out how much they owe, how much they spend, or track their future spending. It evokes feelings of dread, self-remorse, being restricted, shame, and even panic.

And what does budgeting get you? Usually there is no tangible reward to budgeting—just limitations of what we enjoy, what we like in life, what we really, really want to do. However if you set up a budget that focuses on your dreams you will enjoy a whole new perspective on life. It will allow you to envision a more fulfilling, more peaceful future. Having faith that it can work is the cornerstone of your success in budgeting to get what you really, really want.

4 steps to get started

1. Decide on what you want your money to do for you. (If you have trouble with this imagine that you have just won a lottery. What would be the first one or two priorities you would do? Pay off your bills, quit your job, buy a new house or car? Whatever you choose is probably what you truly want out of your money.)

2. To begin the budget, or spending plan, write down your “gotta” bills: your mortgage or rent, utilities, insurance, day care, MINIMUM payments on your credit cards and student loans, an emergency fund, car payments, etc. These are the items you really have no control over. (Subtract your total gottas from your income.)

3. Second, write down two to four “wanta’s”—the dreams, the hopes, the goals. These may include paying off credit cards, buying a home, taking a vacation, helping a family member, changing jobs or starting a business. Look at your balance in number two and decide how much you want to spend on your dreams. You may want to calculate how many months it will take to accumulate the money you need. For example, calculate how much you need to put aside each month if you want to buy a home in two years with ten percent down. Now, like the commercial says, just do it. (Subtract your total wanta’s from your previous balance in number 2 above.)

4. And last, live with what’s left. Buy your groceries, clothes, entertainment—all of those things you really can control—with whatever is left. Your priority has shifted from mall-surfing to putting your money to work on what you really, really want.

Pay your gotta’s and wanta’s first and you don’t have to track every penny you spend after that. There’s no need to. You simply live on what’s left. Always be flexible, don’t give up because things don’t always go as planned.

“Life is what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans.” – John Lennon.

You will hit bumps in the road and you will need to adjust what you funnel into your dream money. Building an emergency fund is critical in beginning to fly right over those bumps without getting into further debt. Stopping debting is essential to achieving your dreams. You wouldn’t try to paint a masterpiece while sinking in quicksand. Don’t build a new life while digging yourself deeper into a hole. If you take charge of your budget and make it work for you, you will have a magnificent opportunity to totally redesign your life. Don’t wait for the lottery. Make it happen now.

Matt Bell is a personal finance writer and speaker. He is the author of two books published by NavPress – Money, Purpose, Joy and Money Strategies for Tough Times . He also writes two free eNewsletters that are available through his web site.

Mint.com’s New Features Put to the Test

The popular Mint.com free online budget service recently announced a “significant product upgrade.” Here’s a brief look at its new features organized by “Hits,” “Hits With Glitches,” and “Misses.”   

Hits

Actual vs. Planned Spending.

Of all the new features, Mint’s most important improvement is that you can now see how your actual spending compares with your planned spending. This fixes what had been a gaping hole in an otherwise sophisticated and user-friendly service. Prior to this upgrade, you could see how much you spent in each of your budget categories in some past time period (last month, last quarter, year-to-date, etc.), but not how that compared with what you had planned to spend.   

Income Planning.

I’ve always thought of a budget as a cash flow plan. Of course, cash flow pertains to both expenses and income. However, prior to this upgrade, you could set a budget for your spending, but not for your income. With this upgrade, Mint now tracks what’s going out as well as what’s coming in.

Budget Rollover.

Didn’t spend your entire entertainment budget this month? Now the unspent amount rolls over into the next month. By the same token, if you overspend this month, next month’s budget will show that you have less to spend. This new feature isn’t retroactive, but going forward it will be a nice upgrade.

Hits With Glitches

“Infrequent” Expense Budgeting.

Expenses that don’t occur every month but do occur at some point every year can be real budget busters. If you don’t plan ahead, that semi-annual property tax bill can be a real killer. Prior to this upgrade, you could plan for such expenses only by setting a monthly budget amount of one-twelfth the annual cost. For the months where you didn’t have the expense, Mint would show you to be under budget; for the months when you do have the expense, it would show you to be way over budget. The new release attempts to fix that.   

However, there are two issues with this upgrade. When I tried to set up our next life insurance premium payment for July 2010, the drop-down list of possible months only showed 11 months including this month. There was no way to select next July. I talked with the folks at Mint and they told me that by the time this article appears that problem should be fixed (Mint gets lots of points for responsiveness!)

The other glitch in this new feature may be more difficult to fix. Let’s say you pay $300 for auto insurance every six months and your next payment is due in two months. Mint will tell you, “We’ll set aside $150 each month…” In other words, it assumes you have not been setting any money aside for the past four months. I talked with Mint Founder and CEO Aaron Patzer about this and he said, “Something like this is trickier than you can imagine, and complexity is often the enemy of personal finance.” However, he suggested that a button could be added where users indicate whether they’ve been setting money aside for the upcoming expense. At this point, it’s just an idea.   

Misses

Budget Overview.

In the “Overview” tab, Mint provides a helpful snapshot of how much of your monthly budget you’ve spent so far. However, it adds a somewhat unhelpful analysis of categories listed under the headers “On Track,” “Slow Down,” and “Over Budget.” I don’t have an issue with “On Track,” which lists categories where you have not exceeded your monthly budget, or “Over Budget,” which speaks for itself. However, “Slow Down” is meant to highlight categories where you have spent at a pace that Mint deems to be too aggressive given how much of the month remains. Strangely, our mortgage payment showed up under “Slow Down.” Apparently, since we pay our mortgage early in the month, Mint somehow thinks we’re on a pace to overspend in that category. Patzer acknowledges that it “doesn’t quite make sense” to include such categories in its “Slow Down” analysis.

Geographic/ Demographic Comparisons.

Many new graphs are available with this new upgrade, including comparisons on how your spending by category or merchant compares to national, state, city, and soon even demographic averages. The problem is that we are not exactly a country of wise money managers. So, if the average person carries a balance on their credit card and doesn’t have an emergency fund, what are you really learning by comparing yourself to them?   

Freecreditreport.com.

This “miss” is actually nothing new, but it stands out like a sore thumb that refuses to heal. Mint makes its money from sponsors who pay to be among companies recommended by Mint in its “Ways to Save” tab. While Mint’s promotion of its sponsors is not intrusive, the fact that the company works with Freecreditreport.com runs counter to Patzer’s contention that it only presents offers that will actually save people money. With Freecreditreport.com, the “free” credit score it promotes is available only if you sign up for its $12.95-per-month credit monitoring service. To truly get your score for free you have to remember to cancel the service within seven days. Mint would show that it really has its users’ best interests at heart if it stopped working with Freecreditreport.com.

Conclusion

All in all, I’m a fan of Mint.com and the recent upgrades add up to a great overall improvement. The only major item still on my wish list is a better way to track the use of cash. Right now, when you withdraw cash from an ATM, you have to keep going back to that withdrawal to categorize your use of the cash as you spend it. Patzer says a planned December upgrade may automatically transfer ATM withdrawals into a cash account where you can more easily categorize your use of the money.

This article is provided by Jason Price who writes for One Money Design. Jason is a Money Map Coach and has a passion to see people prosper, become debt free, and experience financial freedom.

Budgeting with Mvelopes Personal

Users of personal finance software know there are key features you can’t live without when it comes to automating the management of your personal finances. While the needs of everyone differ and finding the right product is important for your situation, Mvelopes Personal offers some features that put it in the top tier. They seem to do it right by offering some classic styles of budgeting on an electronic platform.

4 notable features of Mvelopes Personal:

1. Envelopes Budgeting: Envelopes budgeting has been around a long time. In short, the premise is to use cash envelopes to manage your money. You simply create an envelope for every major budget category and deposit cash into it according to your written plan. You use the cash to make purchases and when the cash is gone you’re done spending.

Mvelopes has taken a manual process as described above and automated it. With Mvelopes you set up electronic envelopes to manage your cash flow. As expenses are recorded, the amount is deducted from the virtual envelope giving you a quick way to see the balance of each budget category. As you watch the balances while you spend, you’re much less likely to overspend and in some cases save money.

2. Transfer between envelopes: As with a cash envelope, you might have money left over in a budget category and need to spend more in another area. With Mvelopes you can electronically transfer money from one envelope to another keeping your budget in balance. For example, let’s say you have under spent $30 on groceries for the month. You could easily allocate the extra money to cover the need for more gasoline, or to savings.

3. Income allocation: With cash envelopes you withdrawal money from the bank after your paycheck is deposited and insert the proper amount into each of your physical envelopes. The equivalent is provided with Mvelopes by allowing you to set up funding plans which enable you to determine how you want to allocate money for your paychecks. Once you receive your deposit transaction into Mvelopes you choose your funding plan which deposits your money into each virtual envelope.

4. Drag and drop: Once transactions are downloaded from your financial institution, you can drag and drop them to an expense envelope, or to your income cash pool for funding. This feature saves quite a bit of time for assigning transactions to their respective budget category or envelope.

There are many features of Mvelopes, but these four features seem to provide a lot of help in enhancing personal money management.

Personally, I don’t think I could live without using personal finance software. Some people choose to reconcile their checkbooks and maintain a budget manually; there is nothing wrong with this. Software can provide efficiency and exactness that is sometimes hard to get with a manual approach, but at the end of the day people should choose the approach that works best for them.

Do you have any experience (good or bad) working with Mvelopes?

Note from Bob: I don’t currently use Mvelopes for my budgeting, but I agree with Jason and can attest that it is a great product. If you are interested in trying it out, they have a 30-day free trial available to new users.

Budgeting is becoming cool again!

It really comes as no surprise that more and more people are starting to budget as the economy tightens up. I have been noticing more people interested in budgeting – which gets me excited! If you have been around here for any length of time you know that I was converted to budgeting and have been thrilled at how liberating it has been. Yes, I said liberating – I believe that budgeting should be fun and if done properly, it really makes your life a whole lot more peaceful.

In an effort to help out some of the new budgeting converts, I decided to put together this article as a means of consolidating a bunch of budgeting resources. Some are worksheets I created and some are from others. Just about all of them can be downloaded as a PDF, which you can then print from your printer. I have included the Excel file for many of them as well – if you are into that. So hopefully you will be able to find a worksheet that will help you create a better budget! Enjoy!

Just FYI: Quicken Online used to charge $3 a month to use their online money management tool, but it is now FREE! It is very feature-rich and may be worth trying out if you are looking for a money management tool. Find out more about Quicken’s Online Edition

Free Basic budgeting worksheet

This is budgeting worksheet I created that I use when I am trying to add up my total monthly expenses and compare them to my income. I like it because it has about every possible expense that you could have in your budget. It’s very simple and isn’t fancy at all, but it gets the job done when I am making adjustments to my monthly budget.

• Download or print it: Printable budget worksheet.pdf
• Excel: Printable budget worksheet.xls

Printable Budget Worksheet from Freddie Mac

FreddieMac.com provides this budgeting worksheet. It allows you to budget specific amounts for the month and then compare the figures after the month’s end to see your areas for improvement.

• Download or print it: FM Printable budgeting worksheet.pdf

Budgeting worksheet for students

Amsa.com (American Student Assistance) provides this budget sheet. It is simple and will help college students create a budget to keep them in line financially.

• Download or print it: Budget Worksheet_2008.pdf

Christmas shopping budget worksheet

A few years ago after getting frustrated with finding myself in debt every year after Christmas, I decided I needed to take some steps in the right direction by budgeting for Christmas. So, what we did was created a list of everyone who we could imagine buying gifts for that year and we used this worksheet to stay within our budget.

• Download or print it: Christmas Budgeting Worksheet.pdf
• Excel: Christmas Budgeting Worksheet.xls
  

Bill payment schedule

This is another worksheet that was birthed out of a frustrating situation. I found that while I traditionally had been good about paying my bills on time, I was occasionally late on payments – and it wasn’t because I didn’t have the money, but because I didn’t have a good system in place to pay the bills. So I created a worksheet that I still use 2 times each month that allows me to schedule and pay the bills on time!

• Download and print it: bill-payment-schedule.pdf
• Excel: Bill payment schedule.xls

Financial Life on One Page (FLOP)

This is a worksheet that I created to help keep my financial life organized. Basically it is a spreadsheet that contains all of my account details (balances, etc) that would be a very valuable help to my wife if I were to suddenly leave this earth. Since I know a lot more about the details of our financial accounts, I feel that it is part of my responsibility to have things in order for her if I weren’t here. This worksheet helps me do that. To find out more specifically how to benefit from this worksheet check out this article… Your financial life on one page.

• Download or print it: FLOP_Printable_Balance_Sheet.pdf
• Excel: FLOP_Printable_Balance_Sheet.xls

Debt Snowball worksheet

If you are following the recommended Debt Snowball as a means of paying down your debts, then this worksheet might be helpful.

• Find out more about the Debt Snowball Worksheet.

Other free budgeting worksheets

• Home budgeting worksheets
• Better budgeting printable worksheet
• Microsoft Personal Budget worksheet

Bob enjoys dark chocolate, paying off debt, giving, Foosball, loose-leaf tea, helping people succeed, learning, anything God created, playing guitar, doing things the "long" way, Philippians, excellence, Chick-Fil-A, and making his wife smile. He started ChristianPF in 2007 and has been having a blast ever since. Find him on Facebook & Twitter.

The NeoBudget giveaway

Luke from NeoBudget just contacted me and wanted to donate a 1-year subscription to the CPF readers. I have written about NeoBudget in the past, but I have found that many people like it as an Mvelopes alternative. Mvelopes, is the well-known budgeting system created by Crown.org based off of the based off of the the envelope system of budgeting. Neobudget seems to offer just about everything that Mvelopes does, but for a smaller monthly fee. Mvelopes charges from $8-$12 a month and Neobudget only charges $2.50 a month.

NeoBudget is currently offering a 7-day free trial for anyone interested…

Some of the features that NeoBudget offers…

What do I have to do to win the Neo Budget subscription?

In order to be entered for a chance to win the 1 year NeoBudget subscription just follow these steps…

1. Head over to the ChristianPF Forums before 11:59 p.m. CST on June 25th, 2009.
2. Sign up, if you have not already. (Don’t worry, it is a very quick process)
3. Leave a comment by joining one of the threads/conversations or starting a new one.

The winner will be randomly selected using random.org. The winner will be announced on June 26th in the forums!!

Links worth mentioning….

• My recent interview with Neal Frankle
• The Path to contentment
• 107 things that make good financial sense
• What things are you willing to spend more for?
• Would you be willing to work for free?
• Buy ahead to save money on groceries
• Using Evernote to declutter my life

Carnivals…

Personal Finance, Debt Reduction, Frugality, Pecuniary

Bob enjoys dark chocolate, paying off debt, giving, Foosball, loose-leaf tea, helping people succeed, learning, anything God created, playing guitar, doing things the "long" way, Philippians, excellence, Chick-Fil-A, and making his wife smile. He started ChristianPF in 2007 and has been having a blast ever since. Find him on Facebook & Twitter.