My Wonderful Spreadsheet

My daughter, Eva, helped me design a money flow spreadsheet based on her wonderful spreadsheets but tailored for my needs. I wanted to be able to look at the general flow of money in and out, see what our monthly income and expenses are, see what we are spending in certain categories such as gas and medical, and keep track of how much is in certain categories that need to build up over time and then be spent infrequently for things such as insurance.

My first sheet is for the categories that need to build up, such as car insurance, house insurance, Christmas, etc. My next sheet starts with January, with a separate sheet for each month. The columns are labeled: Date, Money Flow (where the money was spent - i.e. Walmart), Category (such as Medical, Gas, Food), Expense (the actual amount spent), and Income (for paychecks, etc.) Off to the side of each month's sheet, I listed the categories that I want to track (Medical, Food, Gas, etc.) and as I enter the expenses into the main part of the sheet, I copy and paste amounts into those categories I want to track. At the end of the month, I can easily use the spreadsheet to total them and to total the month's income and expenses.

I love my spreadsheet!