Budgeting with YNAB
After getting married in October, Tyler and I merged our finances. Combining finances for us meant buckling down and creating a budget, which is precisely what I set out to do starting December 1st.
We had been using Mint.com for a while, Tyler longer than I, but still had no understanding of how much we really had and how to make it work for us. With this in mind, we talked to friends about what they were using, which led us to YNAB (You Need A Budget). It promised not only a window into what our money was doing, but the flexibility to assign that money to future jobs - this key change is what finally made the difference for us!
After signing up, I took the time to inventory our bills and finances, set up categories to capture those transactions, created goals that would pull money into those categories with a single click of a button, and added categories for savings or goals until I had budgeted to zero! This entire process, including time spent learning about the program and researching best practices for budgeting in general, took an entire month.
In all honesty, however, it's six months later and we're still adjusting our budget regularly, stumbling across forgotten yearly bills, and adapting to unexpected costs as they come in. On top of that, we also bought a home, which came with its own set of financial stresses that show no signs of slowing just yet, but that's another story completely (more about it here).
I relish the time I spent studying our finances in December so much that I decided to offer up some of my favorite lessons so far. This is by no means all encompassing, so I expect that I'll have more to share in the future as well.
So, if budgeting has been on your mind, I encourage you to figure out exactly what bills you owe (including yearly payments broken down into monthly installments) and how you'd like your money to work for you, to click through to anything that resonates with you, and to leave a comment with thoughts, insights, or favorite links. Happy budgeting!
TO READ
(great articles about the basics of budgeting)
Financial motivation: simple vs. easy
Financial motivation: how to make it fun
How much should we save for emergencies?
TO WATCH
(how to use YNAB tools to get started)
Determining your core values
Forecasting & budgeting to zero
Pay cycles & budgeting to zero
Too many categories?
Why I love granularity
