Calendar budgeting is a practical and visual approach to managing your finances. This method integrates your budget with a calendar, allowing you to align your income and expenses throughout each month. Not only does this help you stay on track, but it also provides a clearer picture of your financial position. By seeing when income and expenses occur, you can avoid overspending and reduce the likelihood of overdrafts or late payments. Unlike rigid spreadsheets or apps, a calendar budget can be tailored to your specific financial habits and goals. The visual format makes it easy to identify gaps between income and expenses and helps you plan the best time to pay bills based on your available income.
A New Year Means a New Calendar! Here’s How to Implement:
- Begin your calendar budget by getting a paper calendar and some colored markers or pens. You can either print one at home or stop by any of our branches to pick up a free calendar. Then, start marking your paydays or any other sources of income on each month in green. This creates a foundation to plan your cash flow and visually represents incoming funds.
- Next, note down all recurring bills and expenses, such as rent, utilities, subscriptions, and debt payments, on their respective due dates in red. Don’t forget to include variable expenses like groceries and gas. Add irregular or seasonal expenses (e.g., birthday gifts, car maintenance) to the appropriate dates to prevent surprises. You can choose to make different types of expenses in different colors, but simplicity is best with calendar budgeting.
- Mark times when you should schedule transfers to savings or investments in blue, aligning them with paydays to prioritize these goals before discretionary spending.
At this point you should have a very good visual depiction of when you have income coming in and payments going out. Make note when you need to save money from one paycheck to cover expenses that need to be paid before your next influx of cash. Each quarter, you should print out your bank statements and check your calendar against actual spending to identify patterns and adjust.
Calendar budgeting combines simplicity and effectiveness, making it a great tool for financial success and helping to break the paycheck-to-paycheck cycle. Whether you’re saving for a goal or managing day-to-day expenses, this method puts you in control.
If you want to see a visual of this process, check out our Calendar Budgeting video! Looking to learn more about budgeting or other financial topics? Join us for a free financial wellness class!
