Creating a Budget

« Create a personal budget »

Know what you’ve spent.

You can’t create a budget by pulling numbers out of thin air. (Well, you could, but it would be extremely ineffective.) We recommend looking at your spending over the past three months. The first step is to pull all of your checking, savings and credit card information into one place. The idea is to get a good picture of where your money is going, so you can evaluate where you can cut back.

If you’re using Mint, you’ll see a handy pie chart that breaks out your spending by category. One of those slices of pie is bound to seem surprisingly big -- and that’s when you move to the next step.

Don’t forget about cash.

Some people are always running to the ATM and pulling out cash without hanging on to the receipts or entering the withdrawal in their checkbook. If this is you, start keeping records, including notes on where that money’s going. Your budgeting software may list ATM categories for you, but it’s up to you to add that $20 a day on lunch to the spending list.

Some people are always running to the ATM and pulling out cash without hanging on to the receipts or entering the withdrawal in their checkbook. If this is you, start keeping records of where that cash is going. Mint will categorize your $20 ATM withdrawal for you, but it’s up to you to remember that you’re spending that $20 a day on lunch.

Budget where you can.

Everybody has a weakness: a spending habit that’s become so automatic, you don’t even notice it anymore. Sign up for Mint and you’ll see it right away. If you’re spending $300 a month on twice-a-day coffee drinks, you might just have a good idea of where to start.

Then you can use Mint’s updated budget feature to quickly set up a budget on discretionary categories like shopping or restaurants, and you can start to get a handle on your problem areas. We recommend that you don’t try to cut back too hard too fast. Maybe 20% less than you’ve been spending. You want to have a realistic goal so you can stick with it.

Budgeting is easier with Mint.

Mint pulls together all of your spending into one place, with automatic categorization and helpful charts. And our budgeting tools make budget planning a snap.
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Want to learn more? Read more in this section about Tracking a Budget, and Tools You Can Use.