What's inside
- A one-month budget with income, needs, wants and savings lines, plus ten blank lines for your own categories.
- Plan vs actual: type what you planned and what you spent; overspending turns red.
- A 50/30/20 check that shows what share of your pay goes to each bucket, with targets you can change.
- "Left to assign" so you can build a zero-based budget, where every dollar has a job.
How to use it
- Download the file and open it in Excel. For Google Sheets, go to File → Import and upload it, or open it from Google Drive.
- On the Budget sheet, replace the example lines with your own. Give each a type: Income, Need, Want or Save.
- Enter your planned amounts and aim for Left to assign = $0.
- During the month, log your actual spending. Check the 50/30/20 box and adjust next month's plan.
The 50/30/20 rule in one minute
Spend about half of your take-home pay on needs (housing, food, transport, insurance, minimum debt payments), about 30% on wants, and put about 20% toward savings and paying off debt faster. It was popularized by Elizabeth Warren and Amelia Warren Tyagi in All Your Worth (2005). It's a starting point: in expensive cities, 60/20/20 is common.
Questions people ask
Is it really free?
Yes. No sign-up and no email needed. It's yours for personal use.
Does it work in Google Sheets?
Yes. Upload it to Google Drive and open it with Google Sheets, or use File → Import in a new sheet. The formulas and colors carry over.
What counts as a need and what counts as a want?
Needs are costs you can't skip without real harm: housing, utilities, groceries, getting to work, insurance and minimum debt payments. Everything else you choose to spend on is a want, even if it's something you'd hate to give up.
Need more?
The Paycheck Budget & Sinking Funds in our Money Toolkit adds 12 months, sinking funds and an emergency-fund planner.
See what's inside