Put your whole month on one page: what comes in, what goes out and what is left. Mark each expense as a need, a want or a saving and see how your budget compares with the popular 50/30/20 rule.
| Source | Amount |
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| Expense | Amount | Type |
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Needs are the costs you cannot skip without real harm: a place to live, food, basic utilities, getting to work, minimum loan payments, insurance. Wants make life nicer but could be cut in a hard month: eating out, takeaway, new clothes beyond the basics, streaming, hobbies, holidays. Savings are money put aside for later: an emergency fund, a goal, retirement, or extra payments on debt.
Example: take-home pay 3,200. 50/30/20 suggests about 1,600 for needs, 960 for wants and 640 for savings.
If rent alone is 1,200, needs will probably be above 50%. Then aim to keep wants a little lower so that at least 10–20% still goes to savings.
A simple guideline for splitting take-home pay: about 50% for needs (rent, food, bills, transport), 30% for wants (eating out, shopping, hobbies) and 20% for savings and paying off debt. It is a starting point, not a strict rule.
Yes, rent is a need. In expensive cities needs often take more than half of the income. Then the wants share usually has to shrink, or you look for ways to lower the biggest fixed costs over time.
Minimum payments are a need. Anything extra you pay to clear a debt faster counts as saving: it lowers what you owe, just as saving raises what you have.
Use take-home pay, the money that actually reaches your account after tax and deductions. That is the money you can budget.
Yes, in your own browser only, so it is there when you come back next month. Nothing is sent to our server unless you download the PDF, and that file is not kept.
A calculator gives you one answer. A cashbook shows you the whole picture: write down cash in and cash out, see where the money goes in charts and on a calendar, and share a ledger with your family, team or friends.
This takes a few seconds.
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