Have you had trouble sticking with a budget? If you are like us, you’ve tried every method from simple handwritten budgets on a legal pad to excel spreadsheets to complex budget software on the computer. It all works for a month or so, but there’s always some aspect of it that you can’t seem to keep up with.
The fact is, writing out a monthly budget and sticking with it are super important for gaining financial victory, but it can take some (or a lot, depending on the method you use) work and attention.
My husband and I have set this radical goal of paying off our house in less than three years, and I had to realize the only way to reach that goal is if we are writing out a budget every month and following it very strictly. Ugh. As much as I love being organized and data entry (I really do), sticking with a budgeting system has always been hard for me….
…Until….
…this Dave Ramsey fan heard that his company had come out with a new online budgeting tool called EveryDollar. I was ecstatic! Surely a budget tool from the best financial counselor in the world would be exactly what we needed to stay consistent and reach our goals.
We have been using EveryDollar ever since and it does exactly what I’d hoped for! Here are some of the ways it’s helped us:
- Presents your budget in different ways using percentages, graphs, bars, etc.
- The visual graphs are awesome for tracking your spending
- Made tracking income and expenses easy…therefore, doable (plus feature)
- Clean and simple interface minimizes distractions (something other online softwares are really bad about. I’d be budgeting….budgeting…budgeting…ooh look an ad for pretty furniture!)
- Tracks where you are in Dave’s Baby Steps (read about those in the Total Money Makeover)
- Copies your budget over to the next month so it’s easy to keep using month after month
- The email reminders and tips for saving money are really good
The best part is: it’s FREE!!!
Or, at least there is a free version of it, which we used for a little while. What the paid “Plus” version has is the ability to automatically track your transactions from your bank and credit card accounts (which you shouldn’t have if you are following Dave’s plan, but if you do have them, it tracks ‘em). This feature saves so much more time and work that I decided it would be worth the $99.00 a year.
If you sign up for EveryDollar Plus, all you have to do to keep your budget up to date is drag and drop the transactions into the appropriate categories. I do this once a week and it takes less than five minutes! That means more time to play with my kiddos while still being well-informed on where our spending is for the month.
If $99 a year is too much for you, the free version is still really good, you just have to be a little more diligent about keeping receipts and tracking spending and income.
So, if you are having trouble sticking with a budgeting system, search no more! EveryDollar.com makes budgeting easy and not such a chore. It works really well with Dave Ramsey’s philosophies, which are proven to work for thousands of people. And, I have no problem recommending it because it has done wonders for Mr. Charming and I as we work towards this crazy goal of paying off our house in less than three years.
You want the best budgeting tool to help get your finances on track to reach your financial dreams? Then EveryDollar is what you need and you should definitely sign up today!
I’ve received no compensation for this post. I genuinely love EveryDollar!
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