3 Ways to Organize a Budget

We're all snowflakes. So copying the budget layout your mom taught you in 1999 miiiight not be the best possible budget structure for YOU. Follow Hannah as she outlines three effective ways to organize a budget, whether you think best in terms of time, expendability, or categories. Because your mind is unique—let's find you a budget to match.

Timestamps:

0:00 Intro
1:05 Defining terminology
1:42 Structure #1: Frequency Method
4:24 Structure #2: Fixed vs Flexi Method
9:12 Structure #3: Topical Method
11:47 Bonus Tip: "Special" Categories
12:37 Outro

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[amandacollins]

I have a category named "I can only remember so much"

[reaganheese]

Hannah's a good trainer. She's competent but just goofy enough to keep things interesting. The editing is also nice. This keeps me engaged so that I rarely fast forward and I generally finish the whole video once I start. Well done guys!

[merlinsbones]

Now I need some peanut m&m's. First I need to create a category to put them in...maybe call it "It's Hannah's Fault" 😂

[potmn]

I love how YNAB is not one size fits all. It really enforces the idea that you need to find what works for you.

[OlinBryan]

Love how slow and steady Hannah is with her speech cadence. Time for this small brain of mine to keep up, track what she is saying, and mull over how it fits me. 😊

[cissyrene]

Fixed vs flexi is how I'm going to do mine. And I just want to thank you for the time stamps. I watched the whole thing and now that I'm ready to reset up my budget, it's so nice to be able to just go where I need to go.

Also, bless this woman. She's so good at this. But I hope that isn't your real budget, cause if so YNAB owes you a huge raise.

[emmaadams]

Was just binging your guys content, never thought id be this early!
Edit: working on getting a month ahead on bills I've got only $200 more to go! Have a 10k emergency fund and 6k towards a down-payment on a house so far just trying to keep the momentum going by watching as much finance content as I can!

[linkhs]

Come for the budgeting advice, stay for the outtakes. XD I actually have my Categories organized into Needs, Wants, and Savings Based on Warren's book All Your Worth. It helped me really figure out where my money should and could go in my earliest days of budgeting, and it's been a great fit ever since!

[mruppity]

I use a traffic light system against each category - red dot means I can't take from that budget, orange/amber - maybe - green is Flexi

[MickV]

We need an updated Hannah budget method 🎉

[Katiedora]

I think my budget organization is a combination of all three? Essentially, top to bottom is by frequency/importance, but I have a couple of weird catch-all groups in the middle that are by topics that work for me. I also have it labeled which line items cannot be borrowed from, and each category has a mix of those. I'm planning to stick with this set up for the next year at least, and who knows what style will catch my fancy then.

Fixed expenses (rent, utilities, car, etc)
Variable expenses (groceries, personal, household items, misc)
Monthly subscriptions
Annual subscriptions
Just for fun (dining out, books, clothes, donations)
Wish farm (which also works as a goal timeline)
Big stuff (tuition, new computer, and where I put savings for my nephew)
Emergency funds (income replacement, and where I list accounts I don't touch)
Sinking funds (I actually dip in and out of here plenty, but I like the money at the bottom so I'm not thinking about it much)

[sethwilliamson]

I'd love to see sub-groups! (Group > Sub-Group > Category)

[moneybee]

Finding a good backbone approach and tailoring it to suit your specific situation is so important, so it's so important reading up on the different options out there! Great video! :)

[WarrenEnstrom]

Okay, I have a wild idea here that might be a whole mess, but what if you could tag budget categories in more than one category group, then filter by "category group styles" that you predefine and save as a sort of "budget layout"? That way you could use each of the methods above, and just filter by "category group styles" you've created that correspond for topical method, fixed v. flexi method, pay check 1 & 2 method, etc.

For me having these multiple "views" available would help me get a much more robust understanding of my budget!

[toddw]

Also, you can pin individual categories to the top of your budget (and they still show up in their category group). And, you can drag to re-order category groups if you want to - very flexible and about your own unique personal style.

[jacey]

I do mine from most important/urgent to least important/urgent. That way, I can distribute money from top down and I know I don't have anything important buried at the bottom of a list. My top category is Needs (mortgage, groceries, utilities, etc), next is Upcoming Expenses (predictable long-term expenses like car registration, clothing, gifts, etc), then Savings (emergency fund and sinking funds for less-predictable expenses like home maintenance, vet bills, etc), then Goals (vacation, expensive event tickets, new puppy fund). After that I put my TV/music subscriptions in their own category because I wanted to be able to see how much I was spending per month. And last but not least, I have a category for Wants. It has dining out, "Treat Yo'self" aka fun money, and then any smaller wish list items I'm trying to fund individually, like a video game.

[jstabe]

I have no idea why it never dawned on my to lay out my budget based on paychecks. I'm trying to get out of the paycheck to paycheck cycle and this is such a game changer. And the kitties are absolutely getting their own category now. Thank you for such a great video.

[WorkHorse]

The part which kept me glued to the video was watching her selecting an emoji for different categories 😄

[jackwiley]

Getting in comment 2 on a HIFH is GOALS!! Julep looks like a super sweet pup, also.

[opiatezeo]

Didn't expect this to be as informative as it was, so thanks for that! Might have to go re-evaluate my category groups.