Budgeting - My Norfolk Jobs

Budgeting

Follow these guidelines for tracking your spending and designing a budget.
OK, that's £4 at McDonalds, £1.50 on the bus,  £60 going out for dinner at the weekend.  For exactly one month, keep track of every penny you spend. All of it. Every dinner, every bus fare, every tube of toothpaste, everything.

Oh, it's just £2 here, £5 there, is what you tell yourself. But if you're buying a £2 coffee every day, times five days a week, times four, that's £40 a month, just gone. And, when you think back over that month, how much of it was truly worth it? You didn't really need that second CD, that extra bottle of shampoo?
The first step of budgeting is figuring out what you spend.  After you've tracked your spending to see where your money is going, it's time to write up a list of spending categories so you can begin channelling your hard-earned cash with much more control.

Hopefully your monthly income will be a larger number than your total monthly expenses. If not, it's definitely time to begin trimming.  If it is, all that extra money should be saved for your future, not blown in an afternoon shopping spree.
If you add up what all your non-essentials cost you each month and then set up a standing order for that amount to go into a savings account, you'll be amazed at how quickly it'll build up.

Not all the spending categories below will apply to you, and you'll probably have some that aren't listed here so be sure to add and delete categories to customise it to your needs - 

Spending Categories:

Income wages/salary other income     Housing Personal Entertainment rent/mortgage Utilities gas, Electricity, water, refuse phone cable furniture appliances Home Repairs/ maintenance supplies groceries gifts/donations clothing shoes jewellery dry cleaning hair/makeup health and beauty health club/gym pets savings movies concerts theatre holiday hobbies books and magazines videos music restaurants Internet Taxes Transport Insurance   petrol maintenance tolls license/taxes public transportation tickets car life health contents house Debt Healthcare Extras/Miscellaneous credit cards car loans student loans personal loans prescriptions Medical, dental, vision Smoking Childcare Computer expense