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How to make a budget

{ April 22, 2008 @ 7:50 am } · { Article }
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Make a Budget piggy What is the best way to start a budget?

The first thing that anyone who wants to make a budget must do is to compare their income versus their expenses. The good thing is that it is quite easy to do.

To get started you can download this free Excel budgeting spreadsheet which will help you calculate how much you spend each month and compare it to your current income.

It’s too bad most of us never learned this in school and had to figure it out on our own – so here is the lesson that we should have learned in 5th grade:

Expenses > Income = Bad Expenses < Income = Good

And honestly, as simple as it sounds, that is the key to wealth. Anyone, and I mean anyone, who IS wealthy (I emphasize IS because I am not talking about people who appear to be wealthy, but who are actually in debt up to their eyeballs) spends LESS money than they earn. AKA – their expenses are less than their income.

The great news about this is that anyone can do this – no matter what their income level. If you can do it on a small income, then you can do it on a large income. If you can’t do it on a small income, then you won’t be able to do it on a large one either. Trust me!

If you don’t believe me, just ask all of the lottery winners who went bankrupt within years of winning millions of dollars.

Back to making our budget…

Regardless of how your expenses and income compare right now – get excited, because you can easily change it!! If it is bad you can make it so much better!! If it is good, you can still make it even better!! I will show you how later, but for now…

Let’s make a budget!

Did you calculate what your monthly expenses and income were? Were your expenses less than your income? If so, you are a rare breed who is in great shape, so just sit tight for a minute.

For everyone else, whose expenses exceeded your income – you are not alone. You actually have a lot of company. The problem is that it isn’t good company! Most of our debt-ridden society is in the same boat, but you are one of the bold ones who is jumping out of the debt boat!!

So, if your income is $1000 and your expenses are $1200, that means you spend an extra $200 each month that YOU DON’T HAVE!! What your job is now is to find out what you can get rid of or quit buying each month to save that $200. If you have no idea where to start you can check out these money saving tips or browse other money saving ideas.

I know, I know – this is the part that hurts. Just like pruning a bush – cutting back hurts, but ultimately you are going to yield so MUCH more fruit because of it!!

The goal here is to get your expenses and income to AT LEAST be equal. Once that is accomplished we can work on eliminating wasteful spending  or cut other costs to bring the expenses below the income.

Now that you have calculated what your monthly income and expenses are we can start designing our budget. We will first discuss the less effective, but easier method for budgeting…

The world’s easiest budget

There are 2 simple rules to do a simple budget:

  1. You can’t spend more than you earn – carrying a balance on a credit card is not allowed.
  2. Money must go to the budget categories as soon you get paid.

The way it works:

Rather than having 10-20 different categories of items to be budgeted for you only focus on the 1-3 most important ones and let the rest of the chips fall where they will.

So, to do this you take your paycheck of say $1000 and right off the top you put the money to your main priorities. For many people this is tithing to their church, retirement savings, college savings for children, etc…

A sample of this would be:

$1000 (paycheck)

-$100 (tithe)

-$100 (retirement savings)

= $800 (for the rest of the bills and everything else)

It is absolutely critical that the money gets taken out FIRST for these few budgeted items. If not, I can almost guarantee that the full amount will not make it as intended.

I highly recommend making this process automatic by using direct deposit or some other form of automatic withdrawal. There is just something about human nature that has a hard time staying consistent with things like this.

Why do you think the U.S. government takes our taxes directly out of our paycheck, rather than coming to collect the full sum at the end of the year? It is the same principle – use it to your advantage.

Easy budget, but not very efficient

I think this budget is perfect for people who don’t want to budget. It is simple, doesn’t take up much time, and will help you reach some savings goals. That said, it is still inefficient and leaves the door wide open for inefficient and foolish spending.

I think it should be considered the “lazy man’s budget” – and you are not LAZY, you are willing to work to get your finances in order!! I know this because you are still reading. So, since you are NOT lazy and are hungry for more of a challenge, let’s look at how the pros budget.

The money saving budgeting method

Yes, this method takes a little bit more time and energy, but it also will provide you will long-term financial benefits if followed.

To do this we are just going to expand on the lazy man’s budget mentioned above. Rather than having just 1-3 categories of items budgeted for, we are going to create as many as we need to put a limit on our spending in all areas.

You can use the mentioned budget spreadsheet as a guide for tracking your progress. Try to account for every possible expense that you could run into. You will never be able to budget for every possible scenario, but the goal is to minimize surprise expenses. Inevitably, there will still be surprises from time to time – so I suggest creating a category for these surprises (or you can just use your emergency fund).

How to stick with your budget

The almost sure-fire way to make a budget that fails is to NOT budget for any fun stuff. I wrote about how budgeting should be fun and it is a necessary ingredient for success. You need to budget for clothing, entertainment, going out to dinner, or whatever else it is you love to do! The key is to do it in moderation and to set limits and abide by them.

The amazing thing is that by budgeting for fun stuff, it actually liberates you to spend money on these items. When you have money budgeted each month to buy clothes, the money is now sitting there waiting to be used for that assigned purpose. Suddenly you can go clothes shopping without feeling guilty!!

This is how budgeting truly becomes fun. When you have money sitting in the bank waiting to be spent. Or, even better: if you start budgeting for vacation and after a little while you have hundreds of dollars begging to be spent on a vacation!! You go on your trip and come back home and don’t owe any money to a credit card company – now that is how a budget becomes fun and what helps you stick with it!!

Other budget options

There are many ways to make a budget work. The key is to finding a system that works for you and sticking with it. This article has gone over a basic method of budgeting, but I also suggest you check out the envelope budgeting method, or the method that I use to budget with ING.

As far as paying for budget software I think it depends on the user. It is not a necessity by any means, but most software programs will make your life easier and save you time. It just depends on personal preference really.

That said, my favorite budgeting software tool that I have found is called Mvelopes Personal. They are basically like a virtual envelope system for budgeting. They have a very simple and intuitive method for budgeting that is one of the best out there. If you want more information you can Take a tour of Mvelopes Personal. 

Another budgeting tool I found is called YNAB and you can find out more about it at YouNeedABudget.com. It is a very basic tool that will help keep your budget organized. I don’t like it as much as Mvelopes, but I think it is a little bit cheaper. (http://www.christianpf.com/)

I would love to hear what has worked for you and what hasn’t. Let me know in the comments below…

Manajemen Keuangan dan Iman Kristen

{ March 22, 2008 @ 4:13 am } · { Article }
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(Tinjauan Iman Kristen Terhadap Tujuan dari Manajemen Keuangan)

Oleh: Ricky Sudarsono, SE, MRE

            Teori-teori di dalam manajemen keuangan menyatakan bahwa tugas seorang manajer keuangan adalah mengambil keputusan investasi, keputusan pendanaan, menganalisa dan membuat perencanaan keuangan. Ukuran keberhasilan dari manajer keuangan di dalam suatu perusahaan terbuka (Tbk.) adalah apakah nilai perusahaan yang tercerminkan dari harga saham perusahaan mencapai nilai maksimal. Nilai kekayaan suatu perusahaan yang telah terdaftar di bursa saham ditentukan dengan harga saham tersebut di pasar. Secara teoritis, kinerja manajer keuangan yang baik akan berbanding lurus dengan kondisi nilai pasar sahamnya.
Masalah yang seringkali timbul di dalam perusahaan adalah apabila manajer keuangan menempatkan kepentingan pribadinya di atas kepentingan perusahaan. Masalah ini lebih umum disebut dengan agency problem. Manajemen keuangan berusaha memaksimumkan kekayaan pemilik, permasalahan yang mendasar adalah dosa membuat pemilik perusahaan tidak menyadari siapa sebenarnya PEMILIK perusahaan tersebut.
Kembali kepada Alkitab (bandingkan kita harus menaati bahwa hidup kita adalah milik Allah, segala aset dan properti termasuk uang adalah benda-benda mati yang bersifat sementara yang dipercayakan oleh Allah kepada kita dalam rangka mengerjakan pekerjaan baik yang sudah Allah sediakan bagi kita (Ef. 2:8).
Kesalahan terbesar dari seorang manajer perusahaan yang tidak mengerti hal di atas adalah tidak adanya pemikiran untuk melanggengkan usaha/bisnis yang dijalankan atau apa yang biasa disebut dengan sustainable profit. Sustainable profit adalah profit yang membuat semua pihak baik internal maupun lingkungan sekitar mendukung perusahaan mendapatkan profit yang berikutnya. Di dalam hal ini pihak yang harus kita dengarkan adalah Allah dan hanya Allah saja. Maka goal dari manajemen keuangan adalah memaksimalkan kekayaan pemilik tanpa meninggalkan tanggung jawab terhadap lingkungan sekitar.
Permasalahan kedua adalah masalah tolok ukur. Apakah harga saham di pasar boleh dijadikan ukuran? Apakah perusahaan yang nilai sahamnya semakin meningkat adalah benar-benar karena kinerja manajer keuangannya? Apakah manajer keuangan yang bekerja dengan keras pasti akan mampu mencatatatkan nilai saham yang tinggi? Sejarah menunjukkan keduanya tidak selalu berkorelasi positif. Fluktuasi harga saham sering diakibatkan sentimen pasar dan sentimen pasar terkadang tidak mencerminkan kondisi perusahaan yang sebenarnya. Di sini kita melihat seorang manajer keuangan menghadapi ukuran sasaran pencapaian yang tidak jelas.
Di dalam iman Kristen, ukuran pencapaian harus sesuai dengan standar Allah, di mana setiap orang mengerjakan sesuai dengan talenta yang Tuhan sudah berikan dan pekerjaan tersebut sejalan dengan visi besar Allah. Di dalam manajemen keuangan perencanaan merupakan issue yang cukup sentral. Merencanakan berdasarkan masa lalu kemudian membuat prediksi pertumbuhan berdasarkan indikator-indikator ekonomi yang umum. Di tengah periode pelaksanaan jika terjadi perubahan, maka perusahaan harus membuat berbagai macam adjustment agar target semula perusahaan dapat tercapai.
Perusahaan yang didirikan dengan visi dari Tuhan tetap harus membuat rencana, tetap harus melihat masa lalu, belajar dari padanya dan berani membuat rencana masa depan. Bahaya yang terbesar adalah jika rencana buatan manusia dijadikan Tuhan, rencana keuangan tersebut menjadi segala-galanya bagi perusahaan.
Rencana keuangan seharusnya adalah rencana yang kita letakkan di dalam tangan Tuhan dan kita bekerja keras namun tetap bersandar kepada Tuhan. Dengan prinsip seperti ini perusahaan akan menjadi perusahaan yang dinamis, setiap risiko akan selalu dapat dilihat sebagai peluang. Seringkali kondisi makro politik dan ekonomi suatu negara mempengaruhi keberanian manajer keuangan untuk bergantung dan bersandar kepada Allah.
Manajer keuangan yang sadar akan siapa sebenarnya pemilik perusahaan dan uang yang ada pada perusahaan akan membuat manajer keuangan menyadari hakekat dari didirikannya perusahaan adalah agar misi Allah di dunia tercapai. Manajer keuangan akan menginjili dengan cara menjalankan tugas dengan profesional, mengerti bagaimana memakai dana yang dihasilkan oleh perusahaan dengan ukuran banyak jiwa dimenangkan bagi Tuhan.
Seorang manajer yang benar-benar mendapatkan panggilan dari Allah, harus berani menjalankan fungsi manajerialnya dengan sungguh-sungguh dan bagi dia ukuran keberhasilannya adalah bagaimana PEMILIK diperkaya dengan jiwa-jiwa baru.
Hal ini bukan berarti perusahaan harus menjadi badan sosial yang tidak mengejar profit, tetapi mengejar profit di dalam kerangka kehendak Tuhan. Perusahaan seperti ini akan rajin memberikan perpuluhan. Manajer keuangan seperti ini adalah manajer keuangan yang merencanakan dengan hebat tetapi juga bersandar dengan sangat luar biasa kepada Allah pemilik sesungguhnya dari perusahaan. •

(Penulis adalah Kepala Program Manajemen Bisnis Internasional Fakultas Ekonomi, pengajar manajemen keuangan dan bisnis real estat Universitas Kristen Petra, Surabaya) (www.gkagloria.or.id)