How to Set Savings Goals in Personal Finance Software
Applies to Excel template: "Georges Budget for Excel"
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Benefits of setting saving goals in Personal Finance Software
Saving money by setting savings goals is an important step in personal budgeting and reaching goals of getting out of debt and building wealth. Creating a saving plan to set aside money for unexpected expenses such as medical bills or home related expenses such as a new roof or new air conditioner so that you have the cash in the bank to pay for these expenses and stay out of debt.
You can save money by making sure that you are making more money then you are spending. Your income need to be more than your expenses or you will be getting into debt or using up your savings. Many people do not know how much they are spending in a given month or week because they are not keeping track of all their expenses and totaling them. One way to save money is by creating a budget, sticking to that budget and not overspending, and then comparing that budget to your actual expenses.
Personal finance software and Excel templates like Georges Budget for Excel can help show you where you are spending your money and if you are spending more than the monthly spending budget that you set by keeping track of your transactions in Excel checkbook registers or Excel credit card registers and assigning each transaction to an income category or expense category. This allows you to track actual expenses by category and then compare them to the budgets amounts that you set for each category.
How to set savings goals in Personal Finance Software
In the Accounts Summary sheet of Georges Budget for Excel, use the "Goal" Buttons to set Lower Limits and Goals to Reach for Register balances. Set both Lower Limit and Goals to Reach to $0 if you do not want to see the graphical display. By default the amounts are set to $0.
The horizontal axis of the Percent of Goal Reached chart display is set to a range of 0 to 100 percent. The horizontal bars of the charts will be limited by those amounts but the percent amounts displayed are not limited by the those amounts.
You can use the "Goal" button for both asset accounts like a savings account and liabilities like credit card debt. However, most typically you will want to set a savings goal for a savings account by setting the "Goal to Reach" as the balance in that account that you would like to reach. You can then transfer funds from another account such as a checking account to your savings account on a regular basis to build up your savings account or you might have a portion of your paycheck deposited directly from your savings account to meet your savings balance goal.
For asset account like checking accounts and savings accounts:
- Set the Goal to Reach to >= $0.00 and <=$24,999,999,975.
- Set the Lowest Limit = $0
For liability accounts like credit card accounts:
- Set the Lowest Limit to >= -$24,999,999,975. and <=$0
- Set the Goal to Reach = $0
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