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[quote=Anonymous]OP, I used to find it tough to budget too, so this is what I did. First, total up everything you have going out each month- rent, car, insurance, phone, etc. etc. Subtract this total amount from your net income. The resulting amount is what you have to spend on food, gas, entertainment, etc. during the month.

So, let's say your income is $4000 and your bills amount to $2500. That leaves you $1500 in spending money in each month. Figure out when everything must be paid by each month, and try to split it up so that each week, you are paying roughly the same amount. This way, you're not spending $1000 on bills one week and broke and spending $200 another week. It evens things up.

Here's my general budget:

1st week of the month: 1/4 of the rent, phone bill, cable bill
2nd week: 2/3 the car payment, power, 1/4 of the rent
3rd week: 1/3 the car payment, gas, 1/4 of the rent, car insurance
4th week: 1/4 the rent, student loan, credit card

Now, for some of these weeks, you're not spending the money on the bills so much as setting it aside. (Example, saving 1/4 of the rent each week so you don't have to use your entire check on rent the last paycheck of the month. But I still consider that money "spent", i.e., I don't spend it twice!

For me, to even my bills out like this means that I have approximately the same amount leftover each week for spending money. This is helpful because I've learned what I need for the week, and can plan accordingly based on my weekly allotment.

To make this easy for me to remember, I go into my Google calendar each month and write down on every Friday what bills I am paying for that week and how much each one is. Then, on the Saturday of that week, I write in "$X after bills" so I know what's left that I'm able to spend.

I hope I explained this well. It's really the easiest way for me to keep up. Figure out what your baseline amount in bills is going out each month, and divide what gets paid each week so that you're paying roughly the same each week and thus have roughly the same left over each week to spend. It makes it very hard to get surprised with a forgotten bill, or to overdraw because you thought you had more money to spend than you did.[/quote]

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