These days, it is harder and harder for families to get by, with the cost of living rising ever higher, while it seems that pay packets have stagnated, and don’t match the rise in the cost of just surviving. And we know it can be hard to come up with the funds to even just have a little well deserved treat for the family every so often. It is for reasons such as these that having an effective budget is essential for families. Here, we take a look at some of the budgeting tools you can use to help keep track of finances, plan expenses better, and maybe even find additional funds for those all important treats. Best of all – they are all free to use.
Mint.com
Seen as a lifesaver by all that use it, Mint.com has been around for a long time, and for good reason. This is an online tool that you can link to your financial accounts, so it automatically updates in real time. You can even use this tool to work towards retirement goals! With their easy to understand graphs and visual tools, making a keeping to a budget becomes easy.
Moneytrackin’
If you seem to be haemorrhaging money and cannot pin point exactly where this money disappears to each month, then this is the tool for you. With Moneytrackin’, you can monitor outgoings and see exactly where funds are going, making it easier to change behaviour. You can even use this tool if you run a small or home business.
My Spending Plan
My Spending Plan allows you to make better choices for your outgoings. Creating a plan is easy and quick, allowing you to set short term goals, and to plan for upcoming special events that require additional expense, such as birthdays. As well as this, the bill tracker keeps you totally up to date, emailing you reminders of bills that are upcoming. And perhaps best of all, you can also get coupons and money off vouchers through this service, that will better allow you to live within your means.
SavvyMoney
SavvyMoney is for those looking to take proactive steps to creating a budget. It will first provide you with an understanding of what your current situation is, finances wise. From there, you can create a plan to repay debts better, and to budget far more efficiently.
PocketGuard (Mobile)
For those looking to manage their budget on the move, PocketGuard is available on both iOS & Android stores. Linking your accounts and cards to this app (over a secured connection) means that PocketGuard can keep track of, and categorise your outgoings, showing you how much exactly you have remaining to spend, which allows you to avoid going into the red.
These are just a small number of tools that are available to families out there who could do with creating a budget to better track and plan their finances. Truth is, we could all use a budget to plan out our financial comings and goings.
