What's the best report for: "What amount should I set my budget to so I don't overspend?"

Chris Harris

I'm trying to set up my personal budget amounts and am not very sure how to best answer this question.  I've tried using the Planning > Budgets, but it seems that doing it from a report might be easier.

Essentially, I want to know how much money I have left to spend in other categories if I set food to $500, $450, etc.  It seems like this would be a simple question, but I'm having a really difficult time figuring it out.

Any advice on the best report, or maybe a different approach entirely?

mshiggins

Have you taken a look at just budgeting those few categories like food and leaving all the other categories as Everything Else? Then the Everything Else group total would be what you have left to spend. 

Another approach would be to use reminders for an estimate of your spending in the tracked categories and income, combined with turning on Show Reminders in Register. With the reminders shown in the register, the balance amount left over will be what you have left to spend. You would need to update the amount for the reminders as you spend in the tracked categories, though, so this approach would take more effort to maintain. 

mshiggins

Have you taken a look at just budgeting those few categories like food and leaving all the other categories as Everything Else? Then the Everything Else group total would be what you have left to spend. 

Another approach would be to use reminders for an estimate of your spending in the tracked categories and income, combined with turning on Show Reminders in Register. With the reminders shown in the register, the balance amount left over will be what you have left to spend. You would need to update the amount for the reminders as you spend in the tracked categories, though, so this approach would take more effort to maintain. 

Chris Harris

Thank you for the feedback.  Admittedly I haven't.  I've probably made it way more complex than it needs to be.

I'm intrigued.  Is the second one some form of replicating the Envelopes system in Quicken?  I've never heard of this.  As you spend, you deduct that amount from the total remaining on the reminder?

mshiggins

I was thinking of the second option as more of a cash flow management technique, but yes it could be used as an envelope process. 

There are lots of ways to track what you want in Quicken, some take more work than others. You'll want to experiment and find the best fit for you.