A zero-based budget simply means your income minus your expenses equals zero. One more time: Your income minus everything else equals zero. That means you give every dollar a job to do every month. Hint: That’s why we named our tool EveryDollar. Make a plan on purpose for every dollar, every month.
IT’S TIME TO FILL OUT THE QUICK-START BUDGET
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STEP 1 Write down what you’re spending for the month in each item of each category. If you don’t know exact numbers, just make your best guess!
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STEP 2 Add up each item in each category and write the TOTAL at the bottom.
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STEP 3 Add up the numbers in all of the TOTAL boxes and write that number in the TOTAL FOR ALL CATEGORIES box.
