Post #2519298

2026-05-11 14:32 UTC

How does an expense tracker help you and how particular are you about correctly categorizing your expenses, how small an expense do you record and how often do you revisit and revise your overall or category specific budgets? What&#39;s your fun budget or safety buffer percentage like? #personalfinance #askfedi

Replies (3)

@discobeez@mas.to 2026-05-11 15:22

@dpreacher@freeradical.zone I have a "rare expenses" spreadsheet that lists the things I've found trip me up. Replacing car tires every ~5 years, for example. Also replacing the mattress, my prescription glasses, etc. The spreadsheet breaks it all down to how much I should put away monthly, to cover the expense when it comes up. I have a recurring transfer set up that moves that much money into a savings account. Since doing this, there have been far fewer stressful financial events.

Open ##2974777
@ax6761@freeradical.zone 2026-05-11 21:44

@dpreacher@freeradical.zone 2-3 year ago I used to record expenses in large categories -- grocery-{non,}food, gas, electronics, cleaning products, taxi, rent, health, etc -- in a spreadsheet; have another to do total for the month, year, over time. Then I stopped completely as I gained nothing other than knowing monthly expense. Around last year have started recording the expense per payment type per month (credit card(s), cash, check) in a spreadsheet. Another spreadsheet graphs the actual, mean, median. ...

Open ##2974782
@lightning@bv.umbrellix.org 2026-05-11 21:52

@dpreacher@freeradical.zone I still have yet to properly reconcile my ledger-cli with my bank accounts… #lang_en

Open ##2974786