Beyond the Basic Budget

Have you ever met someone who seemed to have it all together? Perhaps this perfectly primped person could balance a load of laundry with a plate of cupcakes while herding sheepdogs, kids and monkeys out the door. Or perhaps this person could simultaneously balance multiple checkbooks at once, charge a purchase to her bankcard, and pay off the student loan, the gas bill and the mortgage (all while filing her taxes).

I’ve met some of these perfect people in my life, and I am never more surprised by anyone than I am by super-budgeters. These peeps have personal finance all figured out down to the very last penny, and I am always envious of this perfection – to the point that I had to check out more about this super-budgeting phenomenon. Let’s look at what I found!

Super-Budgeters are Real People with Real Goals

Although they may resemble a computer or an abacus, I assure you that super-budgeters are real, live, breathing human beings. They’ve just figured out finance better than the average bear. Their secret: breaking down numerous goals into manageable monthly tasks.

How do they really accomplish this? Super-budgeters often have a vast number of accounts and a large number of goals to make this happen. For example, whereas many people may lump the fee for a haircut into miscellaneous spending, a super-budgeter will have a specific account from which the cash for a new ‘do will come.

How Can I Super-Budget?

It may seem like this type of perfection is unreachable to average bears like me, but actually, super-budgeting your life is much simpler than it looks. How? Well let’s look at ways to budget as super-ly as possible.

First off, let’s assume your budget is somewhat structured already. You probably already have a basic idea of how much you spend on housing, bills, savings, food, gas and other essentials. If not, take a look at our post about basic budgeting.

With this basic budget in mind, you can take a look at miscellaneous spending. From here, you can create a spending limit or different accounts for each miscellaneous expenditure, like school supplies, lunches, haircuts, auto repairs, etc. Basically, anything that you ever spend money on should have its own category.

Now you can figure out how much you spend on each every year. Dividing this amount by your number of paychecks per year will bring you to the maximum amount you should spend on each item every time you are paid. Those pesky bills that pop up occasionally can each have their own savings account or one large account, but as long as you are saving for the expected (and the unexpected) every paycheck, you will be on your way to super-budgeter extraordinaire!

Budgeting can be tricky no matter if you are an easygoing budgeter or a super-budgeter. However, if you super-budget, you may be able to handle the unexpected with fewer financial headaches and more spare change in your accounts at the end of the year.

Are you an easygoing budgeter or a super-budgeter? Any tips to help the easygoing budgeters (like me!) find the structure we may need?

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