The Personal Finances Spreadsheet to Get Your Money on Track!

This personal finances tracker for Google Sheets is my secret for keeping track of all of my family’s income, spending, and monthly bills in about 5 minutes a day! A game changer for your budget!

I may not be good at preparing gourmet home-cooked meals and my clean laundry may sit in the dryer for 4 days before I remember to fold it, but when it comes to my family’s personal finances and keeping track of income and expenses, I ROCK!

I’ve been managing ALL of the finances for my family for over 15 years, and when I say “all”, I mean that my husband doesn’t even know the name of our mortgage company – that’s the reason why I made this amazing Emergency Binder so that he isn’t completely lost if something ever happens to me.

And over the last decade, I’ve tried a TON of different ways to keep track of monthly bills, daily expenses and spending, and income.

For many years, I used this daily planner method for money tracking, but then I decided to use the magical powers of automatic spreadsheet calculations and formulas, and I created a budget tracker spreadsheet that I absolutely LOVE! I’ve been using this spreadsheet template for over 5 years now, and it has completely changed how I manage our finances, making it easier to see what spending categories encompass the largest part of our budget and how much money we make each month, down to the penny… and I can access ALL of our budget data for the last 5 years in about 60 seconds flat.

It doesn’t get much easier than that! (Even if you’re not a super tech-y spreadsheet person!)

If you’re tired of watching your bank balance dwindle, and you know that you really need to start tracking daily expenses and spending, then this is the money tracker spreadsheet for you!

Here’s everything you need to know about my #1, go-to, recommend to everyone method for keeping track of income, monthly bills, and spending:

What I LOVE About this Income and Expense Tracker for Google Sheets

Nothing is more motivating than opening up a Google Sheets spreadsheet and checking to see how much money that you’ve saved year to date… at least that’s been my experience over the last 5 years.

Here are some other reasons why I LOVE and highly recommend this personal income and expenses spreadsheet tracker:

Easy to Use

One of the greatest things about my daily expense tracker, which I call “The Master Money Tracker”, is how easy it is to use!

The spreadsheet was designed to be very user-friendly, even for the most tech-challenged people. All of the calculations are done for you, and you can even customize the income types, monthly bill types, and spending categories to meet your needs – want to add a special category called “Starbucks” so that you can keep tabs on your drive thru coffee habit? No problem!

At-a-Glance Income and Expenses Summary

The Summary sheets are provided to give you a snapshot of your finances, Year to Date. You do NOT need to enter any information in these sheets, because all of the calculations are already done for you based on the income, expenses, and transactions entered in your Monthly sheets.

The main “home page” spreadsheet allows you to quickly reference how much your personal net gain (or loss) is, year to date – calculated by subtracting your total monthly bills and spending from your total income:

I reference this sheet ALL the time to see how much money that our family has saved so far for the year. And you can also see your total income, total monthly bills, and total spending from this sheet also.

And here is the Income and Expenses Summary sheet… All of the data on this sheet is automatically transferred in from the transactions that you enter on the monthly sheets:

Monthly and Year-to-Date Calculations

I prefer to keep track of my income and expenses on a monthly basis, but I also like to know how we’re doing financially year to date… and this money tracker spreadsheet makes it easy to do both!

The YTD $$ SUMMARY sheet gives you a year-to-date snapshot of your net gain or loss (whether you’re saving money or spending more than you bring in). And each monthly sheet tells you how you did for that month.

I frequently refer to both the monthly totals and the year-to-date net to make sure that we’re saving a comfortable amount of money each month and we’re not spending more than we make without realizing it.

All Spending Categories are Calculated Automatically

Want to know how much money you spent at restaurants during the month of March? Or how about how much you spent on gas for the year? You can easily find out in less than a minute!

As you’re entering in your daily spending transactions, you’ll select a category for each from a drop down menu. Then, all of the transactions for each category are calculated automatically. You’ll be able to see a running total of your spending for each category on the Income and Expenses Summary sheet!

I used to do all of these calculations by hand at the end of each month, but the spreadsheet budget tracker makes it so much easier!

What to Include in Your Google Sheets Budget Tracker Spreadsheet

To get a full picture of your financial health each month and year to date, I recommend that you include ALL balance-affecting transactions, meaning if a transaction changes your bank balance (either positively or negatively) you include it on your spreadsheet.

Besides normal monthly bills like your mortgage payment and cell phone bill, you should also include daily spending on things like groceries, restaurants, clothing, subscriptions, and medical expenses. Here are some ideas for things to include in your personal finances tracker:

Income

In order to see your total net gain or loss for each month, you’ll need to keep track of all of the income that you and your spouse bring in. And remember, you can easily change the names of the income types that appear in the drop down menu!

Some types of income that you can include in your income table are:

• Paychecks – You can also customize the sheet to say “Bob’s Paychecks”, etc.
• Social Security
• Interest Income
• Rent Income
• Income from investment dividends
• Pension
• Alimony
• Child Support
• Side Hustle or “Gig” income – Like from Uber, Instacart, Door Dash, etc.
• Babysitting, house cleaning, or other side jobs

Monthly Bills

Right beside the income table on the individual month’s sheets, you’ll find a table labeled “Monthly Bills” like this:

The money tracker spreadsheet comes pre-filled with monthly recurring bill types, but you can easily change them to suit your needs:

• Mortgage
• Electricity
• Natural gas
• Water
• Sewer
• TV
• Netflix
• Hulu
• Apple TV
• Other Streaming
• Spotify
• Sirius XM
• Internet
• Cell phone
• Trash pickup
• Security System
• Car payment
• Credit Card Interest
• Car insurance
• Life insurance
• Health insurance
• Pest Control
• Taxes Paid – Great if you pay quarterly estimated personal taxes

*These are just the monthly bills that come pre-filled on the spreadsheet… You can change any of the names to fit your needs!

Daily Spending

Entering in your daily spending is probably the most time consuming task, but it’s also super important because many people have no idea how much they are spending on little odds and ends, like their daily gas station coffee. And your daily spending (anything that’s not a regular monthly bill) probably encompasses a large percentage of the total money that you spend each month.

Just think about how many transactions you have on the average day – it’s probably anywhere between 5-15 transactions for things like gas, drive-thru breakfast, lunch, groceries, random household necessities, etc.

Here are some examples of spending categories that you can customize in your personal expense tracker:

• Groceries/Supplies
• Restaurants
• Clothing
• Fuel (Gas, diesel)
• Entertainment
• Personal Care (Hair, nails, etc)
• Car Maintenance
• Home Maintenance
• Fees
• Taxes/Registrations
• Memberships/Subscriptions
• Pet Supplies
• Medical/Health
• Charitable Giving
• Other Gifts
• Kids’ Expenses
• Misc

For each spending transaction that you enter, you’ll select from your list of categories in a drop down menu. The spreadsheet then keeps a running total of each category for each month. Want to see how much you’ve spent eating out at restaurants month to date? No problem!

How to Treat Credit Card Transactions

When recording your credit card transactions, you need to take care to not record the same transaction twice. This is how I personally use the income and expense tracker to record every penny of my family’s finances:

Every 2-3 days, I open the app for our first credit card and I add all of the expenses/spending to the spreadsheet in the appropriate columns – So for instance, our electric bill is automatically charged to our credit card, so I would put that charge under “Electricity” in the Monthly Bills table for the appropriate month.  

Most of the credit card charges though are regular daily spending (things like restaurants, groceries, etc).  I just add those in date order to the Spending transactions table, and categorize them with the drop down menu.  Then, I open up my next credit card app and add those transactions from the previous 2-3 days to the spreadsheet as well.  Then, I move on to our personal bank account app and add all of those transactions to the sheet also.

Since I do pay off our credit cards completely every week, I use the transactions list in my credit card apps and enter all of the transactions from there… Then, when the payment for the credit cards comes out of my bank account, I DON’T enter that payment because the transactions have already been recorded… If I were to record the actual credit card payment AND the individual charges on the credit cards, then that would be counted twice.

*You can find more detailed tips for keeping track of income and expenses here!

If you DO carry a balance on your credit cards, then you’ll need to record the interest portion of your payment each month. In that case, I would recommend making one of your monthly bills named “Credit Card Interest” and adding the interest charge from your credit card statement each month to there. For multiple credit cards, you can even set up different Monthly Bill names like “Capital One Interest” or “Discover Card Interest”.

How to Use The Master Money Tracker Spreadsheet

As I mentioned above, the budget tracker spreadsheet is super easy to use, and it includes a 7 page PDF of detailed instructions with screen shots… So if you can read step-by-step instructions, then you’ll have no problem setting up your spreadsheet and using it to track your income and expenses.

Here are some of the basic steps for how the money tracker spreadsheet works:

Step 1: Personalize the sheet with your bill names, spending categories, and income types.

Click on the spreadsheet tab called “SET UP”. This is where you will enter your custom income types, monthly bill types, and spending categories.

Only enter names in the boxes that are outlined and colored gray. The sheet already includes some sample items to get you started – but you can easily change them to meet your needs. Just click on a cell and type something different into it.

Whatever changes that you make on this SET UP sheet will automatically transfer to the monthly sheets, saving you lots of time! These will also be the choices in your drop down menus for income, bills, and spending.

Step 2: Enter in all transactions each day.

After you’ve personalized the income types and the names of your monthly bills, you’re ready to start using the money tracker spreadsheet!

Find the January sheet, or the correct monthly sheet if you’re starting to track your finances in the middle of the year, and enter each transaction.

If a transaction is a monthly bill, then you’ll enter it in the bills table. If the amount is a regular spending transaction, then you’ll enter it in the spending table. It’s that easy!

For each transaction, you’ll enter the date, the dollar amount, and a description of the charge. Then, click on the small arrow under the Category column and select the appropriate category from the drop down menu that appears. All of the totals that you enter will be added together automatically by category, so you’ll be able to quickly see how much money you spent in each category month to date AND year to date!

Get The Master Money Tracker to Track Your Spending

Of ALL of the products that I’ve created to help with household management, this money tracker spreadsheet is one of my favorites! Along with my super popular Emergency Binder!

If you think that this spreadsheet is just what you need to get your finances on track, then you can check it out in my shop!

You’ll get the link to the Google Sheets spreadsheet that I personally use and LOVE, plus a detailed 7 page PDF of instructions with screenshots to help you!

See The Master Money Tracker Spreadsheet in my Shop HERE!

FAQ’s About the Money Tracker Spreadsheet

If you’ve never kept track of your finances with a spreadsheet, then you may have some more questions. Here are some of the frequently asked questions that I get from my customers about The Master Money Tracker:

Where is the spreadsheet link? I only received a PDF file?

The actual link to the spreadsheet appears on page 1 of the PDF instructions… Just click that link and the spreadsheet will open in Google Sheets.

How do I edit the spreadsheet? It says that I have to get permission to make changes?

The spreadsheet is delivered in “View only” mode, meaning that you can’t make any changes to that copy. This protects the sheet from being changed by others. You will need to sign in to your Google account to make a copy of the spreadsheet before you enter in your information. You will not be able to enter any info into this sheet in View only mode.

Here’s how to make a copy so that you can enter in your info:

• Select File > Make a copy from the upper menu.
• Change the name of the copied spreadsheet to whatever you like. I change mine to “Money Tracker” and then the year… That way I can go back and reference previous year’s sheets if I want to know how our income and expenses compare.
• You now have a private copy of the spreadsheet and you’re ready to start entering in your information.

Does the money tracker spreadsheet work in Excel?

Unfortunately, no. There are some very advanced formulas that are included in the template, and they do not work properly in Microsoft Excel.

Do I have to repurchase the spreadsheet every year?

Nope! You can use it year after year!

I recommend that you save multiple copies of the spreadsheet to your Google Drive account first thing. You can just select “Make a Copy” from the File menu, make extra copies, and name each copy with the year (like Money Tracker 2023, Money Tracker 2024, etc.). Then, you have a new copy of the spreadsheet to start fresh for each new year.

Isn’t it time consuming to type in every single transaction for each month?

For me, it’s not overwhelming at all… It’s just a part of my routine.  Usually it only takes me about 15 minutes to go through and update everything once every 2-3 days.  

I sit at my desk and do it while I’m having my morning coffee, and at the same time since I’m already on my credit card apps, I go ahead and pay off all 3 of our credit cards every 7 days – that way I’m never paying interest, and I kill two birds with one stone so to speak.

Wouldn’t a budgeting app be easier?

Many of the budgeting apps are connected to your bank account or credit card, which is why I prefer to use my spreadsheet method. I’m not saying that those apps are insecure, but I personally don’t like the idea of having to input my financial account numbers into an app, even though it may be easier because all of the transactions are inputted into the app automatically.

The important thing is that you find what works best for you and your family, and you stick with it to make actively managing your finances part of your routine.

This Google Sheets Budget Template Changed My Finances

This spreadsheet to track personal expenses and income is one of my absolute FAVORITE ways to stay on top of our personal finances. Not only is it super motivating to watch our Net Gain (savings) go up every month, but I also feel like I have a much better picture of our financial health.

When my husband and I first got married over 16 years ago, we were spending more money than we made without even realizing it! But with the help of this personal finances tracker, I know where our money is going and where we need to cut back to stay on track.

And remember this:

Knowledge is Power! By taking a few extra minutes each day to KNOW where your money is going, you will have the POWER to make more informed financial decisions.

And if you want some other tips for managing your finances, check out some of these posts:

• Free Bill Tracker Printable PDF – Great if you’re wanting a pen and paper solution for tracking your monthly bills!
• How to Do a No Spend Challenge (and 10 tips to stick with it!) – Grab some free printable challenge trackers to keep you on target!