Family Finance Tracker

Over the past few years, we’ve tried different methods of tracking personal finances using Microsoft Money, Quicken, Microsoft Access, PHP and MySQL, and Microsoft Excel. We’ve returned to one of our first mediums for tracking finances by using spreadsheets in Microsoft Excel. We’ve created a spreadsheet and have posted it for your use if you so desire to keep track of your finances.

The spreadsheet can be downloaded by clicking this link: Finance_Tracker_version_1_Year_2006.xls

(You can right-click the link and choose the option to save the file “Save target” or “Save link”)

When you open the spreadsheet, click the option “Enable Macros” when prompted.

The spreadsheet is ready to go, just start with the “Information & Tools” tab and you can begin creating expense categories.

Create an expense category by clicking the “Create Expense Category” button. This option will create a new tab for expenses. You’ll probably create a new tab/category for each group of expenses you track such as groceries, gasoline, electricity, water, etc.

Use the “Index” tab to navigate between your expense categories since you may create many of them. Each expense category tab you create has a link back to the index in the top left of the page.

The spreadsheet is already configured to create an income statement, and budget report. The spreadsheet also has a tab already created for you to enter income information. Simply add your expense categories and enter budget information within each expense category.

The spreadsheet is provided to you “As is” with no warranty express or implied and was created with Microsoft Excel 2003. The spreadsheet may not work properly with other spreadsheet programs or earlier versions of Excel.