Tracking expenses vs Setting a budget

[Furball808]

Tracking your expenses is a good habit to have. Or I thought so. But I recently came across an advice where tracking expenses actually does nothing for you but rather what we should do is just set a budget for every month. No need to track every dollar spent as long as it is within the budget. What do you think? Personally I believe tracking expenses makes us mindful of what we spend the most on and what we should lessen next time. Is it necessary or no?

[Charles-Tim]

I prefer to set a budget instead of tracking my expenses because tracking my expenses will only give me a headache. I set an amount of money that I want to spend monthly and I multiply my weekly income by 4 to know if I can achieve it and I can. That is enough for me.

But there are some people that may overspend than they are expecting to spend, such people may want to go for the other means which is to track their monthly expenses. That does not change the fact that they can also set a budget.

[Zigabel]

Tracking your expenses is a good habit to have. Or I thought so. But I recently came across an advice where tracking expenses actually does nothing for you but rather what we should do is just set a budget for every month. No need to track every dollar spent as long as it is within the budget. What do you think? Personally I believe tracking expenses makes us mindful of what we spend the most on and what we should lessen next time. Is it necessary or no?

Tracking of expenses just further increase worries because if you never had a budget and you are just spending with the mind that you will eventually track the expenses, you will find out how much you have spent later and just start to bother about every of it that is actually supposed to not be a thing to bother so much about if you had all of it figured out in a budget.

make a budget and that way you are going to stay on course with all of your spending, you are not going to have to track the spending you just do a check on your budget and thick that which you have spent all your money on and then you get an idea of what your spending has looked like within a period of time without having to worry if you have spent so much or if you are not putting your money to good use enough, since it aligns with your budget, you will understand better how your money is been spent than worry.

[Hypnotizer]

Basically if you have a budget, there would be no need for you to be tracking every single expense because the budget is supposed to cover all those areas. If you budget your income the best way, why would you need to track your expenses when you’ve clearly outline and allocate some money for the expenses? As a good budgeter you should know what you spend most on and what you spend less on and how to optimize it,  so that you can effectively distribute your income in the budget.

So I will say tracking your expenses is good but not really necessary.

[retreat]

For some people, maybe they want to track expenses and manage a budget in their finances, but this can be done if they are diligent and not distracted by recording every expense they make. But for me personally, just managing a budget is more than enough, because tracking all my expenses might be troublesome and just a headache, it's better to focus on maintaining discipline within a predetermined budget, so that expenses remain under control without having to burden myself with such troublesome record keeping.

[m2017]

Tracking your expenses is a good habit to have. Or I thought so. But I recently came across an advice where tracking expenses actually does nothing for you but rather what we should do is just set a budget for every month. No need to track every dollar spent as long as it is within the budget. What do you think? Personally I believe tracking expenses makes us mindful of what we spend the most on and what we should lessen next time. Is it necessary or no?

Money loves to be counted.

How can you create a budget for the next (and each) month if you don't know your current monthly budget? Therefore, you'll definitely need to write your current expenses (and even better, for the previous few months) and analyze them.

Knowing your past expenses will allow you to manage them (remove unnecessary ones, add necessary ones). This is exactly what you've mentioned.

Also, recording your expenses allows you to "systematize and organize" your financial life and develops the habit of controlling your financial flows.

[Olatundespo]

Tracking your expenses is a good habit to have. Or I thought so. But I recently came across an advice where tracking expenses actually does nothing for you but rather what we should do is just set a budget for every month. No need to track every dollar spent as long as it is within the budget. What do you think? Personally I believe tracking expenses makes us mindful of what we spend the most on and what we should lessen next time. Is it necessary or no?

I was aware of tracking expenses but it does not actually reduce the family expenses. By recording daily expenses, you may mentally think that it will reduce your expenses but your idea will be proven wrong. Considering the daily expenditure statistics, apart from the basic needs, your family has additional expenses which can decrease or increase depending on your income.

By tracking expenses, you may try to understand the expenses briefly and exclude them from the shopping list later but unless special circumstances arise, you will not be able to reduce the scope of expenses. I think this is unnecessary because those who are responsible for the family refrain from spending excessively.

[Jatiluhung]

Keeping track of expenses every month can be quite exhausting. However, tracking expenses is necessary in order to set a budget or make budget adjustments in the future. But what we really need to track and calculate are our basic needs plus our secondary needs. And that's it. The rest is for savings, investments, and enjoyment. Therefore, we can set a specific budget for our basic needs each month, as well as other needs, including secondary ones. Then, the remainder is allocated to a specific budget for investments and savings (emergency funds) and a little for enjoyment.

There is no need to record all small expenses. We only need to know our basic needs and set a budget from there for everything else, in proportions that make us comfortable and are good for our current and future economic health.

So, I think tracking expenses continuously would be exhausting. It would be better to just know our basic needs and set a budget from there for everything else. Once our basic needs are met.

[Tipstar]

Tracking your expenses is a good habit to have. Or I thought so. But I recently came across an advice where tracking expenses actually does nothing for you but rather what we should do is just set a budget for every month. No need to track every dollar spent as long as it is within the budget. What do you think? Personally I believe tracking expenses makes us mindful of what we spend the most on and what we should lessen next time. Is it necessary or no?

I tried tracking expenses but it don't make sense even in long term. Many of the expenditure are one time or some of them lasts for years or months while some are to be made more often while there are some that are unexpected. Mostly I forget to keep tab on it even when I have the mobile app.
Budgeting is much easier and straightforward, it does help on reducing unnecessary expenses like on junk foods and ordering useless items online but that too would take away some fun. I have recently moved into doing my savings and don't care much about rest.

[Frankolala]

If you don't always spend beyond your budget, there's no need to track your expenses because your budget is there to show you how much you are to spend. However, there are at times that if I spend more than my budget, I have to recalculate why I spent more than that by tracking my expenses so that if it wasn't something important, I can avoid it next time.

Though, it's not every month that your expenses and monthly needs will be equal. Some months it will vary from the other due to additional unexpected expenses which is why your budget cannot give you the real picture of how much you spent that month without tracking your expenses.

[Fiatless]

Tracking your expenses is a good habit to have. Or I thought so. But I recently came across an advice where tracking expenses actually does nothing for you but rather what we should do is just set a budget for every month. No need to track every dollar spent as long as it is within the budget. What do you think? Personally I believe tracking expenses makes us mindful of what we spend the most on and what we should lessen next time. Is it necessary or no?

I don't track every amount I spend on items. I simply ensure that I spend within my budget. At the beginning of the month after collecting my pay, I ensure that all my bills are paid. Every item or service that is needed for that month would be paid for. I also have some amount set aside for miscellaneous expenses. Tracking everything you spend is okay, but it's not my style since I have mastered the skills of spending within my budget. Don't follow what people say because what works for them might not apply to you.

[Japinat]

Tracking your expenses will help you come out with the right amount of monthly budget. If you don't track whatever your expenses are, you will not know either the right amount of allocation you need to set for your budget. And you will not be aware if you are spending your money wisely, or got only wasted it on unnecessary items.

However, tracking your expenses without a solution after will leave you a headache, that's right, but if you end up setting a good amount of budget that would cater your basic needs and pay your monthly bills, then its really an effective method that you track your expenses first prior to creating a budget plan.

[Cgrexp]

Budgeting sets spending limits in every area of our lives and tracking spending shows us whether we are spending within that limit. If it is not clear how and where we are spending the money allocated in each area, unnecessary expenses are overlooked. Spending tracking is an additional awareness that shows whether it is possible to reduce spending in any area if desired.
In other words, spending tracking makes us aware and through budgeting we remain conscious and disciplined.

[Donk1]

Tracking your expenses as an individual is neither good or bad depending on the individual lifestyle. But for me I like to believe if you develop the habit of doing it you might end up becoming greedy to both yourself and the people around you. Unfortunately at times you won't be able to differentiate from what you need and what you want because you don't want to spend too much this alone can indeed make an individual feel guilty whenever they are spending.​That said for me budgeting is very good because it gives you an edge of controlling on how you spend,when you spend, and what you are spending for with no guilt.

​Overall the significance of budgeting is to help an individual to plan their financial life respectively, giving him or her a well structured view of how they make use of their money. But for tracking it's way different.I don't know for everyone but to me tracking your expenses are for mostly business men and women not for a regular individual.Why Because we often spend a lot... That's all for me...

[Mhizlove]

I prefer to set a budget instead of tracking my expenses because tracking my expenses will only give me a headache. I set an amount of money that I want to spend monthly and I multiply my weekly income by 4 to know if I can achieve it and I can. That is enough for me.

But there are some people that may overspend than they are expecting to spend, such people may want to go for the other means which is to track their monthly expenses. That does not change the fact that they can also set a budget.

From what I understand, managing money or money management depends on how it's works for each person, so because you see some people they prefer setting limits on how they spend and they will move on, and again monitoring every expenses is very stressful for these kind of people. So if the income they make can support their budget and again be disciplined when it comes to budgeting, following this method can be effective.

[Pi-network314159]

Tracking your expenses is a good habit to have. Or I thought so. But I recently came across an advice where tracking expenses actually does nothing for you but rather what we should do is just set a budget for every month. No need to track every dollar spent as long as it is within the budget. What do you think? Personally I believe tracking expenses makes us mindful of what we spend the most on and what we should lessen next time. Is it necessary or no?

how can someone track expenses when they have no budget? before a person will track his expenses, he or she might have set a budget and working towards this budget. when you are now over spending above your budget then you track your expenses to know where the fault is coming from. but if you dont have budget, you cant track any expenses since you dont have budget. it is as easy as that.

[AbuBhakar]

Maybe you shouldn't spend more than you really need. Budgeting is up to the person how they do it, so if you are more generous with money, you can overspend, but if you don't have enough money, you need to list your expenses so that you don't overspend.

If you still don't have enough even though you have used all your money, you need to find other sources of income. Don't try to fit in what you know you can't fit in; just try harder so that, instead of just having enough, you still have some savings.

[lionheart78]

Is not setting a budget also track expenses?  Look, if we set a budget, we list the items and bills where we put our money into.

I think they are both important.  Tracking expenses can help us see where the money was spent.  This is very important to people who want to audit their expenses and see where the problem is when they feel that they overspent.  It also helps to identify differences in item prices and can help us to modify our budgeting to a more effective one.

[Fortify]

Tracking your expenses is a good habit to have. Or I thought so. But I recently came across an advice where tracking expenses actually does nothing for you but rather what we should do is just set a budget for every month. No need to track every dollar spent as long as it is within the budget. What do you think? Personally I believe tracking expenses makes us mindful of what we spend the most on and what we should lessen next time. Is it necessary or no?

Being able to actually follow a budget is key as well, because it's all well putting it down into a spreadsheet/on paper but if you only follow it roughly then you can find yourself leaking cash all over the place. It is so easy for lots of little expenses or extravagant spending to wipe out any reserve you might have in a budget. If you are really wanting to grow your wealth then tracking spending is great, but you should also be considering how you can grow your income on the other side of the equation. It's also good to review your budget every so often, because it's easy to keep adding stuff on but you might want to cut back subscriptions every so often or have a break from them if you've used all the content.

[icebar]

Tracking your expenses is a good habit to have. Or I thought so. But I recently came across an advice where tracking expenses actually does nothing for you but rather what we should do is just set a budget for every month. No need to track every dollar spent as long as it is within the budget. What do you think? Personally I believe tracking expenses makes us mindful of what we spend the most on and what we should lessen next time. Is it necessary or no?

You have to buy what you need. There is no point in tracking those expenses a several times. You have to buy. But it is true that if you can set a specific budget, then you can focus on that budget instead of tracking separately. If your budget is over, then you have to stop at that time. Tracking is not a bad idea for those who have a tendency to overspend. Because they buy randomly and later may face financial problems for those purchases. A budget can protect a person from the tendency to overspend. Those who do not budget have to face financial problems constantly.