Monthly Budget Starter — Free Zero-Based Budget
A free zero-based monthly budget template: give every dollar a job across needs, wants, savings and debt. Opens in Excel, Sheets or Numbers.
What's in it
A zero-based starter: plan income against needs, wants, savings and debt so income minus everything equals zero.
- Type, Category, Planned, Actual and Difference columns
- Income, fixed bills, sinking funds, variable spending and savings sections already laid out
- A sinking-funds block for the bills that don't arrive monthly
- Plain CSV — no macros, no embedded formulas, safe to open anywhere
No email, no account, no redirect. The file downloads straight from this site.
| Monthly Budget Starter (zero-based) — theplannedlife.net | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Give every dollar a job: income minus all categories should equal zero. | ||||
| Type | Category | Planned | Actual | Difference |
| Income | Take-home pay | |||
| Income | Other income |
How to use it
- Open it in Excel, Google Sheets, Numbers or LibreOffice.
- Fill the Planned column before the month starts. Every dollar of income should end up in a category.
- Fill Actual as you go, and let Difference show you which category was optimistic.
- Save a copy per month so you can compare — the second month is where this starts working.
Free up money for debtPair it with the free Debt Payoff Calculator to see how extra payments shorten your timeline. Open the debt calculator →