Hi. I’m trying to make sense of the three columns: BUDGET, ACTUAL, AVAILABLE in the INCOME section of the Monthly Budget View tab.
For expenses, I may have the following:
EXPENSE
BUDGET
ACTUAL
AVAILABLE
Books
$25
$18
$7
Electric
$150
$165
-$15
These make sense to me. I spent $7 less than budgeted for books this period and $15 more than planned for electricity.
For income:
INCOME
BUDGET
ACTUAL
AVAILABLE
Pay
$3000
$3000
$0
Interest
$500
$200
-$300
In this case, what does AVAILABLE actually mean? I budgeted for a $3000 paycheck, I was paid $3000, and now available is zero? It feels like the available should be $3000.
In the interest case, I expected (budgeted) $500 but only got $200. Shouldn’t the available be $200 and not -$300? It feels like I have $200.
I know I’m thinking of this wrong. It is a common problem for me. I’d appreciate it if someone could help me understand what the INCOME section of the Monthly Budget View is trying to tell me.
For Interest budget $500, actual $200, you currently are missing your budget by $300, so it’s negative. You need $300 more Interest to meet your budget. It’s $300 not available for spending yet.
Monthly income doesn’t typically happen all on day 1, so there will be negatives initially that go positive as the days pass. It seems kinda strange, because I think we’re more used to expense budgets that might (but hopefully not) go negative later in the month.
Hi Mark. November is over and I’m spending a little time understanding the outcome.
Specifically for the pay, I budgeted $3000. I got $3000. Then shouldn’t $3000 be available? This is where I’m getting confused. Why is there nothing available?
Maybe I’m hung up on the colum name AVAILABLE. In the pay example, available for what?
Yeah, “available” isn’t the most intuitive label. Think of it perhaps as “unfulfilled budget.” If you’ve realized all your budgeted income in a month, then there is $0 left unfulfilled. For a spending category, if you haven’t yet spent the budgeted amount in a month, then that amount is left as unfulfilled budget. Maybe that helps?
It is more confusing to think of AVAILABLE budget for income.
It’s what budget is “available” wrt your budgeted amount.
With $0 AVAILABLE, there isn’t more/less income available wrt your budgeted amount.
With say $200 AVAILABLE, there is more income available wrt your budgeted amount.
With say -$100 AVAILABLE, there is less income available wrt your budgeted amount.
AVAILABLE is a relative delta.
You’re just thinking of it as the ACTUAL income available - look at ACTUAL for that
I can work with that. In spending, and in expense I guess, if AVAILABLE is zero then my expenses or income are what I predicted for the month. That works for me. Thanks!
