Set up your budget

In Your Numbers, envelopes are categories, and you don't need them in cash. In fact, it's not even important where they are, be it cash or distributed in 3 bank accounts.

So let's see how we would do this in Your Numbers.

Add your accounts

The first thing to do is to replicate into the app all the accounts you have in your bank (+ a "Cash" account if you use cash).

Savings in particular can take different forms as you might have them in a your normal account or in some other form.

The main ways to track your savings are:

• An off-budget account: An account that is there only for visibility, but those euros do not play a part in the budget.
• Categories in the bugdet: You savings euros belong to your budget, that is, they have a job assigned in one or many "Savings" categories, and you really don't care in which account they are right now.

Some people have all their savings in off-budget accounts, some in in-budget accounts and categories, and some use both ways. You can use any strategy you like to manage your savings, but as a general rule: it's easier to move long term savings to an off-budget account, and short/mid term to a in-budget account.

Once you decided how to manage your savings, you just click "Add Account" in the side bar to add all your accounts.

See more info about Local and Linked accounts.

All this money you are adding for the first time will go to the Starting Balances category.

Start budgeting

Now it's time to create your envelopes categories (You can delete all or just modify the predefined categories). You should create all the categories that belong to your budget (all the jobs you euros will have), and set an amount to each of the categories. The first month, this is what you plan/think you are going to spend on that category that month, or even later in the future.

For example you could have the following categories:

• Rent: €1000
  • You know it's going to be that fix amount
• Electricity: €50
  • If you know you have to pay €100 every two months, then each month you would accoumulate €50 each month, to make it easier for you in the future
• Groceries: €200
  • Goes around that number. You will see with the time if it really is around that number or not.

Savings
If you manage you savings in an in-budget account, your savings should also get one/many categories with their respective amounts.

Once you created all your categories and set an amount to all of them, the To Budget number should be 0. That means, every euro has now a job.

This

Must become this

If that is not the case, you either set more money than you have in you budget, or you have some "unemployed" euros.