Wealth Plan/JARS System

 If you need assistance budgeting I recommend starting with the below strategy. I set up all the separate accounts through Ally bank as it is free and easy! 

1. watch this - https://blog.harveker.com/6-step-money-managing-system/ 
2. set up Mint.com if you haven’t already, link all your accounts, and create manual budget types for all the JARS (except necessities as this I just keep in my regular checking account) 
   1. make sure to include the total budgets for the month 
3. set up a spreadsheet with your JARS as rows and the columns as shown below
   1. ignore my percentages as I’ve modified as I have continued with this system
   2. add a row for education - I have this on my separate business budget as I can write those expenses off  
4. categorize as you go through the month - this helps you see everything you are spending on and compare it to your budget for the month 
5. around the first of the following month go back through ALL your transactions and make sure they are ALL categorized 
6. drop the amounts spent into a spreadsheet in a column to the right 

PRO TIPS 

1. the first month just categorize your spending - don’t worry about the numbers at the end of the month 
2. going forward still do all your categorization after the month ends then the next time you get paid you can do all the transfers to/from your JARS 
3. If you want/need to make a big purchase that isn’t in your monthly budget just add the available balance from your mint budget to the balance in that JAR account in your Ally account (have the app on your phone) and then you can comfortable and instantly make decisions
4. On a computer, as you are a few months in, you can auto-categorize certain purchases to start reducing the manual categorization - but ONLY do this for things that will never change - like mortgage, insurance, etc. - don’t do things like Fred Meyer because that could be necessities, long term savings for spending (a piece of furniture), etc. 
5. You can split transactions in Mint once they are in the list and not pending - for things like Fred Meyer where it’s a mix of different JARS  
6. The Bonus/Dividend is to set up column D with different percentages for additional income to allocate differently (because when you get a bonus your necessities don't magically go up as well)