I think that a key to being a successful YNABer is to set up a routine for interacting with YNAB on a regular basis. If you let transactions build up, they can easily become overwhelming. And the longer you wait to categorize a transaction the harder it is to remember what you spent money on.
That’s why I go into my budget every day. I usually do it in the morning with my coffee. And, at the risk of sounding like a huge budget nerd, I’ll share that it’s one my favorite parts of the day. It’s so satisfying (and easy) to get everything in shape and know exactly what’s going on with my money.
Today, I thought I’d outline what I do each morning, in case it helps you. Since I do it every day it takes only a few minutes. I have two budgets (one for personal, one for my organizing business), so I get to do it all twice!
Janine’s morning YNAB routine:
- Open the budget.
- Scan the left sidebar for white dots indicating that there’s something needing my attention.
- Click on each account with a white dot and categorize and/or approve any transactions that need it (they are bolded).
- Go back to the budget and assign any money that’s come in. (I always make sure my RTA is $0.00 at the end of the session.)
- Cover any overspending from other categories in my budget right then and there.
- Reconcile all my accounts. (So easy to do daily!)
YNAB has made finding overspending easier by highlighting any overspending at the top of the budget screen with a red or yellow bubble that indicates the number of overspent categories. I just click on that bubble and it shows me the overspent categories. (That bubble is red if it’s cash overspending and yellow if it’s credit overspending. If there is both cash and credit overspending, the bubble is red.)
Checking in with my budget every day keeps YNAB virtually stress-free for me. If your budget sometimes stresses you out, I heartily recommend checking in with it daily!
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