Creating Formulas

Introduction

This section reviews fundamental skills for entering formulas into an Excel worksheet to construct a personal cash budget. Most financial advisors recommend all households construct and maintain a personal budget to achieve and maintain strong financial health. You can practice organizing and maintaining a personal budget at any point. Whether managing your expenses during college or maintaining the finances of a family of four, a personal budget can be a vital tool when making financial decisions. Excel can make managing your money a fun and rewarding exercise.

Figure 1 shows the completed workbook that will be demonstrated in this chapter. Notice that this workbook contains four worksheets. The first worksheet, Budget Summary, contains formulas that utilize or reference the data in the other three worksheets. As a result, the Budget Summary worksheet serves as an overview of the data that was entered and calculated in the other three worksheets of the workbook.

Image of a completed Personal Cash Budget Workbook in the Budget Summary tab

Figure 1 Completed Personal Cash Budget Workbook

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