Saving with budget book

Often enough, it’s the little things that, when bought incidentally, add up to a gaping hole in the private budget – that’s the most common realization as soon as a budget book is used: All expenses are recorded here, so that over time a clear picture of personal spending behavior emerges. At first glance, it may seem very time-consuming if every little snack or coffee in between has to be meticulously recorded. However, there are intelligent tools that can be used as a digital budget book in a very practical way and, above all, free of charge.

And there’s a lot to be said for it: If you simply record all your sales, you can create your own personal financial analysis at the touch of a finger. So you can see exactly how high your fixed and necessary costs are, how much money you spend on the side – and whether you could invest some of it.

If you use the app from wunderbon, for example, you can digitally record your receipts at the connected partner companies right away. This not only saves paper, but is also legally valid should you have a complaint or want to use the receipt for your tax return. Of course, traditional invoices can also be processed in the app; after all, as your own financial manager, you need a complete picture. You’ll find out why this is important when you read on.

Digital budget book – use free of charge via app

Hand on heart: Do you know your monthly expenses exactly? Rent, utilities, phone and Internet providers, monthly car payments – you’re probably familiar with these items. But what about the cost of living? You’re sure to be one of those people who appreciate the latest technological advances and prefer to pay without cash: Just put on your card and your purchase is made. This is contemporary, this is comfortable. But do you have the overview here? At the latest, the credit card statement or the bank statement will show whether you have enough financial leeway at all.

In retrospect, the pay envelope that was once used to pay salaries – first weekly, then monthly – in cash may have been more transparent: The money for fixed costs was taken out to pay the rent and all other necessary bills. Only what was left over could be spent. This must seem strange to you; after all, the world has changed fundamentally. Payment flows are processed digitally – in seconds and extremely conveniently. New payment methods and service providers are making online transactions in particular much easier, and cash is disappearing more and more from our daily lives. This makes it all the more important to adapt your own financial management to the new circumstances: A digital budget book is the ideal tool for this.

It is mainly the variable costs, i.e. all one-off or irregular payments, that are so difficult to plan and record. Each receipt must be kept and entered into the budget book to provide a coherent overall picture. This is troublesome and is certainly the biggest hurdle to stringent, private financial management. This is exactly where an intelligent solution, which can certainly be obtained free of charge, can help. For example, wunderbon is taking a completely new approach: partnerships with retail companies open up the possibility of obtaining the receipt digitally – so it is sent directly to your app, where items are compiled item by item. So a lot of your supposed effort takes care of itself, but that’s just the beginning.

With system to financial success

A digital budget book should be able to do a lot more. All receipts from companies that are not (yet) partners can be easily scanned – wunderbon provides a special scan function for this purpose. Then you’re ready to go: wunderbon analyzes all items in order to exploit cashback potential for you and save money. And then the “Digital Assistant” comes into play: You get a clear compilation of all costs, sorted by different areas. Of course, you can set the rules yourself, for example, to reach a certain savings goal or reduce your expenses.

The fact is that it is difficult to implement major projects without a thorough review of the cash flow. Only a thorough personal financial analysis will show you the scope that you can really exploit. First, there are some important questions to answer, such as:

• What do you spend how much money on?
  
• Are the terms of your contracts or loans even reasonable?
  
• Which positions can be optimized?

If you regularly need the overdraft facility to get through the month, you will pay immense interest on it, just as you would on a credit card balance repayable in installments. If you exceed the limit, it will be even more expensive. If you’re smart about balancing your income and expenses, you’ll actually save money on the bottom line. If you’re smart about balancing your income and expenses, you’ll actually save money on the bottom line.