Money has never been anything I had to worry about growing up. And it’s not that I came from a wealthy family, I was just fortunate enough to have two parents who were really smart with their income and expenses. My college tuition was always paid in full. My car payment was taken care of every month. Everything was always handled for me. At least until I graduated from college, got a job, and moved out on on my own. Even then, I continued living as if I were still living at home. I never really paid attention to my expenses just as long as I had a roof over my head and clothes on my back.

Of course you could imagine how long that lasted. Eventually after paying off all my bills I was left with, well, just enough to make it to the next paycheck. Any unplanned expenses threw me for a loop. There have been some times when I’ve really had to squeeze pennies in order to even buy groceries.

Well, I’ve grown really tired of that.

Long term goal: I’d like to be able to pay off my credit cards, and live comfortably on what I’m making while building up a savings account.

It’s a lofty goal, and one that’s not going to happen overnight. But you have to be able to take baby steps first before you can run a marathon, right?

July’s Goal: To track all income and expenses.

I figure this goal is easy enough. It’s actually something I’ve tried getting into the habit of but never succeeded because I could never really find a method that worked for me. I tried saving all my receipts and setting aside a day or two during the week where I would do nothing but take a look at my finances. That didn’t work because I often lose receipts. Not even something like Quicken could help me because I couldn’t log my purchase immediately after I make it.

Right now I’m evaluating the spreadsheet in Google Docs as well as Pear Budget. The only thing with Google Docs is you have to build your spreadsheet so if you’re not spreadsheet savvy, more than likely this will be a frustrating option for you (btw, there’s a fantastic post here about setting up a form to enter transaction data). Pear Budget seems to be pretty easy to setup, but it does come with a price tag ($3 per month). Right now Google Docs is the more attractive option because, well, it’s free of course. Who will win?