Module 2 | Saving

Budgeting

🤔 What does a budget do?

It lets you keep track of and better control the money you’re earning and spending.

Using a budget to allocate chunks of your income toward different things (such as essentials, savings) can also help you reach specific savings goals.


Budgeting isn’t all about restricting yourself from spending money that can make you happy. Instead, it helps you save a portion of your income for future you, while giving you the peace of mind of being able to spend (or save!) the rest however you'd like.

To make a budget, you can follow our 3-step guide or download a budgeting app on your phone that helps you quickly get the big-picture on your spending.

Your budget can be as simple as you like - in fact, creating one only involves 3 steps! Click on the drop-down menu to see more.


Write down how much you need to save, and by when you need to save it by. For example, your goal could be to...

★ Save 20% of my income to pay for my university fees
★ Save $1000 for my emergency fund in 6 months”

★ Essential spending is things like rent, bills, debt: stuff you don’t have a choice in spending money on. You can also split essential spending further into fixed (costs that don't change, such as rent) and variable (costs that do change, such as food).

★ Non-essential are things you could do without: takeaways, online shopping. Depending on your goal, you might want to see if you cut down on a few of these.

★ For example, say I earn $200 a week working a part-time job, and my goal is to save for a $900 emergency fund in 6 months. I need to save $150 per month, or $38 per week.

★ Or, you could budget your money so that a percentage of your money goes towards each spending category. The “50/30/20” rule is a popular one that's worth thinking about.