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Budget Calculators

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Welcome to the Budget category at iCalculator™ Finance. This section offers an array of calculators dedicated to all aspects of budgeting for individuals, small businesses, and corporations.

Introduction to the concept of a budget

The financial concept of budget may be very common in the modern day but, surprisingly, it is not very old when compared to other financial concepts. Most know and understand what is broadly meant by a budget and probably use the word budget frequently, that's no surprise really given that it is very common nowadays for individuals, households and business to have a budget. In fact financial industries can assess how we manage our budgets using a "credit score". Incredibly, budgeting, budget plans and budget management were not a formal or standard practice until a number of Monarchs got themselves into a little trouble by mismanaging their country's finances. It is little wonder that in modern times, budgets don't just apply to individuals and companies, they are of equal importance, if not essential for public organizations, charities and governments to run the countries.

How did modern budgeting evolve?

There are various events in history that could be attributed to the birth of the modern approach to budgeting but, the biggest catalyst for change really lays with Queen Elizabeth I. When Queen Elizabeth I inherited the throne she was also landed with a significant amount of debt, almost half of which was owed to the Anterp Exchange who applied a 14% interest rate. Although Queen Elizabeth I was particularly good at setting and working to a budget, individuals played politics and stifled a number of initiatives and, as such, her reign ended without the true financial reform needed. It was not until over 200 years later that the version of an annual budget we know now was introduced (18th century). As an interesting aside - the actual word budget was derived from the word "Bougette" which used to be a wallet like object that was used to keep money or documents.

Modern Day budgets

These days, we don't just think of a budget as a simple piece of paper that states what we plan to spend, we see a budget as a financial plan that allows us to make effective decisions that ensure our domestic finances run smoothly or run a profitable business. Most governments around the world issue an annual budget, businesses set annual and quarterly budgets and leverage tools to assess the performance using "key performance indicators to keep them on track and families typically have a monthly budget to plan their monthly expenses in order to have some savings for the future.

To summarize a budget in a single sentence: A budget is a strategic plan that you produce to manage revenue, sales, costs, expenses, cash flows, assets, liabilities and general expenditure. In another sense a budget is an amount of money that is allocated to a project in order to run the project and meet the defined targets of profit or other kinds of results.

Creating and Sticking to a budget

Creating a good, workable budget can really reduce the financial stresses of modern life and allow for those unexpected events which, if not catered for, can lead us into debt. As we elaborated on above, there are budgets for all walks of life, the key thing is to understand the relative advantages of different budgeting techniques and approaches for each situation. With this in mind, we have highlighted some of the more popular budget calculators and scenarios with a view to improving your knowledge of different budget factors and supporting your creation of your own budget, whether as a student, homeowner, business owner or project manager.

Personal budget

Have you ever had a plan to save money from your income? Sometimes a bit of planning can go a long way for you in securing a financially independent future. A personal budget is a plan you make that involves running your expenses in a way that you fulfill all your needs and are still left with some money to spare.

A personal budget could be for you alone or for your entire family and household. Your budget may include day to day expenses like food, transportation, electricity, gas consumption, etc. It could be a bit of a hassle sometimes to keep track of such small things, but it is very important to do so if you want to reach the set goals.

There are many ways to make a budget, you can do it manually or make use of online tools, such as the budget calculators developed by iCalculator. These calculators are very detailed and are created keeping every detail or a common household expense in mind. Two good calculators that support this type of budgeting are:

Budgeting for Students

There are many horror stories of student debt in the media these days but studying doesn't automatically mean you need to get into significant debt. As in all walks of life, it is very important to have a budget, especially when you have a limited source of income and you have to spend on all the necessities and some leisure, of course. Student life becomes much more challenging when you are living away from your family, this makes planning finances even more important.

It would be better to plan before you make your move out of home. However, even if you are already out, you can start by making a list and allocating money according to general trends and go from there. If you need some assistance you can take advantage of a free, online calculator specifically designed for students, a good example is the student budget calculator that can be accessed with the following link:

Budget for savings and investment

Making a budget for saving and investments can really be useful for your future. A budget will help you save and investing that saved up money will help you in future when it will be time for you to retire. A lot of countries now have dedicated pension deductions which come directly from your payroll but these pensions do not always provide a standard of living that supports your retirement needs so budgeting for a private pension to make your retirement years comfortable is well worth while.

The value of your savings today will be better in future only if you invest it and get favorable returns. Otherwise, money will only lose its value in the future, the good news is thanks to the advanced accounting and finance methods, it is possible for you to access the value of your money today and review its relative value in the future.

There are many financial methods that you may use to find out these values, sure it is possible to do it manually, but the calculations can get a bit tricky sometimes, this is where the free online tools provided by iCalculator come in handy.

Some of these tools are created in the form of online calculators that are very easy to use, all you have to do is input the data and the calculators will do the calculations for you. Moreover, these calculators are placed on this page along with budget guides and supporting information. Several good calculators for budgeting for investment and understanding the future value of money are:

Budget Summary

We have briefly looked at the evolution of budgeting and touched on a few common examples of practical budgeting in the modern world. These budget examples are just a few ways of creating and managing budgets, it doesn't end here, and there are many other types of budgets that are made for specific financial planning and key performance indicators for tracking actuals verses budget. iCalculator contains a wealth of budgeting tools and information, all designed to help you create budgets for your household and business. You can find additional budget calculators below or use the search facility to find a specific budget calculator, you can also find more great budget calculators in our Finance Calculators section.