Your budget starts with creating spending categories. How much you budget for various items will depend on your current needs and future plans. While articles in magazines or books on financial management can help you create budget categories, a detailed record of your spending will help you determine how much to budget in those categories. Since saving is vital to long-term financial security, money advisors suggest that savings be budgeted as a fixed expense.

Here is where you write down what you think you'll be spending in the category areas. Here are some sample categories. You can change these to whatever works for you.