With everything, I find the more organized I am, the less stressed I am. My finances are no exception. So, I decided to make a “financial binder”. The nerdy, Type A person in me is LOVING it! In general, I am pretty organized. I’ve talked about the fact that even though we are in debt, we have never missed or been late on a bill. I’m a credit card company’s dream customer. I always pay (at least) the minimum payment and I always pay it on time.

I created a binder to keep everything together and in order. I scoured Pinterest to find different budget forms I would need then I created them to my own preferences. By making it myself, as opposed to buying someone else’s premade Budget Binder, I was able to use only the forms I wanted and make them in a way that would be most beneficial to me! I picked fonts I liked. I set the forms up the way I liked. It’s all mine… and I love it!

I decided on 5 different dividers for my financial binder: Budgeting, Debt, Savings, Goal Setting, and Planning. I used a regular 2 inch binder and colorful dividers. Many of the pages are in plastic sleeves, but the pages that are accessed and written on regularly are just hole-punched and put in the binder. In the front of the binder, I have a pencil pouch that holds pens, pencils, highlighters, and post-it notes.

My “Budgeting” divider holds:

a list of our monthly recurring expenses with a check-off sheet for each month

a budget categories list that lists everything we budget for in a month

blank calendars for each month of the year to be used as bill payment calendars

completed monthly budget sheets for each month of the year (I only print out 3 months at a time to leave a little room for change. However, our wages are very predictable.)

My “Debt” divider holds:

a debt worksheet where all my debts (including my mortgage) are listed

debt payoff charts where I fill in squares with the amount of debt paid off each month (each one is $2000 of debt erased!)

My “Savings” divider holds:

sinking fund trackers for each of my sinking funds

savings charts (I currently have two savings goals)

increase our emergency fund savings to $3000

repay $2000 to a savings account we have set aside for possibly moving

no spend challenge calendars to track how many no spend days I have a month

My “Goal Setting” divider holds:

a monthly goal check-in where I put my goals for the month (be they personal or financial) and can track my progress

an immediate goal (to be accomplished in 30 days or less)

a short-term goal (to be accomplished in 3-6 months)

a long-term goal (to be accomplished in 1-2 years)

My “Planning” divider holds:

bank account information

credit card information

a charitable donations tracker

a Christmas list

It’s such a little thing, but it actually makes me excited to pay bills and track my spending and saving. It’s fun coloring in the squares on my savings chart and my debt pay-off tracker. And anything that makes paying bills fun is a win in my book!