How do you track your finances?

Organgrinder

Alnat1 said:

Badly = me?. I have no spreadsheet. I don't have pension pots, spending pots, multiple savings accounts. I don't need to keep recalculating and jiggling money around. I just spend on what I fancy, when I feel like it.

From reading these threads it appears to me the more money you have, the more time you spend doing "maths" and the more you worry that you won't have enough 

Each unto their own. They say attitudes towards money are mostly developed in childhood. For me, that meant we never had much. We certainly could never spend on what we fancied. As my Dad said when I said I had my eye on a new bike....."you can have your eye on it, but you won't be getting your backside on it".

(I never had a new bike by the way - we couldn't afford them).

Doing the maths for me, takes minutes. If it means I can buy something I'd otherwise not be able to afford then great.

dreaming

Organgrinder said:

Alnat1 said:

Badly = me?. I have no spreadsheet. I don't have pension pots, spending pots, multiple savings accounts. I don't need to keep recalculating and jiggling money around. I just spend on what I fancy, when I feel like it.

From reading these threads it appears to me the more money you have, the more time you spend doing "maths" and the more you worry that you won't have enough 

Each unto their own. They say attitudes towards money are mostly developed in childhood. For me, that meant we never had much. We certainly could never spend on what we fancied. As my Dad said when I said I had my eye on a new bike....."you can have your eye on it, but you won't be getting your backside on it".

(I never had a new bike by the way - we couldn't afford them).

Doing the maths for me, takes minutes. If it means I can buy something I'd otherwise not be able to afford then great.

I often wonder where "attitudes towards money" come from. I come from a poorish background, and being the youngest of 3 rarely had anything new. My August birthday presents were often things for the coming school year, and Christmas also sa a lot of useful presents such as pyjamas, slippers, etc., although we did all get 1 main present each. My brother (the eldest) worked hard to build his own business and is fairly well-off now and lives according to his means with several holidays a year (both UK and abroad), and he loves really good clothes and wines. My sister was absolutely terrible with money, and lived paycheck to paycheck on her just-about minimum wage job until she sadly died with not a penny to her name. For me, after a bit of a false start by marrying a man who didn't seem to understand that the money in the bank was for bills and not for treating your friends to a curry after a Friday night out on the town, control is the key. I was fortunate to have a well-paid job (in finance) and after my divorce I put everything into paying off my mortgage early and then topping up pension contributions. I'm retired now and possibly better-off than I have ever been but I still keep my spreadsheets and various bank accounts and credit cards in order. It doesn't take more than a couple of hours a month as it quite streamlined and my outgoings tend to be quite routine now, although I do have a "mad-money" savings pot for the occasional splurge. My brother thinks I worry about money too much. I think I just like to control where my money is going so that I don't have to worry about it all the time as I did when I was much younger.