Having recently retired, I understand the importance of living within the limits of a fixed income. Leaving a job or career is daunting enough when a person also has to think about how to fill their time, stay healthy, and maintain a sense of contribution to the greater community. Therefore, it is essential to minimize financial worries through sound money management.
The first step toward managing your money is knowing exactly where the money is going. With the assistance of ChatGPT, I have created an easy-to-use expense tracker in Microsoft Excel. I am attaching the file along with an editable prompt, so anyone can use it or tailor it to their own individual needs.
The Prompt
Please create a simple Microsoft Excel household expense tracker.
The file title should be: Household Monthly Expenses
Purpose:
I want to track monthly household expenses and see totals by category and by month.
Workbook structure:
Please create one Summary sheet and one detailed monthly expense sheet for each month of the year.
Each monthly sheet should use this layout:
Column A: Category
Column B: Date
Column C: Amount
Column D: Payment Method
Column E: Notes
Please put the expense categories in Column A as fixed rows. Some categories should have subcategory rows underneath them. The parent category row should contain a formula in Column C that totals the subcategory rows.
Use these example categories:
Rent
Water
Electricity
Internet / WiFi
Phones
Gas / Cooking Fuel
Drinking Water
Groceries
Beverages / Snacks
Household Necessities
Transportation
School Tuition
School Expenses
Clothes — Total
- Adult 1
- Adult 2
- Child
Medical — Total
- Health Insurance
- Adult 1
- Adult 2
- Child
Dental / Orthodontist — Total
- Adult 1
- Adult 2
- Child
Entertainment — Total
- Eating out
- Day trips
- Miscellaneous entertainment
Subscriptions — Total
- Streaming
- Apps / Software
- Other subscriptions
Miscellaneous
Formula requirements:
The parent category rows must automatically total their subcategory rows. For example:
Clothes — Total should total Adult 1, Adult 2, and Child.
Medical — Total should total Health Insurance, Adult 1, Adult 2, and Child.
Dental / Orthodontist — Total should total Adult 1, Adult 2, and Child.
Entertainment — Total should total Eating out, Day trips, and Miscellaneous entertainment.
Subscriptions — Total should total Streaming, Apps / Software, and Other subscriptions.
The monthly total row should add only the main category rows and parent category total rows, not the subcategory rows, so there is no double-counting.
The Summary sheet should automatically pull the totals from the same fixed cells on each monthly sheet. It should show:
- Categories down the left side
- Months across the top
- Monthly totals
- Annual totals
Formatting:
Use simple, clean formatting. Do not make it too colorful. Use currency formatting for the Amount cells. Add a payment-method dropdown list with options such as Cash, Bank transfer, Credit card, Debit card, E-wallet, Check, and Other.
Please include an Instructions sheet explaining how to use the tracker and which cells contain formulas.
