The Rachel Cruze Show - Everything You Need to Know About Budgeting in 11 Minutes

Episode Date: March 20, 2026

💵 Start your free budget today. Download the EveryDollar app!   The biggest mistake people make with their money is not having a plan. So today, I’m going to share the most common excuses I hear when it comes to budgeting and give you the five-step plan you need to start building wealth. Next Steps:  🎥 Watch my video Top 4 Budget Categories We All Neglect. 📈 Are you on track with the Baby Steps? Get a free personalized plan.   Connect With Our Sponsors: Learn more about Christian Healthcare Ministries. Get 20% off when you join DeleteMe. Go to FAIRWINDS Credit Union for an exclusive account bundle!   Explore More From Ramsey Network: 🍸 Smart Money Happy Hour 🎙️ The Ramsey Show  💸 The Ramsey Show Highlights 🧠 The Dr. John Delony Show 💰 George Kamel 🪑 Front Row Seat with Ken Coleman 📈 EntreLeadership   Ramsey Solutions Privacy Policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The biggest mistake that people make with their money is not having a plan. So today, we are going to fix that in five simple steps. Be sure to like, subscribe, and show this episode with a friend. All right, first of all, remember that your income is your largest wealth building tool. Okay? Most people for most of their lives will have some form of cash flow coming in on a consistent basis, right? That you are working, you are making an income, and that's how you're living your life. But if you are not intentional with your income, you are losing money because you're either wasting it, you're not investing it because you don't have a plan. You're not using it to pay off debt. Like you're not using it to create a not only financial foundation under you,

but also to continue to build wealth in the future. So taking on additional part-time work or even a side hustle sometimes is a great option if you need to increase the amount of money that you need coming in every month, especially if you're tackling big goals, like getting out of debt or saving up for an emergency fund. So how can we use our income to really maximize potential in our money? Well, the answer is a monthly budget. And I'm so sorry. There's a part of me of wishes this was not the case because, I mean, personally, my, like, my natural knee-bent reaction to life is not, like, great of details. I kind of just want to enjoy the moment. That's why I was always hesitant with the because it just felt like boring and a lot of numbers. But there's also a lot of common budgeting

questions and excuses that I hear from you guys. So here are the top three. Number one, what if I have an inconsistent income? Because when you budget, you're budgeting your income and what if it looks different every single month? Well, for a lot of people, this is true. So when you're figuring out your budget, you have to figure out your income. And if it is variable, then you want to be able to say, like, hey, here is my guess. Like, here's what I'm looking ahead at the month and whether you're in sales or you're at 1099, like, whatever it looks like, you can just kind of say, okay, here's my guesstimates on what I think I'm going to make this month. And here's the deal. That's going to change. When you get paid on the 15th, if you get paid

on 15th or every week, you may have to adjust your budget up or down. And sometimes you're going to do better some months than you planned or not so good. I usually tend to err on the lower side because I would rather feel good about myself. And more income has come in than I planned. I'm like, oh, that's much easier to budget than having to cut things out. So there's something you kind of figuring out, okay, here's the rhythm and seasonality of your job. Remember that. But having an income at the top of the budget is really important. So again, it's kind of this guesstimate. You might kind of guess, you might kind of estimate, but you can still budget even if you have an inconsistent income. Number two, I've tried and I'm just not good at budgeting.

It just doesn't work for me. Okay. This happens all the time. And especially the first month, like, if you've never budgeted before and you, like, sketch out a budget and you try to live on it that month, you're going to realize life is not only more expensive in certain areas than you realize, but you also don't realize where you've been spending your money. Like, if you've never budgeted before, you're thinking, oh, gosh, I never even thought about, you know, sports signups for the kids or the monthly lunch I go out, you know, with my girlfriends.

Or like, whatever the thing is that you have in your rhythms, sometimes you don't even realize that there is a rhythm that costs money until you're actually aware of it. So that first month you're doing a budget, it's going to probably be a disaster. And that's okay. But that's the problem is most people give up right then. And I actually will tell you to give it three months. Give it 90 days. Have three budget cycles.

And then you actually start to get in a rhythm and a pattern to see that, okay, this is what works for me. Another mistake people make when they say that a budget doesn't work for them is the line item of the miscellaneous category. Okay. So that is a big thing. Put that in there because if you're like, I'm not good at budgeting, it's usually because stuff comes up too that you didn't plan for. So that miscellaneous category is going to be so helpful. All right. The third thing that I hear a lot when it comes to having a hard time budgeting is that my spouse isn't on board or my spouse and I, you know, don't work together when it comes to money or we have

separate accounts. So how do you budget a household if one spouse is on board and not the other? Well, this is common as well. I mean, money fights and money problems. It's a real thing in marriage. And so understanding and getting above just my spouse won't budget with me, getting above that and seeing your marriage and the picture at which you are living in and understanding like, okay, am I satisfied with that? Because when you do budget together, what you're saying is, hey, we are a team and we're going to choose to do life together. We're going to choose to lock arms and we're going to tackle these big issues in life together. We're going to tackle them differently because we're two different people and all the opinions matter in the room. but the way that we approach it, we are going to see each other as a team. When that's your mindset in marriage, then money naturally, not that you're not going to have

fights or issues, but naturally falls under that umbrella. And so I would say if you and your spouse cannot get on the same page when it comes to money or your spouse isn't hearing you with what you're desiring when it comes to money of budgeting or getting out of debt, you know, not only can you just have that conversation and try to sit down, explain just the emotions behind it and all of it for a lot of of people, they end up bringing a third party in. And it sounds kind of extreme, but honestly, like going to marriage therapy is a lot because that therapist will dig way deeper into, you think it's budgeting and it's not. There's so much in there, so much in there of who we are

as people. And it's just maybe coming out in this one area. So I would sit down, explain to your spouse, your why, your desire, paint a picture of what you want it to look like. And again, And if it continues to be an issue, just like any other issue in marriage, I would seek out a third party. Now, it turns out that a budget doesn't limit your spending, and it does give you permission to spend and freedom to spend. So here is how you can do this if you are a total beginner, because again, I am all about a good budget. So number one is you want to list your income. So we just talked about this if you have an inconsistent income, but any regular paycheck, side hustles, if you receive child support, or any kind of passive income during the month that hits your account, that is considered income.

Now, we've used every dollar in our house for years, and it's recently been revamped to actually give you a more personalized experience, which is awesome, and it can actually act more like a coach that guides you through every part of the plan. So if you want to check it out, I'll leave a link down below

so you can get started on every dollar. But the income is number one. Put that at the top. Number two, you're going to list out all of your expenses. So you're going to say, giving, saving, and spending, the three main areas of life. And so those three buckets underneath are going to have different categories and you want to be able to prioritize them.

So really with your spending, food, utilities, shelter, transportation, those four things, you guys are what we call your four walls. These are essential. And then next will be essentials like insurance, child care. If you have debt, making sure you don't get behind on debt payments. And then, of course, there's the non-essentials, you know, fund money, subscriptions, entertainment, all of that. Now, once you map out all of your expenses, and there's going to be a ton in there, you're going to put a dollar amount next to each of those categories. Now, you can go back to last month's bank statement and just see, okay, what were we spending on food at restaurants or groceries or how much does insurance cost if we pay it once a quarter or whatever it looks like? But there is something to have a reality check of what's going on, but don't get bogged down with the numbers.

Like if it's stressing you out, just guesstimate. Again, just say, here's what I think we spend in every expense. Now, I do a expense for me. I have a line item for Rachel. We have a line item for Winston. And then Winston, I now have put line items for each of the kids because stuff comes up with them. And I'm like, here's your line item.

Here's the amount of money that's allotted to every month. Like if they have school lunches or different things, like it comes out of that little line item, which is great. It just keeps this organized. So a lot of line items. You can take some out if they're already in every dollar and you don't need those line items and you can add too. So prioritization, though, is key.

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Again, that's join delete me.com slash Rachel. All right, number three in your budget. So you got your income, you got all your line items and your expenses. The next is to subtract those numbers. Subtract your income minus your expenses, and it should equal zero. And again, you have savings in there. You have a miscellaneous category in there. There's a lot built into that budget.

But the key here is that every dollar has a name. Now, a zero-based budget does not mean $0 in your bank account, okay? So we're not trying to get your bank account to zero until your next paycheck. No, no, no. You want some buffer in that. But again, every dollar has a job. So when you open up your budget through the month, you can see here's my income and here is where it is going.

Now, if you have a negative number, don't panic, but that means you either need to up your income or take some expenses down. If you have a leftover money in it, I would say do something with that. Like, again, because if you don't do anything with it, no plan, it's probably going to just disappear. So whether you use it to pay off debt, if that margin's there and you want to bump up some stuff in lifestyle, whatever it looks like, again, there's something to be said about just being intentional with it. All right, number four is to track your expenses all month long. So, again, the easiest way to do this is with the Ever Dollar app because it attaches to your bank account, which is great. But tracking your transactions helps you stay on budget because you know what is in each category.

So my grocery line item, when I go grocery shopping and my little transaction comes in the app, I drag and drop it to groceries. And I do that. And then I get to see how much is left in groceries that we've planned for the month. So it's one thing to make the budget. It's another thing to stick to it. And tracking transactions makes it real. Number five, keep making a new budget every single month.

So you will copy and paste if you're using every dollar or Excel or whatever you're using. Copy and pasting is fine because a lot of your expenses, will be consistent month to month. But there's also going to be things that you're going to want to adjust. If you're traveling, if there's holidays, anniversaries, back to school, like whatever is happening within your budget and within your life, that needs to be reflected. And so month to month, it's going to change. So you're going to put some things in this month that you're going to take out for next month and so on and so forth. But again, being able to know what is going on in your life is going to help you with your budgets. Okay, that was a lot, you guys. But that is like

the basics. That's the basics of budgeting, which is so powerful. And again, it's going to take a little bit to get in the habit, get in the rhythm of it, but this is such an important part of your money. Now, there are some things that you can still learn about budgeting even beyond this video. So check on my episode, the top four budget categories we all neglect coming up. You can click right there or if you're listening on podcasts, I'll leave a link below. All right, you guys, remember to take control of your money and create a life you love.