Microsoft Money

An Advanced Budget provides extra detail and helps you set more specific long-term planning goals. Although an Advanced Budget requires additional setup and management time, it also provides more in-depth analysis of where your money is going.

Money offers two other ways to help you watch over your budget. Many users like to watch their savings grow while controlling their spending, so they like the Savings and Spending Budget. Other users want a simple way to track day-to-day income and expenses, so the Essential Budget is a good choice for them. You can change which kind of budget you use at any point.

With an Advanced Budget, you can:

Create a detailed budget with categories and subcategories. This is helpful when you want to budget amounts for subcategories of related expenses, like Bills:Cellular and Bills:Electricity.

See how scheduled bills will impact your budget. Bills are closely integrated with your budget. You’ll know right away how much to budget, based on the bills you’ve scheduled.

Track irregular or custom expenses. Maybe you only make your insurance payment once a year. The Advanced Budget lets you track these types of items as well as your regular expenses.

Balance your budget. Add one-time expenses, or apply funds from categories that are under budget to help balance your budget.

Set savings goals. Save for an upcoming expense or purchase. Add your savings goals to the Advanced Budget as an incentive to save the money you need.