YNAB Personal Budget Software & Finance Forums

[lsteps]

Actually a couple of related questions. I have just started, it was the middle of the month and I did not have a full buffer. My quarterly pest control and termite bills came in, I put the monthly budget amount in my budget and had it carry over just in that category and I will budget the same amount next month. But until I have the bill "paid off" it stays in red, do I budget but ignore that it is in red or do I need to fix it another way?

Kinda the same for my Gas bill (used Quicken lots of back data, figured out average monthly and used that number) but of course the winter months are higher and that is sitting in red. So do I change my budgeted amounts or just go with the flow?

What happens if one of those budgeted amounts is over the actual bill? Does the leftover money just appear in the starting amount for next month?

Wrapping my brain around budget vs actual and flow vs static is a challenge. Thanks for any help.

[lebdavidson2]

You can keep going on the average you figured out, but you will have to be very careful that you don't go over your total amounts available. When I was in a similar situation starting out, I budgeted more to cover what I actually spent in a month then when I got to the lighter months I figured out what I needed to budget to have enough on hand for future bigger months.

[lsteps]

Thanks for the reply. I will keep an eye on it and slowly work my way out of red.

And I found the answer to my other question....the remaining amount in a category is rolled into the next months category with out ever showing up as available to budget.