You Need a Budget

Publisher's Summary

For most people, budgeting conjures up the same feelings as, say, prison and dieting. But your initial instinct couldn't be further from the truth. You just haven't budgeted the right way.

You Need a Budget will teach you four simple rules to completely revolutionize the way you think about managing your money. With a budget, you'll break the paycheck-to-paycheck cycle, get out of debt, and save more money. A liberating, enabling, empowering budget will actually make you feel more free, not more restricted. The YNAB philosophy is centered around these four rules:

• Give every dollar a job. Take your cash, checking, and saving accounts and assign jobs to that money. Begin now with what you have on hand. Then follow your plan. Pick your priorities, and make sure your dollars are helping you move closer to the things you care about most.
• Embrace your true expenses. Look ahead and identify the larger, less frequent expenses that tend to sneak up on you. Break those expenses into manageable monthly amounts. Consider insurance premiums, birthdays, holidays, charitable giving, car repairs, etc. This practice evens out your cash outflows, decreases your stress, and helps you make better decisions.
• Roll with the punches. Accept the fact that life always changes and you'll likely always go over budget somewhere. If an unexpected expense comes up and you need to change your budget, just change it. The YNAB philosophy not only tolerates changing your budget but encourages it.
• Age your money. The goal of this rule is to increase the time between the moment you earn money and the moment you spend that money. In other words, if you're going to break the paycheck-to-paycheck cycle, you need to learn to live on money you earned a month or two months or even three months ago.

YNAB's four rules are the pillars of a tried-and-true system that gets you to engage with your money every day. It helps you change your behavior so that you're proactive and in control of your finances. It's not about stressing over last month's statement; instead, you're looking ahead and actively deciding how you want and need to build a life of meaning, not stress.

PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying reference material will be available in your Library section along with the audio.

©2017 YNAB Licensing LLC (P)2017 HarperCollins Publishers

Beginning Budgeter

Great book and concept. I’ve never budgeted before, but have now started. Amazing how you can quickly change your priorities once you see where you money is currently going and where you want it to go

38 of 40 people found this review helpful

Worth the preorder

As a long time fan of the method I purchased a copy on audible, kindle, and two hardcover to give away. It was well worth the read as Jesse continues to effectively extol the flexibility and possibility of the four rules to budgeting. My wife and I enjoyed listening to this on a trip and especially appreciated that it is read by the author who is a fairly well spoken narrator. I strongly recommend this to both long time fans and newbies alike. It gave us new inspiration and even explained an excellent alternative to the traditional emergency fund which my wife and found especially useful.

52 of 56 people found this review helpful

Encouraging, focuses on goals and dreams

I'm in a stage of my life when I'm needing to assess my short and long term goals. I had a sense that money comes into this but wow, this book made me realize that by really embracing my budget, I can pursue my goals more effectively. I feel so much more hopeful!

And no guilt in the book... he talks about people who choose travel over college savings or to increase their grocery budget rather than cut their spending. It all comes down to making conscious decisions about your money rather than blindly wandering through life.

15 of 16 people found this review helpful

This book is awesome!

If your parents never taught you how to budget your money and/or you are living paycheck to paycheck, you need to read this book. Jesse explains how to set up a budget & what it really means to budget; it's not what you think.

This book should be core curriculum in every school to teach children & young adults how to handle finances, debt, and plan for future expenses and retirement.

I am sharing this book with all my kids and grandkids.

12 of 13 people found this review helpful

Best book about how to tackel your finances

Such a great book about your finances with motivating storey and proven rules.

Its done in such a non scary way too.

Made me so motivated

17 of 19 people found this review helpful

Making my husband read or listen to this book

This is so helpful and practical - I have been married for 13 years and we have never had a budget. We do not live paycheck to paycheck but I know we spend money that we do not need to simply because we never had a good system to keep track of it. I also love the part of the book where it talks about how to train your kids on managing money. I am going to get the software and check out all the free resources they talk about at the end of the book.

4 of 4 people found this review helpful

Great Book! Great Principles! Highly recommend!

So many great principles. Narrator was excellent. I recommend this book for veteran and rookie budgeters alike.

3 of 3 people found this review helpful

Awesome advice delivered in a great package

Simple steps to achieve your financial goals in an easy to follow format - just perfect!

11 of 13 people found this review helpful

We ALL Need A Budget!!

This is a great way to look at spending our money. It not only teaches you (& spouse) how to budget... but how to teach your children! Invaluable!!!

6 of 7 people found this review helpful

Just an ad for the YNAB App.

I had to stop listening due to the constant referrals to the authors app, YNAB. The advice seems to be sound, but could be summed up in a blog post. The rest of the book just tries to sell the app, which is not free.

8 of 10 people found this review helpful

Great budgeting book

This is a superb book. Whether you are looking for a starter book to help you manage your money or whether you are a seasoned budgeter this book will help, inspire and guide you. The best thing about Jesse is he is non-judgemental and down to earth. He knows that everyone if different so he doesn’t give you didactic rules but more principles you can adapt to your unique situation. I would thoroughly recommend. I wish this book had been written (and I had read it!) 10 years ago. Goodness knows what my bank balance would look like now if I had!

4 of 4 people found this review helpful

Good book and helpful.

It's a good guide and has some general information which is particularly helpful and will change the lives of people that really struggle with budgeting .

2 of 2 people found this review helpful

Great book!

This book will change your life and your finances. YNAB is an amazing budgeting system but it's also so much more. You won't regret buying it!

1 of 1 people found this review helpful

I love the simplicity of this method <br />

I have been listening and watching Jesse on YouTube (whiteboard Wednesdays) and recently the podcasts I did the free trial a couple of years ago and I was sold but when it came time to buy it I didn't press the trigger not until a year later (last October) I live in the UK and I think it is fantastic and you would think that after listening and watching all his other free resources there would be nothing else to learn/gain from the audio book but you would be wrong. I am going to get the book version of this as soon as it is available in the UK for my 15 year old. I am a total budget convert and a YNABer. Thank you Jesse for the tools to get back in control of my money. Keep up the good work.

1 of 1 people found this review helpful

No PDF available, just the audiobook.

This audiobook contains valuable advice as to budgeting etc. But it is a big disappointment that there is no available PDF book. What you get is just a four pages with simple illustrations. I know that the author has written a full version of the audiobook and I wrongly assumed that this would be available. Completely lost my taste for YNAB.