Your first ten minutes
Start here
Five short steps take you from an empty app to a working budget: a journal, your accounts, your opening balance, a first purchase and a plan for the month.
You don’t need to set up everything today. Start with your main bank account and the things you spend on most; you can add more at any time. When you open Balanced for the first time, small tips point at each step: Your first Journal, Add your Accounts and Record Transactions.
1. Create a journal
Section titled “1. Create a journal”A journal holds everything that belongs together: accounts, transactions and budget. One for your household is a good start.
- In Journals, tap ＋ New Journal in the bottom bar. With no journals yet, you can also tap Create Journal in the middle of the screen.
- Type a name, such as “Household”. Currency starts with your device’s currency; tap it if the journal should use another one (Journal currency). Then tap Save (✓).
- Tap the new journal to open it.
2. Add your accounts
Section titled “2. Add your accounts”Accounts are where money sits, comes from and goes to. Each one has one of five types:
| Type | Start with |
|---|---|
| Assets | Checking, Cash |
| Income | Salary |
| Expenses | Groceries, Rent, Fun: one for each thing you want to budget for |
| Equity | Opening balances |
| Liabilities | A credit card or loan, if you have one |
- In the journal, tap Edit next to Accounts.
- Open a type, such as Assets, and tap Add account.
- Give the account a name, and if you like an emoji and a color, then save. Repeat for each account in the table.
Choose the type with care: you can’t change it later. If an account ends up with the wrong type, create a new one with the right type.
3. Record your opening balance
Section titled “3. Record your opening balance”Your checking account already has money in it. Tell Balanced how much with one transaction from Opening balances into Checking.
- Tap ＋ New Transaction and write a Note, such as “Opening balance”.
- Under Accounts, tap Choose Account, pick Checking and type what your bank shows today, say €1,200.
- Pick Opening balances for the second line and leave its amount empty. Balanced fills in −1,200.
- Turn on Cleared, since the money is already in your bank, and save.
- Assets:Checking
- +1,200.00
- Equity:Opening balances
- −1,200.00
- Balanced
- 0.00 ✓
This €1,200 now counts as money you can budget. Do the same for your cash and any other account that already holds money.
4. Record a transaction
Section titled “4. Record a transaction”You’ve just spent €42.80 at the supermarket. That money moves from Checking to Groceries.
- Tap ＋ New Transaction and write “Supermarket” as the Note. The Date is already set to now.
- Pick Groceries and type 42.80.
- Pick Checking and leave the amount empty. Balanced fills in −42.80, so the transaction adds up to zero, and you can save.
- Expenses:Groceries
- +42.80
- Assets:Checking
- −42.80
- Balanced
- 0.00 ✓
A plus means money arrives in an account, a minus means it leaves. Save only works once the amounts add up to zero. Leave Cleared off until the purchase shows up on your bank statement.
5. Make your first budget
Section titled “5. Make your first budget”Once the month has a transaction, the Budget section appears at the top of the journal. Now decide what your €1,200 is for.
- Tap Adjust in the Budget section.
- Tap a category’s amount and type how much it gets this month.
- Watch To assign shrink. Give Fun the last €150, and when it reaches 0, confetti falls. 🎉
If you assign more than you have, Overassigned appears instead. Lower an amount until it’s gone.
Next steps
Section titled “Next steps”- When your salary arrives, record it from Salary into Checking and turn on Cleared. Only cleared income counts as money to assign.
- Understand what’s going on underneath in the Concepts chapter.
- Learn the monthly routine in Budgeting each month.
- Save typing with Scanning receipts.