How to Make a Monthly Household Budget in Excel (India)

A monthly household budget in Excel needs three things: a list of categories with a budget for each, a running record of every rupee in and out, and a monthly comparison of budget against actual. Once those are in place, you can see exactly where the money goes and how much you really save.

This guide shows how to set up the categories, record UPI, card and cash spends without double counting, read the monthly report and the 50/30/20 split, and fix the most common budgeting mistakes. A worked example for a family of four runs through it.

Step 1: Choose your categories

Keep the list short enough to use – 15 to 25 categories is plenty – and put each one in a group. The groups matter more than the categories, because they show the shape of your spending.

• Income: salary, other income (freelance, rent received), interest and dividends.
• Needs: rent or home-loan EMI, groceries, electricity and water, mobile and internet, fuel and transport, school fees, domestic help, medical, insurance premiums.
• Wants: eating out and ordering in, shopping and clothes, entertainment and OTT, travel, gifts and festivals, personal care.
• Savings & investments: SIPs, PPF or NPS, your emergency fund.
• Transfer: money moving between your own accounts.

Step 2: Set a realistic budget for each category

Don't guess. Pull three months of bank, UPI and card statements, total each category and use the average as your first budget. Then decide where to trim. Fixed costs such as rent, EMIs and school fees rarely move; the room is usually in groceries, ordering in and online shopping.

For annual or quarterly bills – health insurance, school fees paid per quarter, car insurance – divide the yearly amount by 12 and budget that every month, so the big months don't wreck the plan.

Step 3: Record every transaction with its account

Each row needs a date, a short description, the category, the account it came from or went to, and the amount. List your accounts once – for example SBI savings, an HDFC credit card, a UPI wallet and cash – with their opening balances. A credit card balance you owe is entered as a negative number.

If daily entry feels like a chore, set aside ten minutes every Sunday to add the week from your bank, UPI and card apps. The aim is a complete record, not a perfect one.

Step 4: Handle transfers and credit cards correctly

This is where most home budgets go wrong. Moving money between your own accounts is a transfer, not an expense:

• ATM withdrawal: transfer from the bank to Cash. The things you buy with that cash are the expenses.
• Wallet top-up: transfer from the bank to the wallet.
• Credit card bill payment: transfer from the bank to the card. Each card purchase was already recorded as an expense on the day you swiped, so counting the bill again would double your spending.

Worked example: a family of four

The Sharmas have one take-home salary of ₹95,000. In October they spend ₹60,869 on needs (rent ₹22,000, a quarterly school fee of ₹19,500, groceries, domestic help, bills), ₹16,478 on wants and put ₹20,000 into a SIP and PPF.

Needs come to 64% of income, wants 17% and savings 21%. They overspent by ₹2,347, so the month's savings rate drops to about 19%. The overrun is the quarterly school fee: had they budgeted ₹6,500 every month for it, October would have looked normal. Over seven months, their savings rate is about 25%.

Step 5: Read the 50/30/20 split

A common guide is about 50% of take-home pay on needs, 30% on wants and at least 20% saved. It's a starting point, not a rule – in a big city, rent alone can take 35% – but it tells you which group to work on. If needs are high, look at fixed costs at renewal time; if wants are high, set a weekly limit for ordering in and shopping.

Pay yourself first: set SIPs and PPF to go out on salary day so saving doesn't depend on what's left at the end of the month. Build an emergency fund of about six months of essential expenses before taking on new goals; the SIP calculator helps size longer goals.

A template that does the sums for you

Our free Personal Budget & Household Expense Tracker has 40 editable categories in these groups, up to 10 accounts, a monthly budget vs actual report with status, a year summary with your savings rate, and balances you can check against your statements. The Pro edition adds savings goals, a bills and EMIs checklist and a net worth statement.

Planning a loan as well? The EMI calculator shows how a new EMI would fit into the needs budget before you sign.