Songgun's Personal Finance System
Household Budget
A practical expense-tracking system built for college students — clean categories, auto-calculations, and a learning habit every month.
Philosophy
Why This System?
Most budget apps are too complex — or too simple.
Your Own Labels
Label spending your way — not how an app decides — so you can see exactly where money goes.
Learn Every Month
Month-over-month % makes it instantly clear: "Dining out jumped 24% this month."
Food Deep-Dive
Track groceries, dining, and luxury food separately — then compute cost per day, per meal, and your dining-to-cooking ratio.
Balance Runway
Automatically compute when your balance runs out, based on current balance and monthly average spend.
Structure
Workbook Layout
The workbook has three types of sheets.
Overview dashboard
One tab per month
Right: auto-calculated stats panel
New month starter
Categories
Unified Category System
10 categories standardized to the February 2026 format.
| Category | Korean (가계부) | Examples | Note |
|---|---|---|---|
| Necessities | 생필품 | Detergent, laundry, haircut, batteries… | SUMIF |
| Groceries | 식재료 | Rice, chicken, eggs, Costco runs… | SUMIF |
| Supplements | 보조제 | Multivitamins, EAA, omega-3, creatine… | SUMIF |
| Transport | 교통비 | Taxi, train, Uber, bike repairs… | SUMIF |
| Dining Out | 외식 | Restaurants, delivery, cafes, fast food… | SUMIF |
| Luxury Food | 사치 음식 | Monster, chocolate, donuts, soda… | Feb 2026+ |
| Luxuries | 사치품 | Golf, whisky, cleats, contact lenses… | SUMIF |
| Travel | 여행 | Flights, accommodation, travel transport… | Nov 2025+ |
| Self-Development | 자기개발비 | Books, API credits, laptop, Remarkable… | Dec 2025+ |
| Other | 기타 | Subscriptions, misc… | Auto-calculated |
💡 Other is auto-computed as Total − sum of the 9 named categories, so any new label you add is automatically caught without touching the formulas.
Stats Panel
The Auto-Calculation Panel
Enter transactions and all numbers update instantly.
via SUMIF
Key Formula Examples
💡 Put the previous month's sheet name in $H$2 and all MoM formulas update automatically. When copying a sheet for a new month, only this one cell needs changing.
How to Use
Starting a New Month
3 steps to start a new month — no formula rewriting.
Copy Any Existing Month Tab
Right-click e.g. the "Feb 2026" tab → Move or Copy → tick Create a copy → OK.
Rename & Update 3 Yellow Cells
Rename the tab to Mar 2026. Then update only the yellow (blue-text) cells:
- H2 — Previous month's sheet name:
Feb 2026 - H23 — Active days in the month:
31 - H31 — Current bank balance
Clear Old Transactions & Start Entering
Select and delete old data in columns A–D. Column E (running total) uses formulas — leave it alone. Enter new transactions and the stats panel updates instantly.
Cell Color Coding
Tips
Insights for Spending Less
Lessons learned from using this system.
Dining-to-Cooking Ratio ≤ 1
If dining-out cost ≤ grocery cost, ratio ≤ 1. This single number diagnoses your food habit instantly.
Track Luxury Food Separately
Lumping Monster drinks into "supplements" hides the cost. Separating it out is always a revelation.
Set a Daily Food Goal
Set a $15/day food goal and you instantly know when a $25 dinner blows the week's budget.
Isolate Travel Months
Separating travel lets you see your true baseline living cost in non-travel months.
Try It Yourself
Download the template and customize the categories to fit your lifestyle. All formulas still work.