My 5th week is when I try to eat from our food storage. That way things get some rotation, and I get some practice using it, so if a need arose I knew what to cook!
This does open up options for additional line items in the Groceries category as well. I shop Costco for my meats and bulk foods roughly every two months. A line item for Costco, targeting $800 every 8 weeks, or $100 per week to stock it, would be easy to track.
I love this, great idea! I too purchase my meats and bulk foods/toiletries at Costco once a month and just lump everything into "groceries" category, might try your idea for a month or two and see how it works out!
I loved this video! Groceries are the most challenging expense to plan in YNAB. I have a 4th method to share. We go shopping every Friday. I created a ‘Grocery Holding’ category and a ‘Groceries’ category. When we assign money from a paycheck, we assign it to ‘Grocery Holding’ which has a weekly target. Every Friday, I move a week’s worth of $ from ‘Grocery Holding’ to ‘Groceries’. This way we can see how much is left each week. We only spend $ from ‘Groceries’, and this helps us to see how much we have left each week. Hannah, keep the grocery tips coming!
Wow!! Thanks, Hannah, for a great video and for the shout-out for my grocery category method! I felt like a YNAB celebrity for a second! 😂 I sent the video link to my daughter, who is a new YNAB user, and she LOVED your method. She said she's already made the adjustment in her budget, which she's rockin' by the way (proud Momma moment!). Thanks again for all of your videos!
Woo hoo!! Thank YOU! But SOS-here I was assuming Chris was a man, and I said "he" and "his" the whole video!! I'M SO SORRY! Thank you so much for your amazing tips that leveled up this video, and soon to level up my own budget too! And way to go, mama!! I'm also proud of your daughter 😂 Hope she finds her flow with YNAB! 🌻 Hannah
We use the last method after hearing about how you do groceries with 4 breakdown date ranges, we did this, plus also split up auto gasoline, and charity the same ways. 4 breakdowns for each of these, for the 1st-8th, 9th-16th, 17th-24th, 25th-31st (I prefer 8-day periods up front, and then a shorter 7-day week on a 31st or 6-day week for a 30-day month... or February is even sweeter with 4-day final week). This helps us pace our grocery, gas, and charity spending throughout the money and don't "run out" too fast. This works much better than trying to see the little line dividers that breakdown if someone has weekly targets; at least for us. Whatever works for others. We "hide" the grocery/gas/charity for the weeks we are not on in our Focused View, and this keeps it from getting too crowded.
I think of the Weekly Traget a little differently. I get paid on the last Friday of the month, so, my Weekly groceries target is set for Friday, not because I shop on Fridays, but because thats what I can spend until the next Friday. Hope that makes sense 😎
Tip: Make sure you're going through your receipt after grocery shopping and split categories if you need to. It's not uncommon to have "Household supplies" or "Health/Beauty" items in your cart at the same time as your groceries.
Absolutely! I had a grocery store transaction with SIX SPLITS the other day: personal care, fun + outings, my fun money, alcohol, holiday shenangians, and groceries (22nd-31st). It was WILD. 🌻 Hannah
For me, I just have a Groceries & Household category that includes cleaning supplies, health & beauty items, etc. Still have to do splits for Gifts/Clothing/etc., but works well for me to combine the normal household and bathroom stuff with groceries.
I was dreading this until recently but now we're setting up a split for out "Groceries & Household" category - Food, Hospitality, small children's stuff... it's the last 1000€ /m "black hole" that's left for us - gonna tackle it someday 😅 (like... now)
I did the backtrack on this! Used to do the weekly split out but after a while it felt like I was wasting time doing too much moving money back and forth between weeks. Went back to general groceries category and it's been a breeze. Thought I was all fancy making it complicated but there's something to be said for keeping it simple!
Thanks, Hannah! I didn’t understand the appeal of the weekly categories, but after this video I can see how weekly over- or under-spending could be helpful to know at a glance! I love seeing all the different ways people use YNAB 😄
So interesting, thanks for the video! I've been using one monthly grocery budget, but I think I might divide the month into 3 parts: 1st-10th, 11th-20th and 21st-31st, so the intervals are more equal (for most months, at least). This way I can hopefully balance the expenses more equally and not run out of money towards the end of the month, but I feel like four/five weekly categories are too granular for me.
Ahhhh!! Why have I never thought of that before?! Because I'd also like to MINIMIZE how much I go to the grocery story, so this method could also help me have a LARGER grocery budget for LESS trips, which sounds way more appealing. Let me know how it goes!! 🌻 Hannah
We have followed the Dave Ramsey method for almost 18 years. Started Dave Ramsey in 2006 and started YNAB in 2007. Since groceries used to be one of our challenges, we budget monthly for groceries and put cash into an envelope for the entire month. We only spend what is in the envelope. We can always take from another category but we rarely do. It works great once you’re a month ahead on income. I just budget for the month then go to the bank and withdraw the money.
I have multiple lines that I want to track my food spending in. The grocery store, eating out, Costco, and also a hot lunch at school for my kid, my spouse’s coffee subscription service and our annual farm share that’s due in March. I have a grocery category and under that I have a “grocery holding” budget line with a target for 250$/week. This is used to feed into “Groceries”, “eating out” and “Costco” (which is for the food portion of Costco only, clothing and household stuff gets split into separate budget lines). Now, when I spend at any of these 3 locations, I wham from the “Grocery holding” category. Some weeks we spend more at the grocery store and some weeks we eat out more and I don’t really care as long as we stick within the 250$/week. The other food budget lines get assigned according to individual targets.
Great video! I loved using the week 1-4 for a while, but did not love it when it came to looking at reports/reflect section to see total grocery spending % and trends - it was not my fav to add up all the averages. So I went back to having it in one category and love that we can now set weekly targets!
Ahhhh! That makes sense. I've never actually been one to really use the Reflect section as much as I could, but I could see how that would feel more tedious than helpful. Good thing to consider! 🌻 Hannah
I do a Wednesday shop and use a weekly grocery target, but I also have an extra category "Bulk Groceries". Any leftover money goes in "Bulk Groceries", and any grocery overspending is covered from there. When I get enough in "Bulk" then I usually do a meat shop at the butcher that I can freeze into smaller portions and it's cheaper than buying meat from the supermarket.
I know a few people at work that do this too! I should've included that idea! I don't utilize a Costco or Sam's Club or any kind of bulk food store since we don't have any in my town, but I imagine this would help prevent a lot of misleading "overspending." Thanks for sharing! 🌻 Hannah
I'm gonna give this a try. Never hurts to change up the budget and it's easy enough to go back to how I used to do it if I don't like it. I shop every Saturday or Sunday so not sure if I should go by date or week as the name though.
Really intrigued by both yours and Chris' methods! I could see this coming in handy for a lot of the weekly-ish variable expenses like dining out, gas, etc, since for a lot of us we don't always know when we might need to make a grocery run throughout the week, instead of on a set day. Or like for us we may go to a general merch store like a Meijer/Target on a Saturday, Aldi on Sunday, etc.
I choose option 4. Which is option 1 minus creating a target I just have 500$ typed next to the word groceries in my category title. Voila! when I get paid I know that’s my “goal” 500$. Super minimalist. Super simple! I always have the same option of moving $ around if I fall short. All the other options-so extra. lol.
Yes!! This sounds a little like a retro YNAB method!! I used to type my category amounts within the category title before they were included in targets. You go, girl! 🌻 Hannah
Great video! Really made me think about how to reorganize to find out why I was always over budget. I already have Groceries and Household separated. Household was always under budget and groceries was always over budget. Since we live out in the country far from any towns and cities I don't have a regular shop day. I decided to make a New category group called Groceries and household (may change later to something more creative), then I added categories: household, grocery stores, and Costco. I will watch closely for a few months and see if this helps!
Ooooh! Smart! Honestly, I love getting more granular with the spending plan. In my eyes, the more categories, the granularity! The more granularity, the more clarity! 🌻 Hannah
This was a great video! I think I'm going to try it for both my groceries and my spending money. That built in awareness throughout the month, means I'll have to be more intentional in making choices that my future self will appreciate, understand, or straight up regret. Thanks for sharing! 🙂
Oooooh, weekly categories for fun money?! Never even thought of that... I don't know if my spending habits could properly apply that (*girl who spent all her fun money in the first three days of july*), but that could sure help me at least get a clearer picture of HOW QUICKLY I'm spending it. Maybe encourage me to pull on the reins a little bit 😂 🌻 Hannah
Can you do a video on adding a separate budget in a foreign currency? I'm planning to retire abroad and will then have bank accounts in the UK, in the Philippines and an account like Wise. My brain is scrambled trying to figure out how to do my budgeting!! I love YNAB. Thanks.
Great video. But I wonder about deleting the Grocery category and creating a Grocery group. What happened to the Grocery category history. Was that information lost with the deletion? Maybe that's a feature request. The ability to promote a category to a category group.
When I used a monthly grocery target, I was always short in the longer months…so I went to weekly, which is great and easy in YNAB. But now I’m wondering if my groceries need to get Hannah-fied!
Quick question: Do you have separate categories for cosmetics, daily use products like cleaning supply, toilettes paper, tooth brushes or do you also put it under groceries? Right now I have it under groceries, but looking for better overview, but also not interested to check the bill each time to calculate out what was cosmetics etc. Any tipps or ideas? And - loved the video! Super helpful!
Do almost what Chris does but it's not Grocery money, it's Allowance money. I sit down every Friday, snooze the appropriate Allowance category and distribute the money mostly between groceries, toiletries and work cafeteria money and the rest can go whereever my targets say it should go. It's like having a mini pay-day at the start of every weekend!
Great ideas to revamp your groceries. I think ima KISS (Keep it Simple Sis). Old/New to YNAB AND budgeting. However, I think I will apply this to curb my eating out spending 🤔
Nice!! Definitely an interesting way to handle it. I have a question though: does anyone else struggle with grocery pickup orders being a moving target when trying to input your own spending before it has cleared at the bank? I realize they put a large hold on things to account for the items that get weighed at check out. But then I get an email receipt when I pick things up, and if I put that number in my YNAB budget it doesn't ever seem to match what ends up clearing. What gives? Anyone else?
Wait, Are you referring to the shopping at Walmart and using the "Capital One - Walmart Credit Card" posting delay that drives you/me absolutely crazy?
@@jjxtwo1 I don't have that credit card, but I think we have the same problem! If I can manage to only shop once a week (🙃😅) then the true total has usually posted by the time I go again... but that is not always practical!
@@yarnstead I have done some of this, I just often get confused later when I am trying to reconcile and I have to find which of the "Walmarts" is the wrong one 😆 Maybe I need to put a note on them that that one is probably wrong 😅😂
This is where split transactions are gold! If it's food then it goes in groceries. Cleaning supplies or toiletries going in Household. Clothing goes in, well, clothing. Tires goes in auto maintenance. Where things are purchased isn't as important to the budget as which category the item fits in.
Great question! Calling all Costco gurus!! We don't have one here, so I don't deal with this, but I know a lot of people fund a "Bulk Grocery" category monthly that rolls over when it's not spent but doesn't make a massive dent to your regular groceries category. Because Costco could absolutely tank your groceries category for the month, for sure! 🌻 Hannah
Minions and wee beasties has me rolling 😂 but I'm the same! "Household goods" for toiler paper, paper towels, dish washing soap, laundry detergent, aluminum foil, all that. "Personal items" for shampoo, toothpaste, feminine care products, the like. Totally saves my groceries category! 🌻 Hannah
I like the idea of getting clarity with a few more categories - but: how do you work this Groceries categories in regards to "when did I buy this" and "when does it go through with my bank"? I usually manually enter the transaction already when I'm leaving the store or soon at least with todays date; later when YNAB imports from my bank & matches the transaction I change the date to the date on my bank statement (so I don't get confused if there is a reconciliation-hangup later)?
GREAT question! I enter the transactions manually after I get home from the store (just like you), but when those transactions roll in from the bank and they link up to my manually entered transaction, I actually keep the date *I* entered instead of switching it to the date the bank records it as. This way, I can know when *I* actually bought it, and as long as the cleared/uncleared status of each transaction is correct, I can pretty easily deduce which bank dates match up to my manually entered transactions from the proximity and the matching transaction totals. When I reconcile, since my bank transactions vs YNAB transactions are always a little jumbled up and out of order, I tend to look to matching inflows/outflows first and dates second, if I have two similar totals around the same time or something. I hope this helped! Had a hard time knowing how to word this 😂 🌻 Hannah
I get paid twice a month so my target is monthly. I just budget half the target each paycheck. If i have leftover when I get my second paycheck then that’s extra money for groceries At the end of the month
I'm testing out handling groceries Hannah's way for this month and see how it goes. I noticed one thing though. At like 7:07, where it shows "Fully Spent" for 1st-7th, it is not doing that for me. I allocate $75 for that timeframe and didn't spend the full amount for the first 7 days of August. When I move what is left somewhere else, it tells me I need that amount by the 7th instead of "Fully Spent" as in the video and I did follow the video on setting this up, so I don't know what to do.
Yes! Since you moved leftover money out of that category, YNAB thinks you need to "re-meet" the target and is prompting you to put more in there. If you don't want it to do this, click on the 1st-7th category and toggle the "snooze" on for the target! This will turn the target off for the rest of the month and should go back to a plain old green category (or gray, since all the money was spent out of the category). Hope this helped! 🌻 Hannah
Hmmmm... that is a great question that I did not actually think about. One way around this is to create all your new weekly groceries categories in your new groceries category group FIRST, and then delete the old groceries afterward. When you do, you can choose to rehome all your old grocery categories to one of your new weekly grocery categories. However, this will reflect a little wonkily in reports, and I don't believe there's a way to disperse one category's-worth of transactions out among multiple categories. 🤔 If you're a die hard user of reports, this will through your groceries spending trends off, putting ALL past groceries transactions in one category. But if you're like me and you don't pay much attention to them, you'll be fine 😂 🌻 Hannah
Awesome video as always Hannah, i currently use weekly because me and my partner fund groceries from his friday paycheck ($100 every week) and i then do a grocery order every Saturday. Something i struggle with in this is those stubborn sundries, since i never took the time to truly track what I actually spend monthly on the random household stuff, im unsure what target to make (also im indecisive as ever so fresh start is super frequent so i dont have any past trends and its hard to track when all my statements say is "Walmart") is there any advice you or any commenters have to get a handle on tracking these tiny misc transactions better, for someone who doesnt have much data? Thanks!
I'm a BIG TIME transaction splitter. I know a lot of people find it tedious and don't want to take the time to figure out all the various category outflows, but if I don't do this it absolutely DESTROYS my grocery budget. I have a category for Household Goods (toilet paper, paper towels, dishwashing soap, trash bags, new sponges, coffee filters, all that). I also have a category for Personal Items (shampoo, toothpaste, feminine hygiene products, bandaids, etc). If I throw anything in the cart just for fun, I'll split that out to my fun money. We have a separate category for alcohol because you're usually spending $15+ on one item, and that will tannnnk our grocery budget. We also buy espresso beans for our latte machine, and since it's such a consistent cost, we have our own espresso beans category (in my eyes, any expense that's known should have it's own category. This is the BEST for financial clarity!). But it does take work. Hold onto receipts. This is where I find the + - x / funtionality in the outflow boxes SUPER handy. I'll start a split transaction, and add all the various categories I can spot just from looking at the receipt. Then I'll go down the receipt and add up all the grocery items in the grocery outflow box in one long string (just like this: 3+4+2.5+6+4+3+3.5+5). When I eventually click away into a new box, it will complete the equation and add them all together. I do the same for all the other categories, going down the receipt and adding items up in the outflow box as one long string as I go. Usually there is some money leftover after all this (sales tax), and if I click "Save" and select "Auto Distribute", YNAB will distribute whatever money is left over based on the percentage of the grand total that category holds (aka: it will divvy out the sales tax accordingly). If you don't know how much money to allocate in these newer categories, like sundries, just start literally anywhere! I think we started with a target of $25 on each per month. We like to buy a lot of our items organic, low-tox, and sustainable, so we quickly realized $25 often doesn't cut it monthly for Personal Items or Household Goods. When you overspend, simply move money from some other lower priority category to make up for the overspending, and click into the next month and increase your target for that category a little bit. Keep this up until you eventually find your flow! We're often not buying shampoo or toothpaste or a 12pk of paper towels *every* month, so sometimes it can take a while for these "true expenses" to reveal themselves, which is why time, patience, and not sweating overspending in the meantime is key! 🌻 Hannah
Just activate the emoji keyboard! I'll link an article that shows you how to do it for Mac, PC, iOS, or Android! support.ynab.com/en_us/how-to-use-emoji-in-your-budget-SJTNIyQAc 🌻 Hannah
@Hannas Fun Money Problem: "Fun Money Budget" my wife & I actually have our own bank accounts just for our fun money AND she & I both have a separate fun money budget in YNAB. This way when I'm thinking about an unhealthy drive-through breakfast at the yellow M I'm not spending from random "unassigned" fun money but I see at a glance: no money assigned to this in my fun money, do I really want to take 10 bucks out of my 400€ Goal "Challenger Breadpan"?! Hell no! 😆
1. First I looked up a Challenger Breadpan. WOW! Fancy pantsy. 2. This makes a lot of sense! Then also my husband can't judge me for how many times I go to Sonic when I'm solo parenting the baby boy 😂 We're actually finally about to COMBINE our bank accounts after three years of having separate accounts but a shared spending plan in YNAB, so we're actually doing the opposite of this 😂 We *do* each have our own Fun Money category groups though, so that helps us do the same thing you do, just no privacy! 🤪 🌻 Hannah
I have no idea how a person can exist on $100 week groceries??? Or 3 on $150? Maybe I live in the wrong part of the country! I do have a ridiculous special diet, is that it? And before you ask, yes I meal plan, stick to my grocery list and cook from scratch (the special diet forces me!)
Asking again, as I have for a few years now, for YNAB to start supporting Australian bank syncing. By now, I'm at the point of no longer recommending friends and family to use this and even considering leaving YNAB if you guys dont have plans to add Australian banks within the next 6-12 months.
@@carolinewick9496 i've been manually doing my transactions already, I'd prefer to use sync to make my life easier, we have multiple accounts with frequent transactions, sync would make things ALOT easier. YNAB however seems completely uninterested in supporting us Aussies
Imo, it's better not to sync. Manually adding the transactions means I don't always need to wait for the bank to clear them and I'm way more conscious and aware of my spending.
@@stan4620 That's fair enough. I've just received confirmation however that YNAB has no interest in supporting Australian banks in the next 12 months. So I've just signed up to PocketSmith (which does support Aussie banks, as well as supports syncing "pending" transactions and deals with them accordingly when they do clear), I'll be taking the time over the next few weeks to get myself setup there and then cancel my YNAB account, not to mention its about half the price too with quite a few more features, so that's a bonus.
While I like the syncing, if it's not an option you could always do a file import (downloaded from bank) to sync up what you enter. That would also catch any missed items.
My 5th week is when I try to eat from our food storage. That way things get some rotation, and I get some practice using it, so if a need arose I knew what to cook!
You know, this is a great idea! When there's a fifth grocery week, that can be a pantry/freezer challenge week. I love that.
Yes, very smart! Raid the Pantry Day!
🌻 Hannah
This does open up options for additional line items in the Groceries category as well. I shop Costco for my meats and bulk foods roughly every two months. A line item for Costco, targeting $800 every 8 weeks, or $100 per week to stock it, would be easy to track.
That's a good idea!
that's a great tip !
I love this, great idea! I too purchase my meats and bulk foods/toiletries at Costco once a month and just lump everything into "groceries" category, might try your idea for a month or two and see how it works out!
I might have to try this. My Costco and BJ's trips were messing up my weekly categories so I went back to monthly.
I loved this video! Groceries are the most challenging expense to plan in YNAB. I have a 4th method to share. We go shopping every Friday. I created a ‘Grocery Holding’ category and a ‘Groceries’ category. When we assign money from a paycheck, we assign it to ‘Grocery Holding’ which has a weekly target. Every Friday, I move a week’s worth of $ from ‘Grocery Holding’ to ‘Groceries’. This way we can see how much is left each week. We only spend $ from ‘Groceries’, and this helps us to see how much we have left each week.
Hannah, keep the grocery tips coming!
Ooooooh!! I love that too!! Same general idea, but way less categories. Smart!
🌻 Hannah
Wow!! Thanks, Hannah, for a great video and for the shout-out for my grocery category method! I felt like a YNAB celebrity for a second! 😂 I sent the video link to my daughter, who is a new YNAB user, and she LOVED your method. She said she's already made the adjustment in her budget, which she's rockin' by the way (proud Momma moment!). Thanks again for all of your videos!
Woo hoo!! Thank YOU! But SOS-here I was assuming Chris was a man, and I said "he" and "his" the whole video!! I'M SO SORRY! Thank you so much for your amazing tips that leveled up this video, and soon to level up my own budget too!
And way to go, mama!! I'm also proud of your daughter 😂 Hope she finds her flow with YNAB!
🌻 Hannah
We use the last method after hearing about how you do groceries with 4 breakdown date ranges, we did this, plus also split up auto gasoline, and charity the same ways. 4 breakdowns for each of these, for the 1st-8th, 9th-16th, 17th-24th, 25th-31st (I prefer 8-day periods up front, and then a shorter 7-day week on a 31st or 6-day week for a 30-day month... or February is even sweeter with 4-day final week). This helps us pace our grocery, gas, and charity spending throughout the money and don't "run out" too fast. This works much better than trying to see the little line dividers that breakdown if someone has weekly targets; at least for us. Whatever works for others. We "hide" the grocery/gas/charity for the weeks we are not on in our Focused View, and this keeps it from getting too crowded.
I think of the Weekly Traget a little differently.
I get paid on the last Friday of the month, so, my Weekly groceries target is set for Friday, not because I shop on Fridays, but because thats what I can spend until the next Friday.
Hope that makes sense 😎
Tip: Make sure you're going through your receipt after grocery shopping and split categories if you need to. It's not uncommon to have "Household supplies" or "Health/Beauty" items in your cart at the same time as your groceries.
Absolutely! I had a grocery store transaction with SIX SPLITS the other day: personal care, fun + outings, my fun money, alcohol, holiday shenangians, and groceries (22nd-31st). It was WILD.
🌻 Hannah
@@user-gm9bm5mr8y or pet food, which I track separately from my own groceries.
For me, I just have a Groceries & Household category that includes cleaning supplies, health & beauty items, etc. Still have to do splits for Gifts/Clothing/etc., but works well for me to combine the normal household and bathroom stuff with groceries.
I was dreading this until recently but now we're setting up a split for out "Groceries & Household" category - Food, Hospitality, small children's stuff... it's the last 1000€ /m "black hole" that's left for us - gonna tackle it someday 😅 (like... now)
Good thought.
I did the backtrack on this! Used to do the weekly split out but after a while it felt like I was wasting time doing too much moving money back and forth between weeks. Went back to general groceries category and it's been a breeze. Thought I was all fancy making it complicated but there's something to be said for keeping it simple!
😂 I love the good old rush over overcomplicating things. It most certainly has not taken years off of my life, absolutely not 😂🤪🫠
🌻 Hannah
I like just having "food" category that includes everything I put in my mouth during whole month.
Wow, more power to ya! I know a few people who do this and I couldn't live without that granularity 😅 But you got it, do you!
🌻 Hannah
Thanks, Hannah! I didn’t understand the appeal of the weekly categories, but after this video I can see how weekly over- or under-spending could be helpful to know at a glance! I love seeing all the different ways people use YNAB 😄
So interesting, thanks for the video! I've been using one monthly grocery budget, but I think I might divide the month into 3 parts: 1st-10th, 11th-20th and 21st-31st, so the intervals are more equal (for most months, at least). This way I can hopefully balance the expenses more equally and not run out of money towards the end of the month, but I feel like four/five weekly categories are too granular for me.
Ahhhh!! Why have I never thought of that before?! Because I'd also like to MINIMIZE how much I go to the grocery story, so this method could also help me have a LARGER grocery budget for LESS trips, which sounds way more appealing. Let me know how it goes!!
🌻 Hannah
We have followed the Dave Ramsey method for almost 18 years. Started Dave Ramsey in 2006 and started YNAB in 2007. Since groceries used to be one of our challenges, we budget monthly for groceries and put cash into an envelope for the entire month. We only spend what is in the envelope. We can always take from another category but we rarely do. It works great once you’re a month ahead on income.
I just budget for the month then go to the bank and withdraw the money.
I use Option 3A for my eating out spending. Helps me limit how often I do it
this is a great tip... why didn't I think of this!
I have multiple lines that I want to track my food spending in. The grocery store, eating out, Costco, and also a hot lunch at school for my kid, my spouse’s coffee subscription service and our annual farm share that’s due in March.
I have a grocery category and under that I have a “grocery holding” budget line with a target for 250$/week. This is used to feed into “Groceries”, “eating out” and “Costco” (which is for the food portion of Costco only, clothing and household stuff gets split into separate budget lines). Now, when I spend at any of these 3 locations, I wham from the “Grocery holding” category. Some weeks we spend more at the grocery store and some weeks we eat out more and I don’t really care as long as we stick within the 250$/week.
The other food budget lines get assigned according to individual targets.
Great video! I loved using the week 1-4 for a while, but did not love it when it came to looking at reports/reflect section to see total grocery spending % and trends - it was not my fav to add up all the averages. So I went back to having it in one category and love that we can now set weekly targets!
Ahhhh! That makes sense. I've never actually been one to really use the Reflect section as much as I could, but I could see how that would feel more tedious than helpful. Good thing to consider!
🌻 Hannah
I do a Wednesday shop and use a weekly grocery target, but I also have an extra category "Bulk Groceries".
Any leftover money goes in "Bulk Groceries", and any grocery overspending is covered from there.
When I get enough in "Bulk" then I usually do a meat shop at the butcher that I can freeze into smaller portions and it's cheaper than buying meat from the supermarket.
love this idea!
I know a few people at work that do this too! I should've included that idea! I don't utilize a Costco or Sam's Club or any kind of bulk food store since we don't have any in my town, but I imagine this would help prevent a lot of misleading "overspending." Thanks for sharing!
🌻 Hannah
I like this a lot (bulk category) - as we are reworking this for next month maybe incorporate it! :)
I'm gonna give this a try. Never hurts to change up the budget and it's easy enough to go back to how I used to do it if I don't like it. I shop every Saturday or Sunday so not sure if I should go by date or week as the name though.
Shake it up!! Summer grocery shake up!! 🎷
🌻 Hannah
Thank you! This was very helpful! You are literally my favorite CZcamsr
Aww 🥺 How kind! In no life did I ever imagine being a "youtuber," much less someone's favorite!! Honored!!
🌻 Hannah
Haha, men too, also a Hannah fangirl! ✌️😁🎉❤️
Really intrigued by both yours and Chris' methods! I could see this coming in handy for a lot of the weekly-ish variable expenses like dining out, gas, etc, since for a lot of us we don't always know when we might need to make a grocery run throughout the week, instead of on a set day. Or like for us we may go to a general merch store like a Meijer/Target on a Saturday, Aldi on Sunday, etc.
I choose option 4. Which is option 1 minus creating a target I just have 500$ typed next to the word groceries in my category title. Voila! when I get paid I know that’s my “goal” 500$. Super minimalist. Super simple! I always have the same option of moving $ around if I fall short. All the other options-so extra. lol.
Yes!! This sounds a little like a retro YNAB method!! I used to type my category amounts within the category title before they were included in targets. You go, girl!
🌻 Hannah
@@YNABofficial great video. Keep up the good work!
Great video! Really made me think about how to reorganize to find out why I was always over budget. I already have Groceries and Household separated. Household was always under budget and groceries was always over budget. Since we live out in the country far from any towns and cities I don't have a regular shop day. I decided to make a New category group called Groceries and household (may change later to something more creative), then I added categories: household, grocery stores, and Costco. I will watch closely for a few months and see if this helps!
Ooooh! Smart! Honestly, I love getting more granular with the spending plan. In my eyes, the more categories, the granularity! The more granularity, the more clarity!
🌻 Hannah
I use the weekly target type for any spending that varies proportionally per month, mostly gas and groceries.
This was a great video! I think I'm going to try it for both my groceries and my spending money. That built in awareness throughout the month, means I'll have to be more intentional in making choices that my future self will appreciate, understand, or straight up regret. Thanks for sharing! 🙂
Oooooh, weekly categories for fun money?! Never even thought of that... I don't know if my spending habits could properly apply that (*girl who spent all her fun money in the first three days of july*), but that could sure help me at least get a clearer picture of HOW QUICKLY I'm spending it. Maybe encourage me to pull on the reins a little bit 😂
🌻 Hannah
I might try this out! seems like a fun way to change things up!
🥳🍉🍇🌽
🌻 Hannah
That is exactly what I do - date ranges. Method rocks!
🤘🏻🎸👨🏻🎤
🌻 Hannah
Can you do a video on adding a separate budget in a foreign currency? I'm planning to retire abroad and will then have bank accounts in the UK, in the Philippines and an account like Wise. My brain is scrambled trying to figure out how to do my budgeting!! I love YNAB. Thanks.
Ty for the video. I just revamped my grocery budget with your method :0)
Great video. But I wonder about deleting the Grocery category and creating a Grocery group. What happened to the Grocery category history. Was that information lost with the deletion? Maybe that's a feature request. The ability to promote a category to a category group.
When I used a monthly grocery target, I was always short in the longer months…so I went to weekly, which is great and easy in YNAB. But now I’m wondering if my groceries need to get Hannah-fied!
Nice!! In my opinion, clarity can only make things better!
🌻 Hannah
Quick question: Do you have separate categories for cosmetics, daily use products like cleaning supply, toilettes paper, tooth brushes or do you also put it under groceries? Right now I have it under groceries, but looking for better overview, but also not interested to check the bill each time to calculate out what was cosmetics etc. Any tipps or ideas?
And - loved the video! Super helpful!
I surely will give it a Try ! You ( hannah) is my first introduction ever to YNAB and i always trust you :D
Hahaha!! Amazing!! I will do my best to not let you down! 😂
🌻 Hannah
Do almost what Chris does but it's not Grocery money, it's Allowance money. I sit down every Friday, snooze the appropriate Allowance category and distribute the money mostly between groceries, toiletries and work cafeteria money and the rest can go whereever my targets say it should go. It's like having a mini pay-day at the start of every weekend!
THAT'S FUN. Sounds like a good dopamine rush! 😂
🌻 Hannah
Great ideas to revamp your groceries. I think ima KISS (Keep it Simple Sis). Old/New to YNAB AND budgeting.
However, I think I will apply this to curb my eating out spending 🤔
Some like to keep it simple, some like to add 4,000 categories. I'm the second 😂 Great idea on applying this to eating out!!
🌻 Hannah
I started testing out your method, and really like it.
Woo hoo!! That's awesome!! And wow, quick implementation 🏎️
🌻 Hannah
Neat idea! I got to think on it if it will help me or not?
Loved the 🍉 emoji
The watermelon emoji is low key my favorite one.
🌻 Hannah
I would just hide the category instead of deleting it.
Nice!! Definitely an interesting way to handle it.
I have a question though: does anyone else struggle with grocery pickup orders being a moving target when trying to input your own spending before it has cleared at the bank?
I realize they put a large hold on things to account for the items that get weighed at check out. But then I get an email receipt when I pick things up, and if I put that number in my YNAB budget it doesn't ever seem to match what ends up clearing. What gives? Anyone else?
Wait, Are you referring to the shopping at Walmart and using the "Capital One - Walmart Credit Card" posting delay that drives you/me absolutely crazy?
Mine show you as pending on my credit card app. I enter all my transactions anyway so i do enter the pending amount and then adjust it when it clears.
@@jjxtwo1 I don't have that credit card, but I think we have the same problem! If I can manage to only shop once a week (🙃😅) then the true total has usually posted by the time I go again... but that is not always practical!
@@yarnstead I have done some of this, I just often get confused later when I am trying to reconcile and I have to find which of the "Walmarts" is the wrong one 😆
Maybe I need to put a note on them that that one is probably wrong 😅😂
@@lisaroper421 Exactly!
Very cool. I'm going to try this!
How/where do you plan for Costco? That place... LOL
This is where split transactions are gold! If it's food then it goes in groceries. Cleaning supplies or toiletries going in Household. Clothing goes in, well, clothing. Tires goes in auto maintenance. Where things are purchased isn't as important to the budget as which category the item fits in.
Great question! Calling all Costco gurus!! We don't have one here, so I don't deal with this, but I know a lot of people fund a "Bulk Grocery" category monthly that rolls over when it's not spent but doesn't make a massive dent to your regular groceries category. Because Costco could absolutely tank your groceries category for the month, for sure!
🌻 Hannah
FWIW I separate out household supplies and food for my wee beasties into categories of their own.
Same. My minions definitely needed their own category, and I hated using grocery dollars on non-food items, so there's sundries and household goods.
Minions and wee beasties has me rolling 😂 but I'm the same! "Household goods" for toiler paper, paper towels, dish washing soap, laundry detergent, aluminum foil, all that. "Personal items" for shampoo, toothpaste, feminine care products, the like. Totally saves my groceries category!
🌻 Hannah
I will try this! I go over so much! 😭
I like the idea of getting clarity with a few more categories - but: how do you work this Groceries categories in regards to "when did I buy this" and "when does it go through with my bank"? I usually manually enter the transaction already when I'm leaving the store or soon at least with todays date; later when YNAB imports from my bank & matches the transaction I change the date to the date on my bank statement (so I don't get confused if there is a reconciliation-hangup later)?
GREAT question! I enter the transactions manually after I get home from the store (just like you), but when those transactions roll in from the bank and they link up to my manually entered transaction, I actually keep the date *I* entered instead of switching it to the date the bank records it as. This way, I can know when *I* actually bought it, and as long as the cleared/uncleared status of each transaction is correct, I can pretty easily deduce which bank dates match up to my manually entered transactions from the proximity and the matching transaction totals.
When I reconcile, since my bank transactions vs YNAB transactions are always a little jumbled up and out of order, I tend to look to matching inflows/outflows first and dates second, if I have two similar totals around the same time or something.
I hope this helped! Had a hard time knowing how to word this 😂
🌻 Hannah
I get paid twice a month so my target is monthly. I just budget half the target each paycheck. If i have leftover when I get my second paycheck then that’s extra money for groceries At the end of the month
Nice! No one ever complained about EXTRA grocery money!!
🌻 Hannah
What happens to past transactions if I delete the grocery category I had to start a whole new category?
I'm testing out handling groceries Hannah's way for this month and see how it goes. I noticed one thing though. At like 7:07, where it shows "Fully Spent" for 1st-7th, it is not doing that for me. I allocate $75 for that timeframe and didn't spend the full amount for the first 7 days of August. When I move what is left somewhere else, it tells me I need that amount by the 7th instead of "Fully Spent" as in the video and I did follow the video on setting this up, so I don't know what to do.
Yes! Since you moved leftover money out of that category, YNAB thinks you need to "re-meet" the target and is prompting you to put more in there. If you don't want it to do this, click on the 1st-7th category and toggle the "snooze" on for the target! This will turn the target off for the rest of the month and should go back to a plain old green category (or gray, since all the money was spent out of the category). Hope this helped!
🌻 Hannah
I pay my bills from my credit card not my checking account is there a way to set it up to allocate the money from my cc?
@hannah. I want to switch to this but I can't figure out how to easily reassign my past activity in groceries. Can you explain that in a video?
Hmmmm... that is a great question that I did not actually think about. One way around this is to create all your new weekly groceries categories in your new groceries category group FIRST, and then delete the old groceries afterward. When you do, you can choose to rehome all your old grocery categories to one of your new weekly grocery categories. However, this will reflect a little wonkily in reports, and I don't believe there's a way to disperse one category's-worth of transactions out among multiple categories. 🤔 If you're a die hard user of reports, this will through your groceries spending trends off, putting ALL past groceries transactions in one category. But if you're like me and you don't pay much attention to them, you'll be fine 😂
🌻 Hannah
Awesome video as always Hannah, i currently use weekly because me and my partner fund groceries from his friday paycheck ($100 every week) and i then do a grocery order every Saturday. Something i struggle with in this is those stubborn sundries, since i never took the time to truly track what I actually spend monthly on the random household stuff, im unsure what target to make (also im indecisive as ever so fresh start is super frequent so i dont have any past trends and its hard to track when all my statements say is "Walmart") is there any advice you or any commenters have to get a handle on tracking these tiny misc transactions better, for someone who doesnt have much data? Thanks!
I'm a BIG TIME transaction splitter. I know a lot of people find it tedious and don't want to take the time to figure out all the various category outflows, but if I don't do this it absolutely DESTROYS my grocery budget.
I have a category for Household Goods (toilet paper, paper towels, dishwashing soap, trash bags, new sponges, coffee filters, all that).
I also have a category for Personal Items (shampoo, toothpaste, feminine hygiene products, bandaids, etc).
If I throw anything in the cart just for fun, I'll split that out to my fun money. We have a separate category for alcohol because you're usually spending $15+ on one item, and that will tannnnk our grocery budget. We also buy espresso beans for our latte machine, and since it's such a consistent cost, we have our own espresso beans category (in my eyes, any expense that's known should have it's own category. This is the BEST for financial clarity!).
But it does take work. Hold onto receipts. This is where I find the + - x / funtionality in the outflow boxes SUPER handy. I'll start a split transaction, and add all the various categories I can spot just from looking at the receipt. Then I'll go down the receipt and add up all the grocery items in the grocery outflow box in one long string (just like this: 3+4+2.5+6+4+3+3.5+5). When I eventually click away into a new box, it will complete the equation and add them all together. I do the same for all the other categories, going down the receipt and adding items up in the outflow box as one long string as I go. Usually there is some money leftover after all this (sales tax), and if I click "Save" and select "Auto Distribute", YNAB will distribute whatever money is left over based on the percentage of the grand total that category holds (aka: it will divvy out the sales tax accordingly).
If you don't know how much money to allocate in these newer categories, like sundries, just start literally anywhere! I think we started with a target of $25 on each per month. We like to buy a lot of our items organic, low-tox, and sustainable, so we quickly realized $25 often doesn't cut it monthly for Personal Items or Household Goods. When you overspend, simply move money from some other lower priority category to make up for the overspending, and click into the next month and increase your target for that category a little bit. Keep this up until you eventually find your flow! We're often not buying shampoo or toothpaste or a 12pk of paper towels *every* month, so sometimes it can take a while for these "true expenses" to reveal themselves, which is why time, patience, and not sweating overspending in the meantime is key!
🌻 Hannah
How did you put the veggies on there? I don’t see a way to do it
Just activate the emoji keyboard! I'll link an article that shows you how to do it for Mac, PC, iOS, or Android!
support.ynab.com/en_us/how-to-use-emoji-in-your-budget-SJTNIyQAc
🌻 Hannah
@@YNABofficial that was very helpful. Thank you!
@Hannas Fun Money Problem: "Fun Money Budget" my wife & I actually have our own bank accounts just for our fun money AND she & I both have a separate fun money budget in YNAB. This way when I'm thinking about an unhealthy drive-through breakfast at the yellow M I'm not spending from random "unassigned" fun money but I see at a glance: no money assigned to this in my fun money, do I really want to take 10 bucks out of my 400€ Goal "Challenger Breadpan"?! Hell no! 😆
1. First I looked up a Challenger Breadpan. WOW! Fancy pantsy.
2. This makes a lot of sense! Then also my husband can't judge me for how many times I go to Sonic when I'm solo parenting the baby boy 😂
We're actually finally about to COMBINE our bank accounts after three years of having separate accounts but a shared spending plan in YNAB, so we're actually doing the opposite of this 😂 We *do* each have our own Fun Money category groups though, so that helps us do the same thing you do, just no privacy! 🤪
🌻 Hannah
This is pretty cool
I have no idea how a person can exist on $100 week groceries??? Or 3 on $150? Maybe I live in the wrong part of the country! I do have a ridiculous special diet, is that it? And before you ask, yes I meal plan, stick to my grocery list and cook from scratch (the special diet forces me!)
Asking again, as I have for a few years now, for YNAB to start supporting Australian bank syncing. By now, I'm at the point of no longer recommending friends and family to use this and even considering leaving YNAB if you guys dont have plans to add Australian banks within the next 6-12 months.
You don't need to sync your accounts. You can just manually reconcile every few days. That's what I do...
@@carolinewick9496 i've been manually doing my transactions already, I'd prefer to use sync to make my life easier, we have multiple accounts with frequent transactions, sync would make things ALOT easier. YNAB however seems completely uninterested in supporting us Aussies
Imo, it's better not to sync. Manually adding the transactions means I don't always need to wait for the bank to clear them and I'm way more conscious and aware of my spending.
@@stan4620 That's fair enough. I've just received confirmation however that YNAB has no interest in supporting Australian banks in the next 12 months. So I've just signed up to PocketSmith (which does support Aussie banks, as well as supports syncing "pending" transactions and deals with them accordingly when they do clear), I'll be taking the time over the next few weeks to get myself setup there and then cancel my YNAB account, not to mention its about half the price too with quite a few more features, so that's a bonus.
While I like the syncing, if it's not an option you could always do a file import (downloaded from bank) to sync up what you enter. That would also catch any missed items.
I am a 3b type of girl 😂🎉
3️⃣🅱️ 🤘🏻
🌻 Hannah
Your hand movements are REALLY distracting rather than helping
Consider me a wild child 😌
🌻 Hannah