With the rising cost of everyday items today, creating a family budget plan is becoming increasingly important to keep track of where your family’s money is going. Making your money work for you is the ultimate goal of any budget, but be patient if you’ve never budgeted before.

Most financial problems, both personal and family, are the result of poor budgeting skills or not following your budget. This is true for people in all income ranges. If you want financial freedom, you must be able to keep track of your assets and liabilities and your income and expenses.

The fact is that people of all income levels have the same struggles with money. People who make thousands of dollars per paycheck can have the same financial problems as those who make only a thousand dollars per paycheck. The problem is not the amount of money one earns at work; it’s their behavior with their money once they receive that paycheck. And the financial behavior of most people is very poor.

A family budget plan is nothing more than a cash flow plan. A plan for your money. We make plans for everything else, from where we’re going on vacation to house plans, but we rarely make a plan for our money. And if there’s no plan, then your money doesn’t know what it’s supposed to do, other than spend it on things.

A good budget, once you become familiar with it, which can take about three months, should take into account all of your family’s income and expenses. There must be a balance between the income and expense side of the equation. If not, it’s time to start finding areas to trim. As you work your budget over time, you should free up enough money so you can start making allocations for savings and retirement accounts.

The first step in any family budget plan is to write down your total monthly income and your total monthly expenses on a piece of paper. When you list your expenses, be sure to include everything from the largest payment to the smallest expense. Subtract expenses from income and see if there is anything left over. If not, you can start looking at the expense column and start weeding out unnecessary items that cost money that could be better used elsewhere.

If you have money left over, you need to seriously consider where this money should go. If you have debts like credit cards or car payments, it’s wise to put some or all of this money toward paying them off. If you don’t have extra debt, start saving and investing. In a short time you will have a good nest of savings built that will ensure the future of your family.

If you’re having trouble staying within your family budget plan, here are four quick tips that can help you reach your goals.

1. Keep a log book or ledger where you can list your income and expenses on a daily or weekly basis. One of the hardest things for most people is keeping track of their daily money habits.

2. When shopping for groceries, make a list before you go and buy all your groceries at once. Make sure you stick to your list and don’t buy things that aren’t on it.

3. Do not go to the store if you do not need to buy necessary items. Impulse buying is the budget’s worst enemy.

4. If you are tempted to buy something, think about it before you make that purchase. For large items over $300 or more, take a day to think about it. Chances are you don’t really need whatever it is.