The first thing that you need to do is create a new worksheet. While you can create your budget any way that best fits your needs, creating a few tables may be the easiest. To do this, follow the below instructions.
1. Open a new worksheet.
2. Right click on Sheet 1 at the bottom, and click rename.
3. Rename your worksheet.
4. Select the number of cells (the squares on the sheet) that you need to create the adequate number of spaces to put your information into.
5. Go to the Insert Tab at the top.
6. Go the Tables group, and click Table.
7. Or, you may press CTRL+L or CTRL+T for shortcuts.
I would break your spreadsheet into three tables: Income, Fixed Expenses/Bills and Other Expenses. Some of the fixed expenses will not always be the same each month so you will have to estimate how much those variable bills are.
In each table, break it into four columns and however many rows that you need in order to fit in all your expenses. For example, you will want a row for each of these things: rent/mortgage, electricity, Internet, and so on.
Let's take the Fixed Expenses table as an example. You will write Fixed Expenses/Bills in the first column, first row of this table. The second column, first row will be what you have budgeted for this item (Budget). The third column, first row will be what you actually spent (Actual). The fourth column, first row will be the difference between the two sums.
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In this way, you can keep track of how well you are staying on budget. You can set up your negative numbers to always appear in red by using conditional formatting under your cell options.
