The Wallet Method

Stop running short before payday, without tracking every dollar.

Each week you get a set amount of spending money, your weekly adult allowance. You decide how to spend it: groceries, eating out, coffee, fun. When it's gone, it's gone until refill day. Works even if your pay goes up and down.

The Wallet Method: one weekly adult allowance, no tracking every dollar. For steady pay, commission, side gigs and self-employed.

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What you get

The Wallet Method picture book54 pages that walk you through the whole method with real-life examples. Quick and fun to read.
The workbookFor Excel or Google Sheets. 9 tabs. Fill in the yellow boxes and it does the math for you.
How-To Guide12 pages, one for each tab of the workbook.
Start HereWhat to open first, and in what order.

How it works

Pay yourself first. On payday, at least 10% goes to savings before anything else.
Cover your bills. Everything that comes out on its own, set up once.
Get one weekly adult allowance: a set amount of spending money for everything else, like groceries, eating out, coffee and fun. It refills the same day every week.

When the wallet is empty, it's empty until refill day.

Three steps: pay yourself first, cover your bills, get one weekly adult allowance.

If your pay goes up and down

Commission, tips, bonuses, side gigs, self-employed: most budgets assume the same paycheck every two weeks. The Wallet Method has a whole chapter and a workbook tab for this. All your pay goes into a pot, and you pay yourself a steady salary from it. Big months fill the pot, slow months draw from it, and your weekly adult allowance stays the same.

Pay yourself a steady salary: big months fill the pot, slow months draw from it.

Also inside

Jars for the costs that wreck budgets: gifts, clothing, haircuts
Two wallets for couples, so you stop fighting about money
How to find money in your bills
A plan for your first four weeks

The workbook: fill the yellow boxes and it does the math. Works in Excel and Google Sheets.

Who made it

I'm Steve. I worked at two of Canada's big banks, then spent more than ten years as a mortgage broker, going through people's bank and credit card statements at their kitchen tables. A lot of them said the same thing: "I had no idea." This is the method I showed them, and the one I ran myself.

Steve, Calgary, Alberta

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Questions? Message me on Etsy. A real person answers.

Want to try the idea first?

The free Wallet Method app works out your weekly adult allowance on your phone. No bank login, no account.

Try the free app

Good to know

This is a digital download. Nothing will be shipped.
The workbook opens in Microsoft Excel or Google Sheets (free with a Google account). It's easiest on a computer. The PDFs open on any phone, tablet or computer.
No bank login. You type your own numbers.
Amounts are in dollars and the examples use US accounts, but the method works anywhere.