Rating: 
Summary: A first-rate household tool
Review: After using the third edition of The Budget Kit, I anxiously awaited the 4th edition and was not disappointed! The Budget Kit is a fantastic resource for helping to get your finances in order. It's a great way to track where your money is going or has gone in the past so that you can stay on top of your financial situation. Of course, this means stepping out of your comfort zone and facing your financial situation in the face. However, The Budget Kit is the best way I've found to do just that without leaving you discouraged at the end of the process. In fact, once you've gone through the relevant pages in this book you will be in control of your finances, not controlled by them. The handy perforated sheets make it easy to put what you need together and the Mvelopes program is a perfect companion to the book.
Rating:
Summary: A Must Have Book for ALL Households
Review: After using the third edition of The Budget Kit, I anxiously awaited the 4th edition and was not disappointed! The Budget Kit is a fantastic resource for helping to get your finances in order. It's a great way to track where your money is going or has gone in the past so that you can stay on top of your financial situation. Of course, this means stepping out of your comfort zone and facing your financial situation in the face. However, The Budget Kit is the best way I've found to do just that without leaving you discouraged at the end of the process. In fact, once you've gone through the relevant pages in this book you will be in control of your finances, not controlled by them. The handy perforated sheets make it easy to put what you need together and the Mvelopes program is a perfect companion to the book.
Rating: 
Summary: Great Content / Terrible mis-representation of ebook!!!!!!
Review: Amazon should get a clue about this book. I even called the publisher and they told me they did not know of any 2 page print restriction. Amazon Customer Service told me to check my printer settings.
I think the content is great, but if you are going to sell something that is considered a workbook, you probibly should allow people to print from the file. At 2 pages per day, I can get all the forms printed in about 2 weeks. I really want to use my book, but it's pretty much worthless in this format.
Amazon! wake up and put the restrictions in black and white! Not some disclamer that some publishers restrict print access!
I'm taking my business to where I can touch and feel before I buy.
Rating:
Summary: Best Book on Budgeting
Review: I am a veteran Certified Financial Planner professional and personal finance author. I've looked for years to find a practical and useful budgeting book to recommend to clients and consumers. Judy Lawrence wrote the best book on budgeting I've seen by far. Most similar products are painfully boring. This book is worth the money and implementing this workbook is absolutely worth your time! It's all about cash flow. Know where you are. Begin managing your cash flow with this workbook and you'll get where you want to be.
Rating:
Summary: Best Book on Budgeting
Review: I am a veteran Certified Financial Planner professional and personal finance author. I've looked for years to find a practical and useful budgeting book to recommend to clients and consumers. Judy Lawrence wrote the best book on budgeting I've seen by far. Most similar products are painfully boring. This book is worth the money and implementing this workbook is absolutely worth your time! It's all about cash flow. Know where you are. Begin managing your cash flow with this workbook and you'll get where you want to be.
Rating: 
Summary: A good framework to hang your plan on
Review: I got this book when I wanted to retire from a job & commute I'd come to hate. Catch 22 was that I couldn't access my retirement funds for about a year and a half after quitting.
I'd already ditched all but one credit card, reduced the balance on the last one and started paying off the entire balance each month, not charging more than I could pay. I had a small savings account, and had started saving regularly. But I really had no idea how much I spent on groceries or utilities, etc., I just paid the bills and didn't pay that much attention to where the money went.
So I really had no good idea how much I would need to get through the 18 months until my pension kicked in. I also had discovered that all the "retirement guru press" hype had led me to overestimate the probable yield of my retirement account, so I needed to get a more realistic idea of what income I could expect to withdraw from the account without outliving it and whether I could actually live with that.
The book prompted me to see how to actually figure out what I was spending. I did have a stash of grocery store receipts and bank statements, etc. I started keeping tract of ALL expenditures, as recommended, no matter how trivial, getting a paper receipt for everything. I compiled by category all the old receipts I had for over a year. The book helped me do that and identify where I could cut back. For one thing, I dropped a lot of subscriptions, cut down on fast food and started cooking more (I also lost 15 lbs doing that), set limits on gift expenditures, etc.
The one drawback for me with the book was the categories on the forms didn't really suit me (I regard my Internet subscription as a "utility" just like phone and heat), so I got a multi-column account book, invented my own categories, and started keeping it on a monthly basis, estimating and limiting from the older stuff I'd compiled, and adding for inflation, especially on taxes, heath insurance premiums, and utilities. I was surprised how little time it took; the preliminary effort took 2 weekends, and then just an hour or so a week (now down to a couple of hours a month, a reality check mid-month and then total up at the end.)
This enabled me to retire as planned in a year and get through the interim incomeless period. I've continued to keep the expense records and budget for 3 years now, managing my money much better, with no unpleasant surprises. I was even able to handle an medical emergency this year without problem.
This is a good book: if you're serious about getting control of your financial life, it will give you the structure to do it. Go for it!
Rating:
Summary: Wow! I've finally mastered the art of the budget
Review: I had the misfortune to fall in love with a profession that doesn't pay beans. I also have tastes that would be more in line for an heiress. What to do?Well, what I -did- do was overspend, get myself into credit-card debt, get myself out of it and still not have any idea how to save money or manage a budget. But this great little book changed that. There's some advice and encouragement from the author here, but that's not the focus here. The focus would be extremely easy-to-use charts that help you plan your spending and keep track of what you actually -did- spend. It's pretty easy: First, figure out your yearly expenses (the author provides a long list of these to jog your memory). These include car maintenance, professional dues, subscription renewals, haircuts, vet visits -- the whole shebang. There's also a great worksheet that lets you figure out your gift-giving expenses for birthdays, holidays and so on. Add them all up and divide by 12. That's the amount you need to save every month for these occasional expenses. (Why didn't I think of that?) Then, for each month, there's a one-page worksheet where you figure out what your income will be for the month and what your expenses will be. You can easily chart when you'll get paid and when you'll need to pay your bills. Finally, there's a two-page worksheet for each month to keep track of what you actually did spend. (It was a real eye-opener for me to realize what I actually spent on snacks each month!) This is the first time I've every been able to create and stick to a realistic budget, and I have to say that it's pretty awesome. I actually have money left the second week of each pay period now, and I don't have to skip paying one bill so I can pay the others. Here's a tip that I used to keep track of my budget: I copied it into my planner every week, so after I spent my allocation for, say, dining, I would cross it off. That way, I didn't get confused about how much of my budget for the week I'd actually used.
Rating:
Summary: I got myself out of debt with this book
Review: I have found Judy Lawrence's The Budget Kit so helpful that I bought copies for two of my friends who were struggling with ways to keep track of their money. It is all about making choices and the need for the information to make those choices. This book is the key to keeping that critical information up-to-date and available. Not knowing where you money is coming from or going is like driving with your eyes closed. Lawrence makes the process so positive and simple , it becomes enjoyable and empowering. I highly recommend this book to anyone. Buy it as a wedding present, as a graduation gift, as an anniversary gift for you and your spouse.
Rating:
Summary: The best book on budgeting I have found
Review: I have found Judy Lawrence's The Budget Kit so helpful that I bought copies for two of my friends who were struggling with ways to keep track of their money. It is all about making choices and the need for the information to make those choices. This book is the key to keeping that critical information up-to-date and available. Not knowing where you money is coming from or going is like driving with your eyes closed. Lawrence makes the process so positive and simple , it becomes enjoyable and empowering. I highly recommend this book to anyone. Buy it as a wedding present, as a graduation gift, as an anniversary gift for you and your spouse.
Rating:
Summary: Perfect guide for managing your personal finances
Review: I have very few money-management skills. My husband has even fewer. Therefore, our marriage has been, until recently, a recipe for financial disaster. The final straw came one day when I opened up our checking account statement, and realized that, even though our expenses are roughly a little more than 1/2 our income, we only had $5 in our checking account, and no savings.
That's when I decided to pick up this fabulous little book. This book is written in plain English that even financial novices such as ourselves could understand. The monthly budget forms literally changed our lives. In about three months, we have completely changed our financial outlook. For the first time ever, all of our bills are paid on time and in full, and we actually have money left over! We have started saving and paying off more of our debts. We even hope to be able to buy our first house within the next year, something I believe would still be hopelessly out of reach without the help of this book.
Don't think this book is just for beginners, though. The forms, references, and ideas in this book are useful to anyone looking for a way to easily manage their personal finances.
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