How McNut Budgeting works
A practical walkthrough of the budgeting tools inside McNut Budgeting.
McNut Budgeting is a private workspace for keeping personal money records. The steps below show how its features fit together, from setting up categories to reviewing spending.
Set up categories for your priorities
Create categories for bills, savings, groceries, transport, and any other priorities you want to track. The dashboard shows a balance for each category, so you can see how much of your recorded money is assigned to each purpose.
Record income and spending
Add deposits and withdrawals to the relevant category. The transaction history lets you review the entries behind a balance, including what changed and when. These are personal records that you enter or import into the app.
Divide an income payment
The Income Distributor lets you enter an income amount and allocate it across categories using percentages or fixed amounts. Review the proposed split and any unallocated remainder before creating the category deposits.
Plan regular costs and review patterns
Add recurring payments and save a payday in Settings. The dashboard projects your category balances after scheduled bills, and lets you preview a possible purchase. Forecasts use the records you keep up to date.
Fund bills when you get paid
The Income Distributor can suggest amounts needed for recurring bills before the next payday. Review and change the split before saving deposits to your categories.
Keep shared purchases clear
When someone owes you part of a shared purchase, Money Owed tracks that amount separately and can link it to the original withdrawal. Unconfirmed repayments are excluded from payday previews. Marking an entry repaid clears the amount owed without counting it as new income.
Worked example: can a grocery purchase wait?
Suppose your Groceries category shows $240 and a $65 recurring grocery order is due before payday. That leaves $175 before any new purchase. A $30 shop would leave $145. This is a category calculation, not a claim that your bank account contains $145: other categories, pending card payments, and transactions you have not recorded can change the real amount available. Use the purchase preview to compare the proposed cost with the category's projected balance, then check your bank balance and upcoming commitments before spending. The preview does not create a transaction. If you go ahead, record the withdrawal so the next preview starts from an accurate balance.
Worked example: split a pay without hiding a shortfall
Imagine a $1,000 pay and four planned allocations: $450 for rent, $200 for groceries, $150 for transport, and $100 for savings. The planned deposits total $900, leaving $100 unallocated. Assign that remainder to a category after checking irregular bills; the Income Distributor requires the full pay to be allocated before saving. If you increase one allocation by $120, the plan exceeds the pay by $20, so reduce another amount. A percentage split is useful when pay varies, while a fixed amount is clearer for a bill with a known cost. The Income Distributor shows the remainder before you confirm the deposits, and you can edit its suggestions.
A ten-minute review before each payday
First, reconcile recent deposits and withdrawals with your bank so category balances reflect what happened. Next, review recurring payments due before the following payday, including annual or irregular costs that may need a separate reserve. Then check each category's projected balance and adjust the income split where a bill would leave a shortfall. Finally, preview any large planned purchase in its category. If a category looks comfortable only because a transaction is missing, record it before making a decision. McNut Budgeting helps organise your records; it cannot detect every pending payment or guarantee that a purchase is affordable.