One of the most common questions I get inside the Don’t Go Broke Collective is: what numbers are worth tracking every month?
It comes up so often that I wanted to bring the answer here too. It starts with something most of us already look at regularly: our bank balance.
It’s an easy way to see where things stand at a glance. But your balance is only one piece of the picture. It shows what you have left, but not whether your spending reflects your priorities, whether you’re making progress toward your goals, or whether a big expense is coming up that you haven’t planned for yet.
These five numbers give you the rest of the picture.
- Your total spending for the month
This is the starting point. Before you can adjust anything, you need to know where your money went.
Not an estimate. The actual number, pulled from your bank and card statements, across every category.
Most people are surprised by what they find.
The subscriptions they forgot about. The groceries that crept up. The small purchases that added up faster than expected. Seeing the total before breaking it down by category gives you a clear picture of the scale of your spending.
- Your savings and investment contributions
This tells you whether you are consistently putting money toward your future or just intending to.
Note the specific amounts that went in this month: to your savings account, your TFSA, your RRSP, or any other investment account. Then compare it to what you planned to contribute.
A smaller amount invested consistently gives your money more time to compound than making larger contributions only occasionally.
- Your debt balance
If you have debt, track the total balance at the end of each month.
The payment amount alone doesn’t tell you much. What matters is how much you actually owe and whether that balance is coming down over time. Tracking it monthly makes it easier to see whether your current payments are making a meaningful dent or whether interest is offsetting much of your progress.
- Your progress toward your current financial goal
Whatever you are working toward right now – whether that is building an emergency fund, saving for a down payment, or paying off a specific debt – this number tells you whether you are on track.
Set a monthly target and check where you landed at the end of each month. Progress is rarely perfectly linear, and some months will be slower than others. But if you are consistently falling short, that is useful information. It either means the target needs adjusting or your spending habits do.
- Any large expenses coming up in the next one to three months
Some expenses are easy to forget because they don’t happen every month. A car service, an annual renewal, a trip, or a seasonal expense can all put pressure on your budget when they come around.
At the end of each month, look at what’s coming up over the next one to three months. If you know you’ll need $1,200 for a trip in two months, for example, you can plan to set aside $600 each month instead of having to find the full amount when the expense arrives.
The goal is simple: know what’s coming before it becomes a problem.
What these numbers tell you together
Each number gives you a different insight into your finances. Together, they show you whether things are moving in the right direction.
Overspending in one area is easy to miss when you only check your balance.
But when you look at your spending, savings contributions, and debt balance together, it becomes easier to see what is actually happening. If spending is going up, savings contributions are going down, and your debt balance is barely changing, you can spot the problem early and make adjustments before it becomes a pattern.
The habit that makes this useful
Set aside 15 to 20 minutes at the end of each month to go through these five numbers.
You do not need a complicated system. A notes app, a spreadsheet, or a notebook is enough. What matters is that you do it consistently, and that you look at all five numbers together rather than checking one occasionally and guessing about the rest.
Once it becomes a monthly habit, you will start catching things earlier, before it becomes a bigger problem.
Join the accountability group
Knowing what to track is one thing. Finding the time and following through when life gets busy is another.
Inside the Don’t Go Broke Collective, members do not wait until the end of the month to check in on their numbers. They do it every week, sharing where they are, what shifted, and what they are adjusting. That consistent check-in is what turns the numbers into action and what stops a slow month from becoming a pattern.
The group includes monthly Ask Me Anything sessions where you can bring questions exactly like these, live sessions on investing, taxes, and real estate, and weekly prompts that keep you accountable between meetings.
If you’ve been meaning to work on your finances, this is where you start.
CTA: Join the Don’t Go Broke Collective
For my Nigerian community: You’ll need a VPN to access Skool. Make sure you have one set up before you join so you can get straight in.
Until next time,
xoReni
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