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Product Review by Mary Hunt 
About Mary Hunt Mary Hunt is creator and editor of Cheapskate Monthly, a monthly newsletter dedicated to helping people find practical and realistic solutions for their financial problems. Mary has recently joined the editorial teams of the Dayton Daily News, the Orange County Register and the Colorado Springs Gazette Telegraph newspapers as a weekly columnist and appears regularly in Good Morning America, Extra and Single Parent Family Magazine (published by Focus on the Family). Mary has also appeared on national television and radio shows such as Good Morning America, Focus on the Family, The Oprah Winfrey Show, The 700 Club, and The Phil Donahue Show, among others.
Product Review
The Schara BudgetMap Some time ago subscribers Roger and Cathy Hendricks of Washington, wrote asking if I'd ever heard of something called the Schara BudgetMap. If so, they asked, what did I think about it? I hadn't, but figured I should so I contacted the owner of the company, Bill Schara. Within days a box labeled BudgetMap was sitting on my desk. I pulled out the workbook that came in the box because it looked like the owner's manual and a logical place to start. As I scanned the manual I felt my chest tightening and my heart pounding -- not unlike the way I felt when I hyperventilated during childbirth. This looked a lot like upper division Accounting -- an area of study that quite frankly makes me crazy. I put everything back into the box and promised myself I'd try again once I recovered. Some weeks later I did get back to it, but this time skipped the workbook and went straight to the product. Let me interject at this point -- and please Mr. Schara do not take this personally -- I am not fond of the word budget. Thankfully, I have learned, BudgetMap is not a budget in the traditional sense of the word. It is not a financial straightjacket or someone else's restrictive money diet. The Schara BudgetMap is a simple management tool designed to replace the register part of your checkbook. In fact, it looks just like a checkbook register. The simple instructions inside the register prompted me to say right out loud: Why didn't I think of this? Each page in the register folds out to reveal 12 neat and tidy columns with space to fill in the spending categories you choose. The BudgetMap register looks like an ordinary checkbook register but it is so unique, it has received a U.S. patent. Specially folded pages open up to "map" out the way you have decided to spend the money in your checking account. Let's say your paycheck is for $1500. You enter that as a deposit on the left side just as you would in a regular checkbook register. But with BudgetMap there's another step. You fill in the columns on the right to reflect how that $1500 is to be divided. Example: $800 goes into a labeled House; $65 for Food, $300 Automobile, $50 Clothing, $90 Utilities, $42 Entertainment, $120 Charity, $15 Lunch at Work, $2 Medical and $16 Miscellaneous. The amounts you show in the columns add up to the current balance on the left side, in this example $1500. Now when you write a check you enter it twice: First on the left as a regular debit and then on the right in the corresponding column that reflects the spending category. Let's say you buy a pair of jeans for $30. You enter the check number and "$30" on the left side, deducting it from the current balance of $1500 and entering a new balance of $1470. You also deduct $30 from the Clothing column on the right that shows a balance of $50, leaving a new balance of $20 in that category. All it takes is a quick glance to know you have only $20 available for future clothing purchases until you make another deposit to the category. Once deducted all of the columns on the right add up to match the balance on the left which is in this example $1470. BudgetMap reminds me a lot of the envelope method I've recommended from time to time for those of us who cannot seem to manage a checking account or simply prefer to live with cash. With the envelope method you cash your paycheck and divide the currency into envelopes that are labeled with categories like "Tithe," "Rent," "Food," "Clothing," "Gasoline," and so on. As you go through the week you spend from the appropriate envelope, either carrying them with you or keeping them in a secure place. You do not take money from the "Food" envelope to pay the rent. And when the envelope labeled Food is empty, there's no more spending in that category until the next fill-up. BudgetMap takes the simple yet effective envelope method of money management and applies it to a checking account. BudgetMap is compact, tidy and amazingly effective. You can, and should, also track your credit, debit and cash purchases with BudgetMap. BudgetMap could be easily adapted to work well with your Freedom Account (see Chapter 8, Debt-Proof Living or CM, October '99, pages 405). As a nice bonus each BudgetMap check register includes pages to map your Savings Account. You can learn more about BudgetMap by taking a quick 5-Step Tutorial at www.budgetmap.com. You can also read testimonials from satisfied customers. . . . When BudgetMap arrives, go straight to the instructions in the register. Once you have digested how it works (believe me, it is very simple), you will be ready to take a look at the BudgetMap Workbook that offers a more advanced treatment of how to use BudgetMap for long-term financial planning. I find BudgetMap to be a unique and useful money management tool. When you consider the price is less than one bounced check, BudgetMap also represents quite a bargain. If you manage your income through a checking account, BudgetMap is a personal finance tool that is worth your consideration, even if its name does include the dreaded b-word! CM
Reprinted with permission from Cheapskate Monthly About Cheapskate Monthly Cheapskate Monthly is more than another financial newsletter. Its articles go beyond just saving you hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars. Mary Hunt's warmth, sincerity and insight will give you a new outlook toward personal finances and help you enjoy a truly enriched life while still living within your means. See Cheapskate Monthly's online site at www.cheapskatemonthly.com.
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