Rollover
Rollover simply means carrying over any money available in your budget to the next period.
Enabling Rollover for a budget allows you to budget money you have today to a category, but spend it a later date.
Let's say you have a budgeted $100 for a category this month but spent only $75.
Then $25 rolls over and your available amount for the next month would be increased by $25.
Similarly, if you spend $120, then the next month leaves you with $20 less available.
Envelope Budgeting
Envelope budgeting is a popular style of budgeting that lets you allocate your available
money into different categories (virtual envelopes). Money is allocated (or budgeted) into separate categories as and when it's received. Any amount leftover in the envelope simply
carries over (or rolls over) to the next period. At any time, you can see the "Available" amount of money in a budget
to know how much money you can spend for that category.
Rollover / Envelope budgets are great for categories that you want to save for over a period of time, or categories with uneven or sporadic spending.
- Travel is typically a sporadic expenditure. You can budget a fixed amount (say $200) every month and simply check the available amount to see how much you have saved up at any time you plan to take a trip.
- Utility bills are a variable expenditure. You can budget a fixed amount every month and allow any surplus/deficit to rollover.
- If you want to keep money aside to make a big purchase later (say buy the latest iPhone worth $1000), you can start budgeting a small amount (say $20) every month. That way you won't allocate it to any other expense. At any time, you can check the
available amount in the category to see if you have saved enough to make the purchase.