To learn more about what Available money is and what you can do with it, read our help article: What is Available money?
In this article we’ll cover some common questions related to Available money (formally called Unallocated).
Why is my Available balance so high?
There are a few reasons why your Available balance might be higher than you expected.
- You just recorded an income, or one was automatically imported. Use that income to fill your Envelopes by creating an Envelope Fill.
- You have Envelopes with negative balances. Pay back these Envelopes from your Available balance with an Envelope Fill and it will be closer to what you expect.
- You deleted an Envelope with a balance. When an Envelope is deleted, its balance becomes Available.
- You added or edited an Account: When you add a new Account, or edit an existing one, the money starts out Available. Put it in your Envelopes by creating an Envelope Fill.
Why is my Available balance so low?
If your Available balance is low…
- You may have filled your Envelopes with more money than you have in your Account(s). If this is the case, just keep recording incomes as you receive them to pay back your Available money. Or, try transferring some money back to Available by creating one or more Envelope Transfers.
- You added a Credit Card Account that you pay off in full every month. Credit Card Accounts count against what you have Available since they lower the overall amount you have to budget with. In that case, you may still want to only fill your Envelopes with what’s in your Available, so there’s no risk of filling with more than you would have if you paid off your current credit card balances.
- You may need to finish entering all your Accounts or incomes. These will increase your Available balance.
- Your Account balances might be inaccurate — check them against your real-life balances to make sure they’re showing the correct balances. If the balances in Goodbudget are lower than in real life, you may be showing less Available than you should have. In that case, edit the balance so it’s accurate.
- You have unassigned imported expenses. File-uploaded or automatically imported expenses that are not assigned to Envelopes will be placed in your Available bucket. After you select an Envelope for those transactions, your Available money will adjust to reflect the change.
