Budget Builder (50/30/20)
Turn your monthly take-home pay into needs, wants and savings targets using the 50/30/20 rule or your own mix — then check it against what you actually spend and see how your savings rate maps to years of financial independence.
Your framework allocation
How each dollar of take-home pay is assigned under the chosen framework.
Actual spending vs target
Grouped by bucket. Bars above target mean that category is eating into your savings.
Budget breakdown
Target amounts under your framework. Enter actual spending to fill the comparison columns.
| Bucket | Target | Actual | Difference |
|---|
How this is calculated
The 50/30/20 rule (where it comes from)
The framework was popularized by Elizabeth Warren — the U.S. senator and bankruptcy-law scholar — and her daughter Amelia Warren Tyagi in the 2005 book All Your Worth. It splits your after-tax take-home pay: needs = 50%, wants = 30%, savings + extra debt repayment = 20%. The 60-10-10-10-10 variant assigns 60% to essentials and four 10% slices (this tool groups them into 60% needs, 20% savings and 20% wants for the chart).
Custom splits normalize to 100%
With a custom framework the three percentages are normalized so they always sum to 100: share = slice ÷ (needs + wants + savings). You can set them in any ratio — for example 60/20/20 for a high-cost city — and the tool rescales automatically.
Targets and savings rate
Each target is simply take-home × share. Your savings rate is the savings share of take-home pay. The hero number is your monthly savings target under the framework.
Years to financial independence (a teaser)
Using the 4% rule, your FI number is 25 × annual spending. The rough years-to-FI shown here is FI number ÷ annual savings — savings only, before any investment growth, so it is deliberately pessimistic. Notice a quirk: at a 20% savings rate this is always about 100 years regardless of income, because you save 20 and spend 80 (25 × 80 ÷ 20 = 100). Raising the savings rate is what actually moves the needle. For a proper projection with market returns, CPP and OAS, use the FIRE calculator.
Needs vs wants classification
When you enter actual spending, housing + transport + groceries is treated as needs and dining + subscriptions + other as wants. Whatever is left of your take-home pay after both is your implied actual savings. A bucket over its target is flagged so you know where the money is leaking.
The Canadian reality check
Average one-bedroom rent tops $2,000/month in Toronto and Vancouver, so housing alone can blow past 50% of take-home for many renters. That is a signal to adjust the framework, not to feel guilty. Protect the savings slice first (pay yourself first — automate a transfer on payday), then fit needs and wants to what is left.
What this doesn't model
Irregular income, annual or one-off expenses (insurance renewals, property tax), sinking funds, or the tax treatment of where you save. Convert a gross salary to take-home with the income tax calculator first, and plan the destination of your savings with the FIRE calculator.