Best way of tracking savings, pension pots etc

[tadpolefeet]

hi there,
Our financial situation has recently changed for the better (with both an inheritance and a promotion), and I want to put together something so I could have an overview of our finances. I thought of putting together a simple spreadsheet, but presumably someone has done this before and there must be a template. I have found lots of "budgeting" spreadsheets, and then started thinking about retirement planning, and discovered an array of those too. I want to be able to see how much S&S ISA A, Pension Pot B etc has gone up from one year to the next... but the more I look the more confused I get.
I'm reasonably excel-literate...
I'm wondering what other people use, and can anyone recommend something for me?
Thanks!

Simple excel.
The rows contain outgoings, mortgage remaining, pensions, investments and savings.
Columns show the months.
Spend an hour a month updating it.
Also handy to put in future annual costs ie car insurance / service etc so you see it coming.
Then a simple calculation at the bottom showing variance this month vs 12 months ago.
Either as £ or %.
Or both as I do :)

I hesitate to suggest it, but I use an old fashioned physical folder, paper and pen!!

A page for each account with the Provider listed as the title,
columns for Date, Account type, Account number & Sortcode, Balance, %+/- change, Date for next review.

Simple, quick to view, archaic but effective.

I used to use Money which is no longer supported.

This is the next best thing I have found

https://www.jiosoft.co.uk/?gad=1&gclid=EAIaIQobChMIr6GZuo3V_gIVfYBQBh0SJghYEAMYASAAEgKvk_D_BwE

I'd stick with excel but create a tab per investment/ expense. Then one tab at the front as a summary pulling everything together.

Loads of people, me included will tell you Ynab (you need a budget)

Pm me if you'd like a referral code 🙂

I have a single excel with multiple tabs

Summary of everything
Bank and savings accounts
Work shares, current share price, dates they are free from tax, dividends
Pensions / value and calculations when I dream I can retire
Monthly Payslip details (so i can monitor how much goes into AVCs, tax etc)
Details of all monthly /annual bills/dd/so (coloured coded if just nice to have)
Premium bonds, winnings and rate of return (mine and ds)
uni costs/student finance options/LISA for ds

The Summary sheet even has graph and barcharts and an unrealistic and unreliable countdown to retirement that can fluxuate by years 🤣. It is very fancy for all my modest little pots of money. I update some tabs every month when I get a payslip, premium bond win etc others I maybe review 3-4 times a year.

Just start pulling all the info you have together, it will be individual to you, will slowly develop over time and unlike apps you can tailor exactly to your changing needs.

THank you all for the suggestions! I think I don't want to pay for something (esp on-going fees) and suspect that an excel sheet is the way to go.
@Survey99 this sounds like closest to what I want, as the "unreliable countdown to retirement" is exactly what I have been thinking about. I can't get my head around exactly what I need yet, but I guess that I should start putting it together and see where it gets me. Did you start it from scratch yourself, or did you find a template somewhere?
Thanks!

All from scratch. Just messed around with it when I was in an excel mood over the last few years. Nothing too advanced in excel - just basic formulas and a charts.

My retirement tab is basic. It has my various pensions and savings (shares etc) and I can put in what they could each give me each year between age 60-67 and shows how much I am short if I want to retire at 60.

Recently put in buying a new car (🤬 LEZ) out of savings and it means I need to work another 18 months so need to rethink that one! 🤣

The Rebel Finance School has some nice spreadsheets- a net worth one, savings rate tracker and retirement planner.

Excel. One spreadsheet for each month going out for a year showing all income/expenses. Final balance c/f to following month opening balance.

One tab for each credit card to track spending - totals feed into spreadsheet in the month payment is due. For savings, one column for each account showing amount, term, rate & maturity. Used to also include mortgage but that’s all settled so now only savings!

one tab for all pension provisions.

I update each month although I always add any spending in at least weekly. All tracked with banking apps on my phone so I don’t miss anything. Easily beats paper version and feels much more in control!

OP, this is such a great post and I’m wondering how you got on? I feel like I need to visualise the excel to copy it 😂. Otherwise, if you have a template you want to share, please do DM. I feel like we just need to get our own house in order.

Excel is your friend
i’ve got one with an annuity cashflow for my mortgage so I can alter interest rates/term/payments to see when i would be mortgage free or how much I still owe at the end of the term.
i have another for retirement which has a lot of assumptions on growth/inflation etc. It includes state pension and tells me how much i could take from my pension each year to either empty it when I’m say 90 or have half left etc. I’ve tested it against on line models and its close enough to be a very good guide.
I’ve have an excel for things like holiday budgets, hobbies,

Thank you all for your suggestions and ideas - they are really helpful.

@sellotape12 This is what I have so far. New tab in Excel.
Column A - Bank account name; Col B - Account Type; Col C - Acct number; Col D - Rates where relevant (and date); Col E - Year 1; Col F - Year 2... up to 2023, and beyond.
Then each row is an account, but I have grouped into 4 sections. First, my accounts, 2nd - my partner's accounts; 3rd - joint accounts (or others eg my daughter's savings that don't go into the "pot"); 4th our pensions. Each has a subtotal.

I have put in all the details of our accounts, and added the balance in Columns E to K (ie the past 7 years, as I had that info easily available)... and can continue to add going forward. Then I created a couple of simple bar graphs, showing the totals for our savings together (excluding joints) and another one for our pensions.

(In an older version of this I also had a negative figure for our mortgage, and it was a great incentive to watch it get smaller!)

So that very nicely shows me where we are now and how we got here. What I haven't worked out yet is how to do the future planning, forecasting bit... so that is next!

Thank you for the suggestion of Rebel Finance School @Medee - really useful. I have found what looks like a great Financial Forecasting template at the bottom of this page (plus a YouTube video explaining it). I haven't yet got my head fully around it (or populated it!) but will see how I get on with that. But I am also increasingly realising that we probably do need to track our spending to get a better sense of what we would need in retirement.

Thanks all - and do keep your ideas coming!

ps - @Survey99 and @Wherearemymarbles - would you be able to tell me a bit more about the layout/structure of your retirement tabs, please?
Thanks!

I have 3 pensions. I have a spreadsheet and each months on the first I input the balance. I then have a formula to calculate how much each has grown / dropped in the month. I started this as I wanted to see how they were performing and if I should merge them. I then have a little calculation which shows me my pension income based on that and the 25% lump sum. I have another page with estimate income requirements (todays uplifted for inflation) I have a 3rd page which tracks my projected pension month by month based on a standard rate of growth and how much I will be putting in contributions. That's looking a bit bad though as I just seem to have stood still in pension growth in last 18 months - up a bit down a bit! But in theory that shows me where I might be at pension age.

Love all these tips; thanks all. Pity we didn’t get taught this in school.

I have found my people!!

I have an expenses / outgoings excel and a basic pension one but off the back of this thread I'm going to pimp it up to cover everything and do some projections!!