Understanding your numbers

"Why are these numbers different?"

You'll notice the same category — say, a car loan — showing up as several different dollar amounts around the app. That's not a bug. Each figure is the same thing measured a different way, so the app puts a small badge next to each one to tell you which is which. Once you know the five badges, the confusion disappears.

The deepest split is between two worlds. Never compare a number from one world to a number from the other without noticing which is which:

• Plan = forward-looking, in today's dollars — what you *expect*.
• Actual = backward-looking, from imported transactions — what *happened*.

The five figures and their badges

Plan — a forward-looking assumption in today's dollars. It's what you typed under My Numbers: "I spend about $510/mo on the car loan." Steady and hypothetical.

Projected — a Plan figure grown by inflation (for expenses) or COLA (for income) to a future month. Because it's in *future* dollars, it looks bigger: that $510 loan payment might read $620 in a month fifteen years out. Same assumption, just carried forward. You'll see Projected figures inside the month-by-month detail on the Forecast tab.

Actual (this month) — what you really spent or earned in one month, pulled from your imported transactions. This is the volatile one. A loan might be $510 in June, $0 in July (the payment posted on the 30th), and $1,020 in August (two payments cleared). One month tells you almost nothing on its own.

Target — your budget goal for a category — an aspiration you set on the Budget tab, not a measurement. "I want to keep groceries under $700." Reality may land above or below it.

Trailing average (Avg 12mo) — total real spending over the last 12 complete calendar months, divided by 12. The current, still-running month is left out on purpose: a recurring bill that hasn't posted yet would drag the average down and make you look thriftier than you are. This is the one number that crosses from your spending into your Plan.

A worked example: the car loan

Say your loan payment is $510/mo. Here's the same loan, five ways:

• Plan: $510 — what you entered. Today's dollars.
• Projected: $510 in an early month, drifting up only if you set inflation on

it (loans usually don't inflate — set 0%).

• Actual (July): $0 — the July payment hasn't cleared yet.
• Target: $510 — the ceiling you set in the Budget.
• Avg 12mo: $510 — twelve real payments averaged out.

All five describe the *same $510 loan*. The Actual jumps around; the Avg is the steady truth; the Plan is your assumption. When the steady truth and your assumption disagree, that's your signal to update the Plan.

Today's dollars vs future dollars

Plan and Projected are the same assumption at two points in time. We show most headline numbers in today's dollars because that's what you can reason about — "$6,000/mo" means something to you; "$11,200/mo in 2046" doesn't. When you open a future month in the detail view, you're seeing Projected (future) dollars, which is why they look inflated. Nothing has changed except the calendar.

The Plan-vs-Actual reconciliation

On the Home dashboard there's a Plan vs actual spending card showing three figures side by side: your Plan (assumed /mo), this month's Actual, and your Avg 12mo (real /mo). When your Avg drifts more than about 15% from your Plan, the app marks the plan stale and prompts:

> Plan assumes $5,500/mo; you actually spend $6,200/mo. Review & > apply →

Choosing Review & apply takes you to the Budget tab, where you can drop your real trailing average into the Forecast in one step — see Use your real spending in the forecast.

None of this is advice — it's your own numbers, organized. Every term here is defined in the glossary.