Vipu User Guide

Overview

Vipu is designed to answer one simple question: "Do I have enough money to cover next month's expenses?"

Unlike apps that track every transaction, Vipu focuses on the big picture. You set up your recurring income and expenses once, then just update your account balances periodically. The app does the math to show your financial position.

Vipu has four main features:

• Weekly Budget - Track if you can cover upcoming expenses
• Net Worth - Track your total wealth over time
• Forecasting & FIRE - Project net worth growth and plan for financial independence
• Financial Goals - Set targets and track progress

The Balance-Based Approach

Vipu uses what we call balance-based budgeting. It sits between two extremes:

What Vipu Is NOT

• Not micro-budgeting (like YNAB or Mint) - You don't track every transaction or allocate every euro to a category. No need to log your morning coffee or categorize that €47.50 purchase.
• Not just net worth tracking - You're not flying blind between monthly snapshots. You always know if you can cover your obligations.

What Vipu IS

Balance-based budgeting means:

• Track balances, not transactions - You update account totals, not individual purchases
• Know your obligations - Monthly expenses are always visible, always reserved for
• Check in periodically - A weekly 5-minute review keeps you on track
• Focus on the question that matters - "Can I cover next month?" not "Where did my money go?"

Who This Works For

Balance-based budgeting works well if you:

• Have relatively stable, predictable income
• Know roughly what your monthly expenses are
• Don't want to log every transaction
• Want peace of mind without constant vigilance
• Care more about building wealth over time than optimizing every purchase

Who Might Need Something Different

This approach might not fit if you:

• Have highly variable income (freelance, commission-based)
• Need to track where every euro goes to control spending
• Are in a debt crisis and need tight transaction control
• Want detailed spending analytics and reports

For those situations, a transaction-tracking app like YNAB might serve you better. Vipu is for people who've gotten past the "where does my money go?" stage and want a simpler maintenance mode.

Weekly Budget

The "One Month Ahead" Philosophy

Vipu assumes you want to always have enough money to cover next month's expenses. This means:

• Expenses stay listed even after you've paid them this month
• Your goal is to maintain a positive "net position" at all times
• Expenses are normalized to a monthly cost regardless of their actual frequency

Frequencies and Deadlines

Income and expenses support flexible schedules:

• Frequency - Every N days, weeks, months, or years
• Due day - Day of the month it's due
• Start/end dates - For temporary items

Vipu normalizes everything to a monthly equivalent for the budget overview. Weekly groceries of 100 EUR become ~433 EUR/month. Annual insurance of 1,200 EUR becomes 100 EUR/month.

One-Time Items

Items marked as ephemeral are temporary entries for things like a vacation booking or year-end bonus. They appear in your budget but are meant to be deleted once handled.

Understanding the Summary Cards

The budget page shows three summary cards:

1. Current Position = Total account balances - Monthly expenses
   Can you cover next month right now?
2. After This Month = Current Position + Net income
   Where will you be after this month's salary?
3. With Savings Goals = After This Month - Savings targets
   What's left after setting aside savings?

Accounts vs Credit Cards

Vipu separates regular accounts from credit cards:

• Accounts (checking, savings) - Money you have
• Credit Cards - Money you owe (shown as negative)

Both are included in your total balance. A checking account with 3,000 EUR and a credit card with -500 EUR means your total balance is 2,500 EUR.

Credit cards can have a payment due day to track when each payment is due.

Income and Deductions

Income items can be taxed or untaxed. For taxed income, Vipu calculates net income using your tax percentage (set in settings). Individual items can override the default tax rate.

Deductions reduce your paycheck before it hits your bank (lunch benefits, pension contributions, etc.). They're shown separately from income since your employer handles them.

You can set a payday in settings (e.g. the 25th) to anchor your budget cycle to when you actually get paid.

Expenses vs Savings Goals

• Monthly Expenses - Recurring costs (rent, utilities, subscriptions)
• Savings Goals - Targets you're working toward (emergency fund, vacation, new computer) or e.g. a buffer of money you want to always have

Both reduce your available funds, but savings goals are shown separately in the third summary card.

Net Worth Tracking

Monthly Snapshots

Net worth tracking works differently from the budget. Instead of real-time updates, you create a snapshot once per month recording all your assets and liabilities.

This approach is intentional:

• Less maintenance than tracking every account daily
• Focuses on long-term trends, not daily fluctuations
• Allows tracking long term progress with minimal work

Groups and Categories

Net worth is organized into groups and categories:

• Groups are visual containers (Cash, Investments, Property, Loans, etc.)
• Categories are the actual line items within groups (Checking Account, Savings Account, Stock Portfolio, etc.)

You can customize both. The default groups are just suggestions - create whatever makes sense for your situation.

Personal vs Company Wealth

Each category can be marked as personal or company-owned. This is useful for:

• Finnish entrepreneurs with a holding company (Oy) - the original need
• Anyone who wants to track business assets separately
• Understanding what you can actually access personally

Charts and Trends

The net worth page shows:

• Area chart - Your net worth over time
• Pie chart - Current allocation by group
• Summary cards - Current total, monthly change, year-to-date change

Forecasting & FIRE Statistics

Net Worth Forecasting

The forecasting panel projects your future net worth from your snapshot history. Pick a lookback period to control how the growth trend is calculated:

• Month - Last month's change (volatile but responsive)
• Quarter - Last 3 months (default)
• Half year - Last 6 months (smooths out seasonal variation)
• Year - Last 12 months (most stable)

FIRE Calculator

The FIRE (Financial Independence, Retire Early) calculator shows:

• FIRE Number - Portfolio needed to retire (annual expenses / safe withdrawal rate)
• CoastFIRE - Amount needed today for investment growth alone to reach your FIRE number by retirement
• Years to FIRE - Time to financial independence given your savings rate and returns

You can configure annual return, inflation, safe withdrawal rate, current/target age, monthly savings, and annual expenses. Savings and expenses are auto-calculated from your budget but can be overridden. Settings persist in local storage.

A chart compares your projected growth against the required trajectory.

Financial Goals

Goals let you set targets and track progress. There are three goal types:

• Net Worth Target - Total net worth goal
• Savings Rate - Average monthly savings as % of net income (one allowed)
• Savings Goal - Target balance for a specific net worth category

Goals can have a target date. With 3+ months of data, Vipu shows whether you're on track or behind based on linear projection.

Goals appear as horizontal lines on the net worth chart. Each active goal also shows a progress bar and status indicator.

Recommended Workflows

Weekly Routine (5 minutes)

1. Open the Budget page
2. Update each account balance with the current amount
3. Check your "Current Position" - is it positive?
4. If you paid off a credit card, update that balance too

Monthly Routine (15 minutes)

1. At the end of each month, go to Net Worth
2. Click "Add Snapshot" and select the month
3. Optional: Prefill suitable accounts with data from the budget
4. Enter current values for each category
5. Review charts and forecasting projections
6. Check FIRE statistics
7. Optional: update any income/expense changes for next month

Getting Set Up (30-60 minutes, one time)

1. Add your bank accounts and credit cards (with payment due days)
2. Set up your income sources with frequencies (salary, side income)
3. Add any payroll deductions (lunch benefits, pension, etc.)
4. Add your expenses with appropriate frequencies (rent monthly, groceries weekly, insurance yearly, etc.)
5. Set your tax percentage and payday in settings
6. Create net worth categories that match your accounts
7. Add your first net worth snapshot
8. Optionally: set up financial goals and configure FIRE calculator settings

Getting Started

When you first open Vipu, the database is empty. You have two options:

1. Load example data - Use the "Seed Data" buttons to load sample data and explore the app
2. Start fresh - Add your own accounts, income, and expenses manually

For installation instructions, see the README on GitHub.