For irregular income
A budget for irregular income that fills in the right order
Freelance, gig work, commission, tips, a salary with bonuses on top. When you can't know what next month pays, a budget that assumes the same number every month is fiction. Tavera Money builds your plan on a lean month and fills it as money actually lands: Essentials first, then everything else. Good months put money aside so slow months don't wreck your budget.
Included on every plan, including the free one
Priority order
Every dollar knows where it goes first
Sort your categories into three tiers. When money lands, it fills them left to right, and each category is filled completely before the next one gets anything.
1. Essentials
Covered first, every time
Rent, groceries, utilities, insurance, the tax you owe on what you earned. The first money in goes here, and nothing else gets a dollar until these are full.
2. Important
Next in line
Debt payments above the minimum, savings goals, the things that matter but would survive a slow month. Filled once Essentials are.
3. Extras
Funded last, skippable
Eating out, hobbies, the nice-to-haves. A good month funds them. A lean month leaves them waiting, which is the point.
Built on a lean month
Plan around the month you can count on
Tavera Money charts your last twelve months of income and asks what your plan should be built on: a lean month, a typical month, or a number of your own. It tells you how many of those months came in under it, and whether your Essentials fit inside it, before you commit.
- A lean month is lower than three out of four of yours, and the safest place to start
- Salary plus extras? Your plan lives inside the base pay, and everything on top is a bonus
- Works from manual transactions too. A linked bank just fills in the history for you
Fund my plan
See where the money goes before it goes there
When a payment comes in, Tavera Money shows exactly which categories it would fill, in priority order. Skip any category for now and its share moves on to the next in line. Nothing changes until you confirm, and any funding can be undone. A lean deposit is meant to cover rent in full, not cover everything a little.
- Choose per household: always ask, cover Essentials automatically, or fund everything automatically
- Base pay shows as Expected until it lands, and is never counted as money you can spend yet
- Paycheck came in short or long? Update the amount, treat it as a one-off, or skip it
Steady Pay
Turn good months into a paycheck for slow ones
Once your whole plan is funded, whatever is left goes into Steady Pay: a savings goal that works as your income buffer. At the start of each budget period it offers to pay you a regular paycheck out of it, so you can live on money you have already earned instead of waiting for the next invoice to clear.
- Aims for one lean month, and covers Essentials when a month comes up short
- Link it to your real savings account and it reminds you when to move the money
- Rather send the extra to a vacation fund? Point it at any goal instead
Month-end recap
A recap that knows lean months are normal
An irregular income has slow months by definition, so the month-end recap never treats one as a failure. It tells you whether Essentials were covered and for how many months running, what Steady Pay carried you through, and what the next good month will put back.
- "Essentials covered 4 months running" is the number that actually matters
- Lean months are answered with the rebuild, not the shortfall
- Steady Pay already holding next month’s paycheck? It says so
What it won't pretend to do
Tavera Money doesn't predict what you'll earn. Your plan is built on a number you choose from your own history, and money only counts once it has actually arrived. It doesn't move money between your bank accounts either: link Steady Pay to your savings account and, when it pays you, it tells you how much to move so the cash is where you spend it. And it won't work out your taxes, but make tax a category in Essentials and every payment funds it first.
Questions
Budgeting on an irregular income
What is the best way to budget with an irregular income?
Build your plan on a lean month rather than an average one, rank your spending so you know what gets paid first, and fund the plan in that order as each payment actually arrives instead of all at once on the 1st. Whatever is left after the whole plan is funded goes into a buffer, so a slow month can be paid from a good one. Tavera Money does each of those steps for you.
Is irregular income budgeting on the free plan?
Yes. It is included on every plan, including the free Basic plan, and it works with manual accounts and transactions. Linking a bank on Premium only saves you typing in the deposits.
I have a salary plus commission or bonuses. Does this work for me?
Yes, that is one of the two irregular-income setups. Your plan lives inside your base pay, which Tavera Money can find in your history and shows as Expected until it lands. Commission, bonuses, tips and overtime on top are treated as a bonus: they fill Important and Extras, then build Steady Pay.
What happens in a month I earn less than my plan?
Essentials are filled first, so a short month covers rent in full rather than everything a little. If Steady Pay has money in it, Tavera Money offers to cover the Essentials that are still short. Either way, the next money that comes in goes to them before anything else.
What is Steady Pay?
An ordinary savings goal that acts as your income buffer. Once your whole plan is funded, leftover money goes into it, and at the start of each budget period it offers to pay you a regular paycheck out of it. It aims for one lean month, and you can link it to the real savings account the money sits in.
Does it work for a couple where only one of us has irregular income?
Yes. The setting belongs to the household, so there is one shared plan and every deposit from either of you fills it in the same priority order. If one of you has a steady salary and the other freelances, that is the salary-plus-variable setup.
Can I switch back to a regular budget?
Any time. Switching applies from the current budget period on, and earlier months are never restated, so your history reads exactly as it did.
New to this? Read our guide to how to budget on an irregular income, or the step-by-step setup.
Budget on the income you actually have.
Set up takes a few minutes: pick how you get paid, choose your lean month, sort your categories. Free, with no card.
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