Tracking your day to day expenses is one way to take control of your spending and create a monthly budget. Programs such as Quicken have many interactive features but cost $59.99 or more for use of all features. Using a free income and expense worksheet is a cost effective alternative. The best income and expense worksheet will be in a table that can do calculations, such as Excel. Microsoft has
. created a number of free budget templates that can be downloaded by users at Microsoft.com.