Forecast

The Forecast screen answers the most important question in household accounting: “how will my money look over the coming months?”. Cuéntamo takes your current balance, adds your recurring movements (salary, bills, mortgage…) and the planned movements that haven't happened yet, and draws a balance line into the future. With that it warns you whether you'll go into the red, when, and how much room you have to spend without getting into trouble.

You don't need to do anything special for it to work: the forecast feeds itself from what you've already recorded. The more complete your recurrents and accounts are, the more reliable the line.

Where the numbers come from

The forecast is built from three ingredients:

• The current balance of your accounts. It's the starting point, the height the line takes off from as of today.
• Your history of real movements, which draws the part of the line before today (where you're coming from).
• Your future projections: the movements Cuéntamo generates from your recurrents (salary, bills, subscriptions…) plus any future movement you've confirmed by hand.

One key thing: not every account enters the forecast. On the Accounts screen, each account has a role. Only accounts with the Normal role (and where the “In forecast” switch is on) add to the balance projection. Auxiliary accounts and Debts and reimbursements accounts stay out of the forecast line (even though their balance still counts towards your total balance and your net worth). If you miss an account in the projection, check its role: there's a note with a direct link to Accounts just above the chart.

The horizon (how many months you look ahead)

At the top right, the “Horizon” selector decides how far the projection reaches: 3, 6, 12, 24, 36, 48 or 60 months (up to 5 years out). The chart and table adjust to what you pick.

Free users can look up to 6 months; the longer horizons are tagged “Más” and, when clicked, open the Cuéntamo Más window. With Más you see the full projection up to 60 months.

An important safety detail: even though the free version only shows 6 months, Cuéntamo always calculates long term under the hood. So if a balance problem appears beyond your visible window, it doesn't give you a misleadingly optimistic number: it warns you that the forecast is trending down (with an estimate in years of when the red would arrive), while reserving the exact date and amount for Cuéntamo Más.

Current balance and expected minimum

The first large card shows your current balance (in red if negative). Below it, the “Expected minimum” line: the lowest point your balance will reach within the horizon, with the date when it would happen. It's the figure most worth watching, because a negative minimum means that at some point you run out of money.

If that minimum is negative, the card adds the date of the first red day and a list of ideas to avoid it:

• Earn or save X per month (the exact amount that, contributed each month, would keep the balance positive across the whole horizon).
• Review your recurrents, with a direct link to the Recurrents screen.
• Check the planned movements up to the critical date, with a link to the already-filtered list.
• Transfer money from savings or defer a large expense.

In the free version, if the only problem is beyond your 6 visible months, you'll see a qualitative warning (“the forecast is trending down…”) with an estimate in years, instead of the exact figures.

Negative-balance alerts per account

If a specific account is going to go negative, a block of red alerts appears, one per affected account. Each alert states the account name, the exact date it would go into the red and the projected balance that day.

The “View movements” link takes you straight to that account's movements around the critical date (two weeks before and after), with the overdraft day highlighted, so you can see at a glance which charge causes it and act on it (move it, bring an income forward, make a transfer…).

The balance evolution chart

The chart draws your balance over time with a dotted vertical line marked “Today” that separates past and future:

• The solid green line is the real balance (your history up to today).
• The dashed blue line is the projected balance (from today onwards).
• If you're simulating a scenario, an amber line for the simulated balance also appears (see below).

There's a horizontal line at zero to see at once when you cross into the red, and if you've set a cushion (see below), a dashed amber line marks that level.

A nuance worth understanding: for each stretch of the future, the projected line doesn't use the end-of-period balance but the lowest balance within that stretch. It's a deliberate, conservative choice: this way the chart doesn't hide a dip that happens mid-month (for example, if you get paid on the 30th but the big bill falls on the 5th). Hover over any point to see the exact date and balance.

How much can I spend? (spending capacity and cushion)

The “How much can I spend?” card turns the forecast into actionable figures. It distinguishes two situations:

• If your forecast is already going negative, it shows the deficit: how much you're short (as a one-off contribution) and how much you'd have to save each month to avoid the red.
• If you're in the positive, it tells you the maximum one-off spend you can afford today and the extra monthly spend you could sustain without the balance dropping below your safety threshold.

The cushion is that safety threshold: the money you always want parked just in case. With the 0 / 1 / 2 / 3 / 6 buttons you pick how many months of spending it equals (Cuéntamo computes the amount from your average spending and shows it alongside). Your choice is remembered for next time.

When there's a cushion, the figures split in two: how much you can spend without touching the cushion (the prudent option) and how much dipping into it (with the estimated date it would rebuild). Below, a message tells you whether the cushion is already covered, on what date it will be at the current pace, or whether it isn't reached within the horizon.

Fine-tuning the cushion (Cuéntamo Más)

The “Configure” button (Cuéntamo Más) opens a panel to size the cushion more realistically, by marking two kinds of recurrents:

• Guaranteed income: the recurring income you'd keep receiving even in an emergency (for example, a pension or rent you collect). It's deducted from the spending the cushion has to cover.
• Non-essential expenses: the recurrents you'd cut in a crisis (restaurants, subscriptions, leisure…). They're also deducted, because the cushion only has to cover the essentials.

With those two adjustments, the cushion stops being “X months of all my spending” and becomes “X months of my net essential spending”, which is a much more useful and less alarming figure.

The scenario simulator (Cuéntamo Más)

The “What if…?” link (Cuéntamo Más) opens the scenario simulator: a testing bench to see the impact of a change without touching your real data. In the panel you can:

• Disable a recurrent (for example, “what if I drop this subscription?”).
• Change the amount of a recurrent (a pay rise, a pricier bill…).
• Add hypothetical income or expenses you haven't recorded.

While you simulate, an amber banner reminds you you're in simulation mode, the chart draws the simulated line next to the real one, and the spending-capacity card and monthly detail show the simulated figures with the real one alongside for comparison. You can save named scenarios to recover them later, and the reset button returns you to your real forecast. Nothing you do here changes your movements or your recurrents.

The monthly detail (table and donuts)

At the bottom, a month-by-month table breaks down income, expenses, net (the month's difference) and cumulative balance (in red if negative). Past months appear in normal tone; future ones are in italics and marked “prev.” (planned). A blue “Today” row separates the present, showing your current balance.

With the year selector you switch tax years (free users see up to the current year; with Cuéntamo Más, up to five years out). On narrow screens the table automatically turns into cards.

Click any month to expand it: two donut charts open, one for income and one for expenses, with the split by category and its percentage. Each donut category is a link: clicking it jumps to the movements for that month and category, already filtered, to see the detail. When you simulate, each row also shows its real value below the simulated one.

Multi-currency

If you have accounts in other currencies (Cuéntamo Más), a block appears below the chart with the applied exchange rates and when they were last checked. If a quote hasn't been updated for more than a day, it's flagged with a warning, because the conversion of those accounts to your base currency might not be up to date.

Getting the most out of it

• Keep your recurrents up to date: they are the engine of the forecast. A missing bill or an outdated amount skews the line.
• Check the expected minimum from time to time: it's your early alarm for going into the red.
• Before a big expense, look at the maximum one-off spend in “How much can I spend?” to know whether you can afford it without touching the cushion.
• Use the simulator (Más) for important decisions: a job change, a mortgage, cancelling subscriptions… before you take the step.
• Combine the forecast with your budgets and your savings goals for a complete picture of your planning.