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Hey, mama! I’m going to walk you through exactly how to create a financial plan for your maternity leave as an online business owner.

I’ve gone through this exact same process with many of my clients to help them plan for their time off, and I even created a spreadsheet template for you to use to do the same thing! So without further ado, let’s take a look at those steps to put your plan into place!

1. Do your bookkeeping.

Before you can even begin to create a financial plan for your maternity leave, the one thing that needs to happen before anything else is doing your bookkeeping. Knowing what has happened historically and relying on that information to create projections for your savings plan makes everything 100x easier. Trust me when I say this! Here are a couple of ways to get this done:

• Head on over to Xero to start up your $12 subscription, link your business bank account and get started categorizing your transactions! (DM me on IG, if you have any questions!) 
• If an accounting software isn’t your jam, strike up a spreadsheet and input your numbers there to see your total revenue & total expenses.
• Hire a bookkeeper, if you seriously don’t want to touch any of this with a ten-foot pole. (I get it. I’ve heard that maaany times from our current clients.)

2. Create a total savings goal.

Now that you’ve got your books up to date, let’s create a savings goal! You’ll want to take these few things into account when coming up with that magic number:

• What is the amount of recurring expenses that you’ll still be paying while you’re out on maternity leave? Think: software subscriptions and team members who are manning the ship while you’re away!
• What do you normally pay yourself each month? (Or even better – what do you want to pay yourself each month when you’re on maternity leave?)
• Do you need to save for any additional non-business related expenses such as hiring a doula, paying for chiropractic care, investing in a newborn course, etc.? Sum all of those up and add them to the goal!
• Also take into account any family, spouse, or partner contributions to your maternity leave savings! For example: if you and your spouse can set aside a specific portion of his or her paycheck each month, you can reduce your savings goal by that amount each time the money is added to your savings account.

3. Calculate your monthly savings goal!

Now that you have your total savings goal, divide that by the number of months that you have left in your pregnancy to get the amount that you want to save each month until that baby is in your arms!

When you are doing your bookkeeping every month, designate a portion of your net profit (revenue – expenses) to your savings. Some months might have higher or lower savings than others, and you might need to increase your revenue or decrease your expenses to meet your overall savings goals!

You could stop here if you want, but I highly recommend reviewing your Profit & Loss to come up with some conservative projections of what your profit will look like over the next few months.

Thankfully, I created a product to help you do just that!

My Maternity Leave Financial Plan Spreadsheet template includes everything you need to:

• Create your savings goal, 
• Track the recurring expenses you expect to pay while you’re out, 
• and also review your Profit & Loss to input numbers to calculate your projected savings over the next few months!

It’s in Google Sheets format, but you can convert it to Excel if you prefer.

Don’t worry. If spreadsheets freak you out, I made all of this as simple and easy to use as possible! It’s even pretty to look at 😉

Download the spreadsheet today for only $47! 

And as always, email us at hello@madisondearly.com or find us on Instagram @madisondearly if you have any questions as you’re creating your own maternity leave financial plan!