Is AI a good budgeting source

Everyone is talking about AI.  What it does.  How it works.  How it will take over the world, like Skynet one day. 

Recently, out of curiosity, I asked for an AI based program to create a family budget for me.  I gave it some specified perimeters, such as I wanted to know what the total amount of my income would be based on my area I live in, (for me and my spouse) then expenses based on the area (St Pete, Florida) and then I asked the program to draw up a nice, 5-week plan that I can use to budget my money.  The actual budget consists of several pages of line items, which at first I was impressed by because I thought, wow, that is a very detailed budget and I really like that.  But then I started reading what it entailed, and I was a lot less impressed. Then I looked at the format and I was even less impressed.  There is no possible way that a family of 4 can comfortably use this budget worksheet to do anything but get a glorified look at their income and expenses as a projection and as an actual item – after the facts.  I suppose it is better than nothing, but not by much.  But I will let you judge it for what it is.  Here, take a look at some of the highlights.  We’ll start with the income section.

Income 1: $6000.00

Income 2: $2300.00

Bonus Income: $2500.00 (not sure what Bonus income is, is that like a second job?)

Knowing something about this industry, I guess the system is supposing the first income to be that of a male (if we are talking about a male/female partnership with 2 kids) and the second of the spouse, who is probably female.  I am guessing, not sure, I did not specify the request enough, I think.  Anyway, the model came up with a total monthly income of $10,800 for the family.  Does not specify if that is gross or after tax.  The median household income in the St. Pete area (for 2024) is roughly $72,000 per year or roughly $6000.00 per month if I round up about 60 bucks or so.  That’s median HOUSEHOLD income, not individual.  So right off the bet the income is off by about $4,000 per month.  That’s almost 50K per year.   AI is not scoring major points here, or even minor points.  It is basically failing at this point but let’s look at the expenses, maybe it will make up for it in the expenses section. 

So in the expenses section, unfortunately there is no breakdown based on the date or the day of the month, nor is there a provision to institute that, so it would be up to the family to actually monitor the budget daily or at least weekly to ensure that.  I prefer to have a budget that kind of makes you look at it if not daily, then at least a few times a week, so in my budget program I have daily tasks every week to complete to entice folks to log in and to look at their budgets.

Also, the AI set the budget monthly with no provision given to any rollover expenses or incomes.  There is just a monthly budget, assuming the same expenses every month.  Here are some of the larger expenses it outlined. 

Mortgage:                   $1700.00 – fair

Cable:                         $100.00 – I actually don’t know anyone who has cable anymore

Electric:                       $50.00 – in FL heat, the average electricity bill is $350.00 per month

House Cleaning:         $200.00 – I’m sorry, what?  Who has a monthly cleaning service??

Natural Gas:                $400.00 – way too high – usually runs about $35.00 per month for us

Cell Phone:                  $60.00 – completely off – our cell phone bill is $175.00 per month

Transportation:            $1425.00 – assuming that means car payments, insurance and gas

Groceries:                    $100.00 – on what planet?!

Dining out:                   $1500.00 – Seriously?!

Insurance (health):    $900.00

Entertainment:            $500.00 (no way)

Savings:                       $200.00 – way too low – should be 10% or about $1000 minimum

There are a lot more categories posted, but I won’t go into them because they make 0.00 sense.  Such as a wine category, a gym membership category, or rideshare and a bunch of others.  I did find it interesting that there was a TAX category with $300.00 for taxes, which on a $9,000 monthly income I guess means the income is gross?  That makes it worse and if there is only a $300 payment made on that, Uncle Sammy will come knocking next April. 

The bottom line is, in my estimation as someone who is a big proponent of budgeting and teaches budgeting techniques, I find the AI budget to be completely subpar.  Maybe in the future it will improve but right now, it is terrible.