<prompt> Human: Hey all,I need some help figuring out how to budget. Im a Type-A person who doesnt like not being organized but I dont really have any idea about finances. Heres my story:I am starting my first job in a few weeks in a large, Midwest city thats not Chicago. Think Indianapolis, Minneapolis or St. Louis. I just got married. I 25 years old will be making 125,000 per year. My wife 25 years old makes 45,000 per year. We have roughly 25,000 in savings.I have 70,000 in student loans minimum payment of 835month. Our current plan is to throw my wifes entire post-tax salary at my loans and try to knock them out in 3 years, but I waffle about doing that vs paying the minimum and saving more moneytraveling a little more.I owe my employer 10,000 for an interest-free loan extended to me to help with the transition time between school, getting licensed, and beginning work. This will come out of my first years paycheck at 384 per paycheck every two weeks.We think our apartment rent, once we move in a little bit, will be about 1500month. We both have cars and giving them up isnt an option in this city!Here are our priorities: Save money to buy a house. Were not terribly interested in a starter home, so we want to rent for a few years and then buy something nice. In our market, thatd be 500,000. My car is 10 years old and will need to be replaced within the next few years. We want to have the money to replace it with something nice without financing too much of the purchase price. My student loan debt needs to go away. I hate being in debt and neither of us are comfortable with it. We both want to retire comfortably. We will have kids 1 or 2 within 5 years and I want to make sure I have enough for them to be comfortable and for them to go to collegegrad schooletc. without any debt.How should we use our combined income in order to best meet our goals? Im literally lost but whenever I try talking to my parents about it, they laugh and tell me that well be making enough money that itd be crazy to think about a plan: Just dont spend crazily and well be comfortable. Im definitely not trying to brag and I realize were in a very strong position, but I dont like not knowing what Im doing. Any advice will be well received!  <response>: You need to just start writing everything down. You can use a notepad, Excel or any financial software.First, write down your income. Lets just guess and say you will be taking home about 8000 down to maybe 7250 after loan payments per month between the two of you.Then start writing down your expected expenses this is budgeting: Rent - 1,500 Groceries - ? Eating out - ? Entertainment - ? etc.Now spend your first month monitoring how well you budgeted. If you made a mistake, no big deal, just correct it for next month.After your spending has been accounted for, you can do whatever you like with the rest. Your 25k in savings is more than enough for your emergency fund. You can put a little extra aside each month for your new car. Im guessing that your student loan interest rate is going to be about 7 so you will want to pay those down as quickly as possible.Dont worry about the house down payment too much yet. Once you pay down those loans, you can re-direct those massive monthly payments to saving for a down payment.As a twice per week paycheck receiver, there will be 2 months per year when you get 3 paychecks. If you budget each month so that you can only live on 2, you can put that entire paycheck towards whatever your current goal is loan, car, house, etc.You are in great shape. Just start reading up here and you will do fine. 