Microsoft Excel is a wonderful tool for helping us make decisions in our lives about the things that matter most to us: especially about business and household finance-related issues.
One of the most useful applications of Excel for helping you make decisions is to use it to create what-if scenarios. In other words, you can set up simple (or complex) mathematical models which predict different outcomes depending upon certain variables.
Depending on how you set it up, Excel to tell you:
a. how long it will take you to pay down your mortgage if you make an extra payment each month
b. how long it will take you to save for your kids’ educations by putting away a certain amount each month
c. how much you will save in investments if you put more money toward your IRA vs. keeping your money in CDs, assuming certain returns
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