Construction for dummies in Russia: save money and mind. Alexander Kalashnikov

But some stages of work are more expensive, and some are cheaper – this must be planned and taken into account. In addition, there are projects that you finance for several months, and only then begin to receive a return on investment from them.

      And we do the same for all existing projects on a monthly basis.

      Do not duplicate or confuse individual indicators

      Keep in mind that if you keep records of receipts without VAT, accordingly, its amount paid to the budget should not be included in the payment plan, since it is already “as if paid”. But to complete the picture, it is better to keep records of both revenue and cost including VAT, and take into account its amount in taxes planned for payment.

      The same applies to depreciation charges. If you keep a record of them as part of the costs, do not forget to reflect the increase in the size of the depreciation fund in the cash balance, because. these funds are essentially real money, and when buying or repairing equipment (when spending), they are deducted from it.

      It is also necessary to separate loan payments and payments to suppliers. What you pay suppliers is an expense. Interest on a loan is also an expense, and repayment of the principal amount of debts is reflected in the balance sheet as a reduction in debt to creditors.

      We build a graph (table)

      The principle of constructing cash flow ( cash flow ) is very simple, but very informative. We need to compare monthly revenue with expenses. You can accept other periods – at least a week, at least a quarter – but usually all payments occur within one month, and the consolidation of periods is acceptable for long-term planning of future and long-term projects, and not current and those that are already on the way.

      The data taken as an example assumes the presence of profitability in the range from 10 to 20% and a certain lag in the return on invested funds from the start of project expenditures. The first project can be the main activity. And all the rest are either the same, meaning just an additional amount of work, or fundamentally different, but generating income.

      Table 1

      Cash Flow Calculation Example

      Rice. 1. Graphical display of cash flow to Table 1

      Explanations

      Cash flow is defined as the difference between receipts and expenditures over a period—in our case, a month.

      Cash at the beginning – in our example, this is a conditional 1000 rubles. free cash that you have at the very beginning of the period under review. It can be equal to zero or negative – but it should reflect the real state of affairs at the moment.

      Accordingly, the amount at the end of the period is the amount of money at its beginning plus cash flow.

      The amount at the beginning of each period is the amount at the end of the previous period, so in the table the amount at the end changes on an accrual basis throughout the year, incorporating the cash flow values in each of the periods.