What Is the Cash Map?
By Ryan Inman
Published ยท Updated
What it is
The Cash Map sorts a physician household's monthly take home into three columns, Needs, Goals, and Wants, so every dollar has a job, and whatever cannot be accounted for is shown on its own unmapped line.
A Cash Map starts as a sketch from memory, drawn in about ten minutes. The household writes down one month of take home and sorts it from memory, column by column. The audit version comes later and uses real statements. The sketch comes first because the gap between what a household remembers spending and what the statements show is where the useful questions live.
The Cash Map is the method behind the Cash Map Sketch, one of the free icebreakers. The prompts send the model to this page to learn the method before it sorts any numbers, and the standing AI Icebreaker Rules govern how that work gets done. The page is public and ungated, so a model can always open it.
The three columns
- Needs The monthly costs that keep the household running. Housing, minimum debt payments, insurance premiums, childcare or school, groceries and household basics. A Need is a cost the household cannot skip this month without something breaking.
- Goals The dollars already leaving automatically toward named goals. A goal with no name attached is the classic mislabel. Unnamed savings is not a Goal yet, because money with no name gets spent like money with no job.
- Wants Everything else the household chooses. Travel, dining, help, subscriptions. Wants are not bad, and nothing in this column gets shamed. The method makes cash visible. It does not judge what it shows.
- Unmapped Take home minus the three columns, stated explicitly even when it is zero, never hidden inside miscellaneous. The unmapped line is the most useful number on the map, because it is the money no one can currently account for.
Where it shows on the show
It shows any time a household earns well and still cannot say where the money went. That is the normal starting picture in physician households, because the income arrives in large steps and the spending sorts itself without ever being looked at.
It shows at the attending transition, when take home multiplies and every column grows at once. A map drawn in the first attending year catches the spending shape before it hardens into fixed costs.
It shows when two earners keep separate accounts and neither one sees the whole month. The map is drawn on the combined take home, so the household gets one picture instead of two partial ones.
Financial Health Assessment episodes work from the household's cash picture, and the Cash Map is the sorting tool behind that work. Physician households can submit their own finances at financialfellowship.com/submit.
What it is not
No spending gets judged on a Cash Map, and no spending gets graded. The map makes cash visible, and what a household does with what it sees is a separate conversation. A Cash Map is also not an audit. The sketch is drawn from memory in about ten minutes. The audit version, built from real statements, is different work done at a different time.
Not to be confused with the 3 Bucket Framework, which sorts money already held by time horizon into the Safety Net, the Wealth Engine, and the Accelerator. The Cash Map sorts this month's take home by job. Money already held is a horizon question. This month's pay is a job question.
The main points
- Every dollar of take home gets a job: a Need, a Goal, or a Want.
- Goals carry a name. Unnamed savings is not a Goal yet.
- Wants are listed without shame. The map shows cash. It does not judge it.
- The unmapped line is stated out loud, even when it is zero.
- Sketch from memory in about ten minutes. Audit later, with real statements.
Common questions
What is a cash map?
A Cash Map sorts a physician household's monthly take home into three columns, Needs, Goals, and Wants, so every dollar has a job. Whatever cannot be accounted for is shown on its own unmapped line.
What counts as a Need, and what counts as a Want?
Needs are the monthly costs that keep the household running: housing, minimum debt payments, insurance premiums, childcare or school, groceries and household basics. Wants are everything else the household chooses, such as travel, dining, help, and subscriptions.
What is the unmapped line?
The unmapped line is take home minus the three columns. It is stated explicitly even when it is zero, and it is never hidden inside miscellaneous. It is the most useful number on the map, because it shows the money no one can currently account for.
How is the Cash Map different from the 3 Bucket Framework?
The 3 Bucket Framework sorts money already held, by time horizon, into the Safety Net, the Wealth Engine, and the Accelerator. The Cash Map sorts this month's take home, by job, into Needs, Goals, and Wants, with the unmapped remainder shown.