All the Excel you need to know to make decisions Even if you've never used Excel before, you'll learn all you need to know to build powerful spreadsheets to help you make decisions. You don't need to know anything about programming, statistics, or financial analysis. Most people think of Excel for "number crunching" with complex statistics and analysis. Yes, Excel does this if you have a lot of data to analyze. But usually you don't! For example, you might ask,  "I am 30 years old now, and I want to retire at 55. How much money should I save each year?" What makes this decision hard is the lack of data. Simple Spreadsheets for Hard Decisions focuses on the features and techniques that are useful for real-world decisions like this.

Easy techniques for quickly building useful spreadsheets

How to use spreadsheets to make a decision

Examples of the decisions we all must make are the foundation for presenting these powerful techniques. You will use the techniques to develop spreadsheets that lead you to decisions on increasingly complex sample life challenges. The book is based on example spreadsheets that you may use or modify. Download them here.

Here are some of the decisions included in the book:

• Should I buy a house or rent?
• How much money can I spend?
• Which apartment should I choose?
• Which car should I buy?
• How much do I need to save to send my child to college?
• Which health insurance should I buy?
• Can I afford to retire?
• Should I change jobs?
• Can I handle the risks of aggressive investments?

Introduction

1. Hard Decisions: Deciding with help from Excel

2. Simple Spreadsheets: A workbook and its cells

Case Study 1. How much do I need to save for college? Preview of coming spreadsheets

Case Study 2. Should I change jobs? Pros and cons

3. The Magic Formula: Formulas for a simple spreadsheet

4. Send in the clones: Using AutoFill

Case Study 3. Do I need to cut back on spending? Building a spreadsheet from a single formula

5. Call in the bucket brigade: Complex calculations by cloning simple formulas

6. Decision taming: From a vague question to a spreadsheet answer

Case Study 4. How much can I afford to spend? Building a check register

Case Study 5. Marry a millionaire! Predicting future finances

7. Learning to function: Using Excel’s built-in functions

8. Useful functions: Introducing some handy functions

Case Study 6. Can I afford this car? Loan payments

9. It depends: Using conditionals

Case Study 7. Does my checking account balance? Extending the checkbook spreadsheet

10. Comparing apples and oranges: Making a decision with multiple objectives

Case Study 8. Which apartment should I choose? Even swaps

Case Study 9. Which car should I buy? Balancing multiple objectives

11. Chart your course: Visualizing data with charts

Case Study 10. Which car is the best value? Comparing cost and benefit

Case Study 11. Buy or rent? Comparing annual payments

Case Study 12. Buy or rent? Comparing total costs

Case Study 13. Buy or rent? Present value

Case Study 14. Pension or lump sum? Comparing retirement options

Case Study 15. Do I have enough life insurance? Present value of an income stream

12. Whatever might happen: Using data tables

Case Study 16. Which medical insurance plan? What-if analysis

13. Working backwards: Goal seek

Case Study 17. Are we saving enough for college? Visualizing the future to reach a goal

Case Study 18. Can I afford to retire? Making your money last a lifetime

14. The great unknown: Looking at risks

Case Study 19. Can I afford aggressive investment risks? The chance that your money will last a lifetime

15. The bottom line: Summary

Appendix A: Excel techniques

Appendix B: Useful formulas

Appendix C: Decision questionnaire

Appendix D: Notation

Appendix E: Recommended books

Index