The Life Starter
0 of 6 complete0%
Course Library · Lesson 4 of 6
Money · Guided lesson

Build a twelve-month income forecast

About 22 minutes · 4 reading + 18 practice and checks
Time includes reading, practice, and questions. Extra videos or further study are optional.
See this course’s project requirements

A fictional twelve-month accrual income forecast with demand/capacity drivers, cost behavior, seasonality, sensitivity and revision log.

Keep your working files in your own notebook or software. Save a private description, checklist, and work link in My Proof.

What to include

  • A feasible-unit and earned-revenue driver ledger.
  • A twelve-month seasonal sales and capacity reconciliation.
  • A cost-behavior and monthly profit bridge.
  • A checked twelve-month income statement with annual bridge.
  • A linked price/demand/cost sensitivity with twelve changed rows.
  • An actual-versus-static/flexible profit bridge and revision log.

Review and revise

Use these criteria to check your work and choose what to improve.

  • Drivers: demand/capacity/price/cost assumptions are explicit.
  • Aggregation: all 12 monthly rows reconcile annual profit.
  • Scenarios: linked changes update rounding/capacity consistently.
  • Evidence: actual/flexible/static bridges and historical revisions remain separate.
Open the full course project
Want more background?
Before you begin

The idea in everyday life

Original fictional practice. All money is USD. No account, payment, personal record or outside participation is required. Original fictional service firm: monthly demand Jan.. Dec=80,90,100,110,120,130,140,150,160,170,180,190. Capacity 150 units/month; units=min(demand, capacity), no inventory/backlog. Each delivered unit earns 40 revenue and 22 variable cost; fixed operating expense 1,800/month and noncash depreciation 100/month. No interest, tax or owner withdrawal modeled. Revenue is earned on delivery, not payment arrival. January actual:90 units, price 38, variable cost 23/unit, fixed 1,800, depreciation 100. Linked price scenario: price 44, demand falls 10% rounded down to whole units, capacity 150; other costs initially fixed.

The idea

Annual performance must reconcile to all twelve component periods.

Follow along

Build a twelve-month income forecast — complete worked case

Annual performance must reconcile to all twelve component periods.

Original fictional service firm: monthly demand Jan.. Dec=80,90,100,110,120,130,140,150,160,170,180,190. Capacity 150 units/month; units=min(demand, capacity), no inventory/backlog. Each delivered unit earns 40 revenue and 22 variable cost; fixed operating expense 1,800/month and noncash depreciation 100/month. No interest, tax or owner withdrawal modeled. Revenue is earned on delivery, not payment arrival. January actual:90 units, price 38, variable cost 23/unit, fixed 1,800, depreciation 100. Linked price scenario: price 44, demand falls 10% rounded down to whole units, capacity 150; other costs initially fixed.

Complete monthly drivers

Paste at A1.

AMonthBDemandCCapacityDUnitsERevenueFVariable costGFixed+depreciationHProfit
18015080320017601900-460
29015090360019801900-280
3100150100400022001900-100
411015011044002420190080
5120150120480026401900260
6130150130520028601900440
7140150140560030801900620
8150150150600033001900800
9160150150600033001900800
10170150150600033001900800
11180150150600033001900800
12190150150600033001900800

Copy as plain text
  1. 1. 4.1 Build

    Complete each monthly unit/revenue/cost/profit row using the provided drivers.

    You should see: No hidden annual plug.

  2. 2. 4.2 Build

    Sum annual units, revenue, variable, fixed and depreciation.

    You should see: 1,520/60,800/33,440/21,600/1,200.

  3. 3. 4.3 Build

    Compute annual profit and independently use total contribution less annual monthly pool.

    You should see: Both checks 4,560.

  4. 4. 4.4 Build

    Change all monthly fixed expense to 1,900 while depreciation 100 stays; calculate annual profit 3,360.

    You should see: Extra 1,200 annual cost lowers profit 1,200.

Now change one thing

Keep original annual units 1,520 and contribution 18 each, but monthly fixed cash expense falls to 1,700; depreciation remains 100/month. Enter annual operating profit.

Your work

What to finish

A checked twelve-month income statement with annual bridge.

Common mistake

Watch for this

Replacing monthly data with a target annual profit or hiding losing months.

How can I tell I understand it?

Verify that your completed checked twelve-month income statement with annual bridge meets the three lesson-specific checks and retains the supporting original records.

Try 3 questions

Quick knowledge check

Answer all 3 questions. Get at least 2 right and the lesson completes automatically.

Not yet passed

You’ll get an explanation for each answer. Signed in? Your results save to your account.

1Annual 60,800 revenue less 33,440 variable and 22,800 monthly pool produce profit what?
2What does january profit−460 imply about annual profit 4,560?
3Which independent annual check is tied to the defined drivers?
0 of 3 answeredApply the lesson to a short question, then review the explanation.
4
Finish this lesson

Pass the check. We’ll save the progress.

Answer all 3 questions above and get at least 2 right. You can review the explanations and try again.

Go to the knowledge check
Tools, templates, and lesson sources

Tools and templates

Tools open in a new tab so you can keep your place here.

Sources and further reading

Explore the references behind this lesson.

Open Stax: Operating budgets
Source & access notes · checked 2026-10-01

Read revenue/activity and variable/fixed operating budgets, noncash expense and income-statement assembly; all monthly driver values are original.

Access: Public primary page body opened and relevant sections read through the web reader on 2026-10-01; no account required for reading.

Reuse: Original Life Starter cases, datasets and questions; no source exercise or worked dataset reproduced. Links support further reading.

Report a problem with this lesson

Tell us what went wrong. Please leave out personal information and private project contents.

No sign-in needed.