Earn in USD, live in pesos: the real monthly worksheet

By Daniil Kozin · ex-banker · Florianópolis

The worksheet has seven lines and you fill it in once a month: how many dollars came in, what the fees took, what your effective exchange rate was, how much you set aside for taxes in USD, how much you converted to live on, how much stayed in dollars, and how the month closed against the plan. Twenty minutes on payday, and the rest of the month runs on autopilot.

A while back I wrote the manual for getting paid in dollars while living in pesos: the rails, the accounts, the strategy. This is the missing half, the concrete worksheet you fill in every month once the setup is behind you. I spent years in banking and now build an expense tracker, and both jobs showed me the same scene: people with hard-currency income who still reach the end of the month squeezed, because between the dollar they invoice and the peso they spend sit five decisions nobody taught them to take in order. The worksheet is that order. If you are still choosing your tracking system, start with the best money tracker of 2026.

Why do you need a monthly worksheet if you already earn dollars?

Because earning a hard currency orders nothing by itself: it only changes the size of your mistakes. Without a worksheet you convert whenever the pesos run out, at whatever rate that day offers, you pay fees two and three times over, and taxes arrive as a February surprise. The worksheet turns those five loose decisions into a twenty-minute payday routine with fixed numbers.

Dollar income plays a psychological trick: it feels big. Two thousand dollars sounds roomy until rent, building fees and groceries, all riding an inflation rate that ran at 2.1 percent monthly in May 2026 per INDEC, quietly chew through the margin. The freelancer without a worksheet never sees the slide, because his mental unit is still the dollar, and the dollar does not tell him his peso costs rose 14.7 percent in the first five months of the year. The worksheet forces both currencies onto the same page, once a month, without drama.

Which exchange rate do you plan the month with?

Your effective rate: the pesos that landed in your account divided by the dollars you sold. Forget the blue rate on the board and the official rate in the news: your number is what remains after fees and spread. On July 3, 2026 the blue traded at 1,510 pesos with a 3.1 percent gap over the official rate, yet what you receive for a Payoneer or Deel dollar always lands somewhat below that board.

The classic mistake is planning with the published number and discovering at month's end that pesos are missing. Every rail charges its toll: Payoneer takes up to 2 percent depending on the method, Deel lets you withdraw through bank transfers, wallets or crypto with each path carrying its own cost, and the exchange or bank adds spread on conversion. None of those deductions appear in the quoted rate. That is why line three of the worksheet is computed by your own division: 1,639,000 pesos received over 1,100 dollars sold gives 1,490, about 1.3 percent below that day's board. That 1.3 percent is your real cost of living between two currencies, and you only see it if you write it down.

How is the monthly worksheet built, line by line?

Seven lines, filled in order on payday: gross USD income, rail fees, effective exchange rate, tax set-aside in dollars, monthly conversion with a 10 percent buffer, what stays in USD, and last month's close against its plan. Each line answers exactly one question and none of them needs an accountant.

1. Gross USD income. What you invoiced, before everything. July: US$2,000.
2. Rail fees. What the platform took. Payoneer at 2 percent: US$40. Net: US$1,960.
3. Effective rate. Pesos received over dollars sold: 1,639,000 / 1,100 = 1,490.
4. Tax set-aside in USD. 15 percent of net: US$294 into a sub-balance you do not look at.
5. Monthly conversion. Peso budget (1,480,000) plus a 10 percent buffer: you convert US$1,100.
6. Dollar cushion. 1,960 minus 294 minus 1,100: US$566 stays untouched.
7. Last month's close. Actual spending against budget; the gap adjusts next month's line 5.

How much do you convert to pesos and how much stays in dollars?

You convert your monthly budget plus a 10 percent buffer, and not a dollar more. The budget comes from last month's close: what you actually spent, not what you would like to spend. Everything else stays in dollars, because a peso sitting in the account loses 2.1 percent of its purchasing power per month at May's inflation pace.

The temptation to convert everything at once is understandable: one operation, one fee, one decision. The arithmetic is what kills it. With year-on-year inflation at 33.2 percent, the extra pesos you converted in July are visibly worth less by October. The opposite direction punishes too: falling short sends you into a rushed second conversion, with fresh fees, at whatever rate catches you without margin. The 10 percent buffer exists precisely for that; it absorbs the building-fee hike or the unplanned dinner without opening another exchange operation. If your income also swings month to month, the trailing-average method from budgeting on irregular income plugs straight into this worksheet: the average sets line 5 and the good months fatten line 6.

How do you set aside taxes without an accountant?

With a fixed-percentage rule applied the day you get paid: 10 to 15 percent of net income goes to a USD sub-balance before you convert anything. For most independent workers under Argentina's simplified regime that covers the monthly quota and recategorizations with room to spare. The order matters more than the exact number: taxes come off the top, not out of whatever survives the month.

Setting aside in dollars rather than pesos has a simple logic: the obligation arrives in pesos, but a peso parked in July has already lost value when October's payment comes due. A dollar parked keeps its purchasing power and gets converted only when needed. The 2026 rules help more than most people realize: Argentina's central bank lets freelancers receive up to 36,000 dollars a year without any obligation to convert them to pesos, so keeping your tax reserve in USD is fully legal for almost any individual billing level. If your business has outgrown the simplified regime, a fixed percentage stops being enough and an accountant stops being optional; the worksheet does not replace that jump, it just warns you early, because line 1 shows it growing month after month.

Which tool tracks a two-currency worksheet without manual work?

Any tool that records each expense in its original currency and converts on demand, at the rate of the day the expense happened rather than some invented average. That is the acid test: if the tool forces you to pick a single currency at setup, the two-currency worksheet does not fit inside it, and you are back in the spreadsheet by month two.

One caveat on that table. If your financial life is 100 percent in one currency, YNAB's envelope method goes deeper than Capi on budget discipline, and a well-built spreadsheet owes nobody an apology. The case where Capi wins is exactly this article's case: expenses born in two currencies. You log the coffee in pesos and the software subscription in dollars exactly as they happened, and the month's total appears in whichever currency you ask for, each conversion done at the rate of the expense's own day. Zen Money is the most serious multi-currency rival; I wrote the full Capi vs Zen Money comparison for that matchup. If you split costs with a partner across borders, multi-currency budgeting for expats walks the shared version, and the 50/30/20 rule across currencies shows where the classic ratios bend.

What changes when the exchange-rate gap is 3 percent?

The villain changes. With the July 2026 gap at 3.1 percent, choosing the right dollar stopped being the big decision: blue and official sit 45 pesos apart, not the hundreds of the 100-percent-gap era. Today the real leaks are rail fees, conversion spread and inflation on idle pesos.

This simplifies the worksheet but does not retire it. The effective-rate line is no longer for picking a market; it now polices the middlemen: if your effective rate drifts more than 2 percent from the board, some link in your payment chain is overcharging and deserves a comparison against another rail. And the conversion and buffer lines matter more than ever, because with the gap flattened, monthly inflation is the only silent tax left on your pesos. Argentina's history says gaps reopen without asking permission; a worksheet that already tracks your effective rate every month is also the earliest alarm you can own.

Frequently asked questions about the two-currency worksheet

Which exchange rate should I plan with if I get paid through Payoneer or Deel?

Your effective rate, not the published one. Divide the pesos that landed in your account by the dollars you sold; that is line three of the worksheet. Payoneer charges up to 2 percent in fees and every rail adds its own spread, so the rate you actually receive always sits below the quoted blue rate. Plan the month with your number, not the newspaper's.

How many dollars should I convert to pesos each month?

Your monthly peso budget plus a 10 percent buffer, and nothing more. With Argentine inflation at 2.1 percent monthly as of May 2026, idle pesos lose purchasing power week by week. Converting too much donates that margin to inflation; converting too little forces a second sale with fresh fees. The 10 percent buffer absorbs surprises without leaving much sitting idle.

How do I set aside taxes without an accountant?

Move a fixed percentage of your net income, usually 10 to 15 percent, into a separate USD balance the day you get paid. Setting it aside in dollars matters because the obligation arrives months later, and pesos parked since July have already lost value by October. The rule beats the exact percentage: taxes come off the top, not out of whatever is left.

Does the same worksheet work in Mexico or Colombia?

Yes, with one line of stress removed. Mexico and Colombia have no exchange-rate gap, so the effective-rate line only compares your net rate against the interbank rate to measure what fees are eating. Every other line stays identical: rail fees, tax set-aside in dollars, monthly conversion with a buffer, and the remainder kept in USD.

What does Capi do that a spreadsheet does not?

The spreadsheet waits for you to fill it; Capi fills the worksheet while you live. You log each expense in Telegram by text, voice note or receipt photo, in the currency it happened in, and Capi stores the original amount with that day's rate and shows the month in pesos or dollars on demand. Free for 30 transactions a month, Core at US$69.90 a year.