# Cash Flow

Cash flow is the net amount of money moving in and out of your accounts over a period. Positive cash flow means you're earning more than you spend; negative cash flow means the opposite.

## Why it matters

You can have a high net worth and still face a cash flow crisis — equity in a house doesn't pay the electric bill. Tracking cash flow weekly or monthly reveals whether your day-to-day finances are sustainable, and it's the earliest warning sign of trouble before debt starts accumulating.

Example

If you earned $4,800 this month and spent $4,200, your cash flow is +$600 — money available for savings or debt payoff.

## How Ray helps

Ray aggregates all your income and expenses across connected accounts to show real-time cash flow. Run to see exactly how much money came in vs. went out, broken down by category.

Terminal

`$ ray "what's my cash flow this month?"`

## Related terms

[Net Income](/content/learn/net-income/index.html) — Net income is your take-home pay after all deductions — federal and state taxes, Social Security, Medicare, health insurance premiums, and retirement contributions.

[Budget](/content/learn/budget/index.html) — A budget is a plan for how you'll allocate your income across spending categories, savings, and debt payments over a set period — usually monthly.

[Savings Rate](/content/learn/savings-rate/index.html) — Your savings rate is the percentage of your income that you save or invest rather than spend.

[Net Worth](/content/learn/net-worth/index.html) — Net worth is the total value of everything you own (assets) minus everything you owe (liabilities).

[Liquidity](/content/learn/liquidity/index.html) — Liquidity refers to how quickly and easily you can convert an asset to cash without significant loss in value.

## Try Ray free

Open source, local-first, and takes five minutes to set up.

`$npm install -g ray-finance` [View on GitHub](https://github.com/cdinnison/ray-finance)