Excel templates · For every business
Capital Requirement Plan Template (Excel) — Free
What you have to spend before the business pays for itself, month by month, ending in the one number a bank, an investor or a grant application is really asking for: the cumulative funding requirement at its deepest point.
The download
Free download
Download: Capital requirement plan
- One-off investments separated from running costs
- Opening stock as its own line, repeated as you restock
- A revenue ramp instead of revenue from month one
- Cumulative funding requirement, month by month
No email, no sign-up. Formulas already wired up.
The sheet itself
- One-off investments separated from running costs
- Opening stock as its own line, repeated as you restock
- A revenue ramp instead of revenue from month one
- Cumulative funding requirement, month by month
| A | B | C | D | E | F | G | H | I | J | K | L | M | N | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Capital requirement plan | |||||||||||||
| 2 | Fill in the blue cells — every other cell is a formula and works itself out. foreqast.app | |||||||||||||
| 3 | Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec | ||
| 4 | ||||||||||||||
| 5 | €22,000 | €0 | €0 | €0 | €8,000 | €0 | €0 | €0 | €0 | €6,000 | €0 | €0 | ||
| 6 | €9,000 | €0 | €0 | €0 | €0 | €0 | €0 | €0 | €0 | €0 | €0 | €0 | ||
| 7 | €34,000 | €0 | €12,000 | €0 | €14,000 | €0 | €16,000 | €0 | €18,000 | €0 | €22,000 | €0 | ||
| 8 | €65,000 | €0 | €12,000 | €0 | €22,000 | €0 | €16,000 | €0 | €18,000 | €6,000 | €22,000 | €0 | ||
| 9 | ||||||||||||||
| 10 | €6,500 | €6,500 | €6,500 | €6,500 | €11,000 | €11,000 | €11,000 | €11,000 | €15,500 | €15,500 | €15,500 | €15,500 | ||
| 11 | €2,200 | €2,200 | €2,200 | €2,200 | €2,200 | €2,200 | €2,200 | €2,200 | €2,200 | €2,200 | €2,200 | €2,200 | ||
| 12 | €3,000 | €3,000 | €4,000 | €4,000 | €5,000 | €5,000 | €6,000 | €6,000 | €6,000 | €7,000 | €8,000 | €8,000 | ||
| 13 | €1,400 | €1,400 | €1,400 | €1,400 | €1,400 | €1,400 | €1,400 | €1,400 | €1,400 | €1,400 | €1,400 | €1,400 | ||
| 14 | €13,100 | €13,100 | €14,100 | €14,100 | €19,600 | €19,600 | €20,600 | €20,600 | €25,100 | €26,100 | €27,100 | €27,100 | ||
| 15 | ||||||||||||||
| 16 | €0 | €3,000 | €8,000 | €14,000 | €21,000 | €28,000 | €36,000 | €42,000 | €49,000 | €55,000 | €63,000 | €71,000 | ||
| 17 | €0 | €1,260 | €3,360 | €5,880 | €8,820 | €11,760 | €15,120 | €17,640 | €20,580 | €23,100 | €26,460 | €29,820 | ||
| 18 | €-78,100 | €-11,360 | €-21,460 | €-5,980 | €-29,420 | €-3,360 | €-15,720 | €3,760 | €-14,680 | €-200 | €-12,560 | €14,080 | ||
| 19 | €0 | €-78,100 | €-89,460 | €-110,920 | €-116,900 | €-146,320 | €-149,680 | €-165,400 | €-161,640 | €-176,320 | €-176,520 | €-189,080 | ||
| 20 | €-78,100 | €-89,460 | €-110,920 | €-116,900 | €-146,320 | €-149,680 | €-165,400 | €-161,640 | €-176,320 | €-176,520 | €-189,080 | €-175,000 | ||
The blue cells are yours to fill in. Every other cell is a formula and works itself out.
How to use it
- 1
List the investments at what they cost to pay for
Gross, including VAT, in the month the invoice is due. The input tax comes back later and belongs in a different row, not netted off here.
- 2
Ramp revenue the way it really starts
Almost nothing in month 1, a little in month 2. The template starts at zero and reaches €71,000 in month 12; steepen or flatten it, but do not begin at full speed.
- 3
Keep your own living costs in the plan
Founder pay belongs in the payroll row from month one. A capital requirement that assumes you live on nothing for a year is a requirement you will exceed.
- 4
Take the deepest point, then add a reserve
The lowest cumulative figure is the minimum funding. Add 20–30% — every plan meets one delay, and the reserve is cheaper than a second round of applications.
A worked example
€65,000 of setup and a slow first quarter
- Investments, month 1
- €65,000
- Running costs, month 1
- €13,100
- Revenue, month 1
- €0
- Cumulative requirement, month 3
- €-121,768
- Deepest point, month 11
- €-208,886
The first three months alone need €122,000. But the plan keeps investing in stock as it grows, so the deepest point is not at the start — it is in month 11, at €209,000. Funding the opening quarter and assuming the rest pays for itself is how a business that is growing runs out of money.
The mistakes that break it
Only funding the launch
The requirement peaks when growth is fastest, not when you open. Look at the whole curve, not the first quarter.
Netting VAT off the investments
You pay the gross amount now and get the input tax back weeks later. Netting it off understates the requirement by around 16%.
Forgetting the stock the growth needs
Doubling revenue means doubling the stock you carry, months before the revenue arrives. That is the biggest single line in most retail plans.
Where the template stops
It assumes the revenue ramp holds
Push every revenue month back by eight weeks and the requirement grows by a third. The sheet cannot show you that without a second copy.
Scenario planning templateA month is an average, and cash is not
A month that ends positive can still go below zero on the 14th, when payroll leaves before the biggest invoice arrives. Column totals hide exactly that.
It is only as current as your last evening with it
Every number in here is typed in. The month you skip is the month the sheet quietly stops describing your business — and it never says so.
What comes after the spreadsheet
Calculate runwayThe plan says when the money gets tight. This says how many months you have, from your own accounting data, updated daily.Calculators