Keeping a Team Budget is Like Being a Fortune 500 Company Accountant

As an actual CPA - let me suggest a good spreadsheet or I actually use QuickBooks.  Also I suggest only one person do any buying as that is what causes all the issues and I have gone through that already with giant spreadsheets and formulas to make it all work.

What I do is set a budget - everyone puts in their share and if someone has to leave early or we don't do an equal event those event costs get shared differently - takes the hard part of first getting all the information and then trueing it up. As what happens is me (the bank) get left paying out more than a I should and then have to try and collect.  If we have extra great as honestly something always breaks or we need more tires, oil and small parts anyway that can easily eat up any excess.  Also makes it easier on the guys to know or choose how much they want to spent each year. We shoot for 2-4 races per year as we are down in TX and don't have as many races going on near us as many other places in the country.

Before each race (months before) - I will set a budget once we know who is going and what cars we are bringing as we have basically 4 cars and 6 drivers - so depending on the series we bring 2-3 cars per race and split up all fees, food and fuel among those who are signing up to participate - then I set the driving schedule based on that. So if someone only wants partial that is fine as the rest of us are generally happy for more track time or we can sell a seat or partial seat as we happen to have at least a few guys just itching to come play!

We don't pay fees.  It is "send money to family and friends" but used to be called "gift".

We have always split costs, so no one person is stuck paying $$$$ and then waiting for reimbursement.  Getting a pre-payment would be fine, but then there'd still be adjustments after the race for the inevitable random expenditures.  we don't do A&Ds, everyone splits all costs equally, unless there's some extenuating circumstance. 

Selling partial seats is an intriguing idea, though each driver would still have to buy a wristband.  Might look into that for the next race. 

Venmo sounds neat, too, though we always use the "send $$ to friends" Paypal thing so there's no fees.

I just figure what seems like a fair price for whatever I'm bringing to the race (Pinto$ <Mustang$<Galaxie$).  I then spend way more than my share and wonder where all the money goes.

I find this to be much simpler than spreadsheets and accounting BS.

I think it would depend on the make-up of your team, a single owner vs. team ownership.

I am somewhere between RobL and Mr. Crapper.  I try to figure all the expenses, including adding some for items that are only replaced every few races, or years.  I usually end up paying slightly more than my A&D's. 

Any improvements I make to the car I pay for myself, since I am the sole owner.

Every year, we review the actual expenses that were incurred and come up with a spreadsheet that estimates consumables for the car and fees for the next year. Then I pad it a little and use whatever extra there is to make material improvements to the car. We set numbers for a race and for an HPDE (HPDE's are cheaper because we can use crappy used brakes and tires) and divide the total by the number of drivers at the event. My brother collects the money and disburses it because he's good at that stuff (I am horrible with money) and I own/maintain the car because that's what I'm OCD about. Price-wise, we are not very cheap, but we are generally well prepared to run properly all weekend, and that costs more.

Drivers buy their own gas. Each driver is issued two fuel jugs on Friday, and all jugs need to be full before the race starts on Saturday. We generally have a little fuel left over, which goes in our POV's or the RV tank on Sunday afternoon.

Food is up to the drivers. I'm fine with a can of collard greens, a can of baked beans, and a pack of hot dogs, and I generally keep enough canned goods in the RV to feed the team all weekend, but Robert and Charles will bring fresh food and prepare it, while Robert and I each make ten gallons of beer that we can trade for food.

There are only 4 of us and one car, and three of us have known each other for well over ten years, while the 4th is someone that we'll probably still be racing with ten years from now if he can put up with us for that long. Sometimes we'll invite someone that we like to drive the car if we need an extra driver, but not often.

I'm done trying to make it fair and splitting things up. We used to try to total the car expenses, and then divide entry fees and make everyone pay that. No more, I'm done.

For the new car I'm building it. I'll pay every last dime. Then come next spring it's flat fee. Want to race? It's (I'm making up a number) $600 each. That pays for entrance, cost to build the car back to me, cost to maintain, spares, etc. Paypal me the money before the entrance deadline or you don't race.

Wow, I never thought it was that complicated. 

We use a simple Google spreadsheet to keep track.  The cost for items used in each race are split equally among four drivers.  Since everyone sends Jay their own drivers entry fee plus 1/4 of the car entry fee, we don't include that on the spreadsheet.  We split hotel costs, towing fuel, race fuel, tires, brakes, any other consumables by four.   After the race is over, we 'settle' up via PayPal so within a week we are all even again.

Costs for anything not related to the actual event (fire suppression system, clutch, bearings, shocks, fuel jugs, radios, etc) are kept on a separate spreadsheet and all costs are split equally among our 5 owners.

We have done it this way for 8 years now and have never had one arguement or anything over the financials.

I pay for everything and then hopefully get the guys to buy a tire or brake pads or fluids. Something that has to be purchased or the car does not run. "We can't race on THREE tires, come on, sell some plasma."

We all true up on the prep expenses before a race. Then have everybody put cash in an envelope on Friday night. If you go to the store you take the cash and replace spent funds with receipts. If there is leftover money (which there normally is not) then the decision is made before leaving the track to split it amongst the car owners or leave it in the envelope for repairs and race prep for the next race.

I would think the meals is where it would make it harder to account for the money so we don't really plan for them. Even if you are racing the car one stint for the weekend the car expenses are split between the owners evenly.

Our meals usually consist of pizza delivered to the track Saturday night and a pre-planned dinner on Friday which everyone pitches into out of their pocket. Munchies and such at the track are the individuals responsibility so lunch for most of the team is a burger and fries from the snack shack.

It tends to work pretty well for us. I have seen the team debit card and love the idea. Just too lazy to go open another bank account.