Excel Financial Models

We build three-statement models that balance, forecast and budget models, transaction and lender models, and unit economics workbooks. Structure comes first: inputs in one place, calculations in another, outputs in a third. Checks sit on the front tab so a broken model says so instead of returning a confident wrong number.

Our work is structural. We separate what is typed from what is calculated, make every formula in a row identical across its columns, replace plugs with real logic, and put error checks where they are visible. Then we document each assumption with its source and its owner. What you get back is a workbook your team can change with confidence and hand to a lender without apologising for it.

Finalert builds and repairs Excel financial models for U.S. companies. Two kinds of work come through the door. The first is a new build: a three-statement model, an operating budget, a lender or transaction model, a unit economics workbook. The second is a rescue, where you have inherited something the business depends on, nobody quite trusts it, and the person who built it is gone. The second is more common and often the more valuable of the two.

We work in Excel and, where your team lives there, in Google Sheets. The structural discipline is the same in either: inputs, calculations and outputs kept apart, one formula repeated consistently across a row, no hard-coded number sitting inside a calculation, and checks that fail visibly. Formatting conventions mark what may be typed and what must never be touched, so the next person to open the file can see the difference immediately.

How a model is built to hold up

A three-statement model has to balance for a reason, not because a plug was inserted to make it close. Profit and loss, balance sheet and cash flow are linked properly, with working capital, debt schedules, fixed assets and tax each driven from their own schedule. When the balance sheet does not tie, the check on the front tab goes red and points at the schedule responsible, which is how you find the error in ten minutes instead of a day.

Every assumption is written down with its value, its source and the person who owns it. Growth rates, headcount plans, payment terms and margin assumptions sit on an input tab where they can be changed and traced, never buried inside a formula halfway across the sheet. Sanity checks run alongside: cash never negative without the facility showing it, depreciation never exceeding the asset base, margins staying inside a range you consider credible.

Inherited workbooks and version control

A rescue starts with an audit, not a rewrite. We trace the formulas, list the inconsistencies, find the hard-coded values and the broken links, and give you a written picture of what the model actually does, including anywhere the current output is wrong. You then decide whether to repair or rebuild. Version control is treated as part of the model: named versions with dates, a change log recording what moved and why, one master file with a clear owner, and inputs isolated so a scenario can be run without editing the logic.

We also agree how the model gets its actuals each period, so the forecast is refreshed on a routine rather than rebuilt from scratch. The limits are worth stating plainly. We build the model and we run it if you want us to. The assumptions and the decisions taken from the output stay with your finance leadership, whose name goes on the numbers. We do not sign tax filings, issue audit or attest opinions, give legal advice, or act as your accountant of record, and a model review is not an audit of your financial statements.