Microsoft Office templates are a powerful way to save lots of time when creating common forms of documents, since they let you get started on a document without beginning from scratch. Whether it be a report template in Word, a budget template in Excel, or a presentation template in PowerPoint, there are all sorts of templates available free to download.

However, chances are you have a document or two that you edit all the time for which no template exists out on the Internet. For those files, you should try creating an Office template — it's easy!

First, create the document, spreadsheet, or presentation that you want to serve as the template. What you create here will be the file that you start with in the future, so make sure you put all the needed info and formatting in before you save it.

Once it's ready, you'll want to save the file with File > Save As, but the trick is to save it as a template file, not a regular one. For Word, this is a .dotx file extension (Word Template) instead of a normal .docx file (Word File). Look for this option in the Save as type: box below the file name field when saving your file.

Saving as a template means that when you double-click on the file, it opens in Word/Excel/PowerPoint like normal, but it opens as Document1 instead of the root file. Thus, when you choose Save for the first time, it prompts you to save it with a new name.

This allows you to start with a base template and create multiple versions of the same document quickly, while also ensuring that you don't accidentally overwrite the template with a quick tap of CTRL + S.

Need an idea to get started? Check out how to create an awesome resume template in Word.

Do you use Office templates? Let us know of your best ones down in the comments!

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