Everyone probably does it a little differently depending on our situations. I think a major factor is how much you weigh to begin with. If you weigh more, you can eat more calories and lose. Another major factor is exercise. Exercise a lot, you can eat more calories. But either way, when you're close to your goal, you have to eat less calories or exercise more or both and even then, it comes off much slower.
Personally, I had 25 pounds to lose and lost 35. I went from 156 to 121. I kept track of every single calorie at [url="http://www.******.com."]www.******.com.[/url] I ate 1200 calories a day, every single day. I did zero exercise.
Since I've lost the weight, I eat between 1300-1400 calories a day to maintain. Zero exercise.
Now I'm sure I could have ate more if I'd have exercised OR I could have still ate 1200 calories a day and just lost faster.
My philosophy was this: I don't know one person, nor have I ever known one person, in my entire life that exercises on a regular basis and has been doing it for years. Not one person, and I'm 43 years old. Now sure I've known people who do exercise but I'd guess over 90% of them were trying to lose weight and eventually quit. I didn't want to use exercise to burn calories as I know I'd never keep on doing it forever. I was very realistic with the way I know I am, which is too lazy to keep up an exercise regime for years.
I choose to only use calorie control. As a consequence of this. I can't eat much because I'm not burning much. But that's ok with me as I'm not going to exercise. HA! I'm not saying this is right or healthy or any other thing. I'm just telling you how I did it.
If I set my calories at 1650, I'd gain, no doubt. But again, I don't exercise. I didn't get headaches.
Good luck to you happy.
Calories, calories, calories 
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