Every place your money lives
Make sure every account is in: every checking, savings, card and loan, so your net worth is the whole truth and not most of it.
Watch
Read the transcript
Hi again. Today we make sure every account is in: every checking, every savings, every card, every loan, so your net worth is the whole truth and not most of it.
Click the Dashboard button at the top of your workbook. The Dashboard opens in a new tab. In the list down the left, click Setup, and Setup opens on step one.
Click Continue through the steps until the top says Step five of five, Your first accounts. Anything you already answered stays as it was.
Click the first box and type a name you will recognise at a glance. Not Account One. Chase Checking. Amex Gold. Honda loan.
Click the Account type box and choose from the list: Personal Checking, Personal.
Click the next box and choose Personal or Business. If you do not run a business, every account is Personal.
Click the next box and choose whether it is something you own or something you owe. An asset is money you own: checking, savings, a house, an investment. A liability is money you owe: a card balance, a loan, a mortgage.
Click the balance box and type what is in it today. For a card or a loan, type the amount you owe as a plain positive number, like twelve hundred, not minus twelve hundred; Setup already knows it is a debt.
Click Add this account. The boxes clear and the account appears under Added so far. Do the next one, and the next, until every account you have is on the list, even the empty card and even the loan. Then click Finish.
Go back to the workbook tab and click the Accounts Directory tab at the bottom. Every account you added is a row: nickname, type, personal or business, asset or liability. This is the other way to add one: click the first empty row, type the nickname, then click each of the next three cells and pick from its dropdown. To fix a name, click it and retype it.
Now click the Monthly Balances tab. Every account is already listed down the left in the same order, with the balance you typed sitting in this month's column. Setup put it there for you.
If you open a new account later, add it on either screen. If you close one, type a zero for it that month and keep its row, so your past months stay as they were.
An account is any place money sits or is owed. The checking you use every day. The savings you forget about. The card with nothing on it. The student loan. If a statement arrives for it, it goes on the list.
The Dashboard reads your workbook the moment you save, so an account you add at nine in the morning is in your net worth at one minute past.
Every account, added once, with a name you will recognise in a year. That is the directory. See you next time.
Hi again. Today we make sure every account is in: every checking, every savings, every card, every loan, so your net worth is the whole truth and not most of it.
Step by step
-
Click the Dashboard button at the top of your workbookThe Dashboard opens in a new tab. In the list down the left, click Setup, and Setup opens on step one.
-
Click Continue through the steps until the top says Step five of five, Your first accountsAnything you already answered stays as it was.
-
Click the first box and type a name you will recognise at a glanceNot Account One. Chase Checking. Amex Gold. Honda loan.
-
Click the Account type box and choose from the list: Personal Checking, Personal
-
Click the next box and choose Personal or BusinessIf you do not run a business, every account is Personal.
-
Click the next box and choose whether it is something you own or something you oweAn asset is money you own: checking, savings, a house, an investment. A liability is money you owe: a card balance, a loan, a mortgage.
-
Click the balance box and type what is in it todayFor a card or a loan, type the amount you owe as a plain positive number, like twelve hundred, not minus twelve hundred; Setup already knows it is a debt.
-
Click Add this accountThe boxes clear and the account appears under Added so far. Do the next one, and the next, until every account you have is on the list, even the empty card and even the loan. Then click Finish.
-
Go back to the workbook tab and click the Accounts Directory tab at the bottomEvery account you added is a row: nickname, type, personal or business, asset or liability. This is the other way to add one: click the first empty row, type the nickname, then click each of the next three cells and pick from its dropdown. To fix a name, click it and retype it.
-
Now click the Monthly Balances tabEvery account is already listed down the left in the same order, with the balance you typed sitting in this month's column. Setup put it there for you.
-
If you open a new account later, add it on either screenIf you close one, type a zero for it that month and keep its row, so your past months stay as they were.