Cash Balance not reflecting Buy transactions in Quicken Mac 2019

christinelisko

I recently imported my Windows QDF to Mac 2019.  I have 4 investment accounts, and one one of them, none of the "buy" transactions are decreasing the cash balance.   I've tried entering a new transaction and same issue.   This is only a problem on one of the accounts - it is a 401(k) account, but my other 401(k) works just fine.   Any ideas on how to fix this?

John_in_NC

I suspect you will find this a result of a "Placeholder" transaction at the beginning of your register offsetting your changes. (These placeholders act like opening balance adjustments for cash/share balances. They will auto-adjust depending on the circumstance.) They will show up in light gray.

Look at the beginning of your register before and after you enter this buy. I suspect you will see the cash balance placeholder changing. Moreover, take a look at the share balance for that fund-it too might be adjusting and you hadn't noticed.

Placeholders serve their purpose, so it isn't simply a matter of deleting it (and that might be the case.) If it is adjusting the balance correctly before your transactions, you can always recreate the placeholder transaction exactly as is (add shares, adjusting cash, etc.) so that it becomes a static transaction that won't auto adjust. Then you could delete the placeholder.

Make backups before you make any changes.

jacobs

You almost certainly have a "placeholder transaction" in that account (almost always the first transaction in the register). Read about what Placeholders are, and how to get rid of them here:

https://community.quicken.com/discussion/7658265/faq-what-are-placeholder-transactions-in-quicken-for-mac

and here:

https://www.quicken.com/support/about-placeholder-entries

christinelisko

I actually do not have any placeholder transactions. This file was imported from a Windows version and the Windows version was just fine.

Once it came over to the Mac, it had issues with the cash balance.

John_in_NC

Look again. You might not have had one on the Win side, and you might not need one on the Mac side. But, I am confident one is working against you here.

christinelisko

I do not have any placeholder or cash balance adjustment transactions. This is how I was able to correct the problem - I entered a transaction to add cash ($1) to the account, Quicken displayed a message "there is no cash balance in this account" or something to that effect, pressed ok to continue. As soon as I did that - all of the "cash out" fields filled in. I then entered a normal buy transaction after that to confirm a new entry would work - it did. I later deleted my $1 transaction and it still looks good. So my guess here - for some reason - is that this particular account's conversion from my windows file ran into some hiccup (a technical term) and didn't quite convert correctly.

Greg228

THANKS christinelisko!!!! Such a stupid "feature". I am quicken Mac 2019 as well. New job, new 401k acct, always been Mac, same problem. So it isn't a Win->Mac conversion issue. It's a "new 401k acct in Mac" issue. I did the same thing, add a $1 cash transaction, got the "warning" you described and all is well. I had another twist. I had a "transfer" in my paycheck detail from my checking to the 401k as a "payment/deposit". Apparently that automatic cash entry isn't enough to trigger this fix. I had to do the manual payment transaction as you did and now all is well. I guess Quicken figures we'll track our 401k details, but not the contribution details from our paycheck. OR is there a better mechanism for that part of the paycheck detail?
Thanks again!