IRA Allocation question

Jennifer L Johnson

I have an IRA that doesn't have shares. My initial purchase has four different indexes. The website shows the percentage value of each one for $70,000 initial purchase and the cash value of each. And the interest rate. My financial person at the bank says I'll be receiving monthly statements. I'm not sure how I should enter this information in Quicken if there are no shares. Thanks!

Jim_Harman

One way to do this would be to create one special security in Quicken, called My IRA or whatever. If you care about tracking your overall asset allocations, you can set the asset allocation for that security to match the percentages of the indices, so if the fund is 30% S&P 500 you would set the Large Cap allocation to 30%, etc. 

Record your initial purchase as 70,000 shares at $1.00. When you make additional contributions, transfer in the cash and buy more shares at $1.00 each. When you get your statement, Add or Remove shares to match the account balance.

Rocket J Squirrel

The simplest thing to do is just keep a cash balance in the Quicken IRA account. Each month, reconcile the cash balance against your printed statement's total value. Quicken will create a transaction to adjust the balance, which you can categorize as IRA Income or whatever you like. And you're done.

Jim's suggestion of creating a fake security will work, but if it spins your head, wait to see the first monthly statement to see exactly what gets reported to you. Then tailor your representation of that data to your liking in Quicken.

Jim_Harman

One way to do this would be to create one special security in Quicken, called My IRA or whatever. If you care about tracking your overall asset allocations, you can set the asset allocation for that security to match the percentages of the indices, so if the fund is 30% S&P 500 you would set the Large Cap allocation to 30%, etc. 

Record your initial purchase as 70,000 shares at $1.00. When you make additional contributions, transfer in the cash and buy more shares at $1.00 each. When you get your statement, Add or Remove shares to match the account balance.

Jennifer L Johnson

It's a little embarrassing that made my head spin, considering I am a free lance bookkeeper . You might have to break it down a little more. As for contributions I don't plan on making any for now. Not wanting to relay too much personal information, but I feel good with what my financial adviser has set up for me. I'm just wanting to show whatever I can in Quicken. Thanks!

Rocket J Squirrel

The simplest thing to do is just keep a cash balance in the Quicken IRA account. Each month, reconcile the cash balance against your printed statement's total value. Quicken will create a transaction to adjust the balance, which you can categorize as IRA Income or whatever you like. And you're done.

Jim's suggestion of creating a fake security will work, but if it spins your head, wait to see the first monthly statement to see exactly what gets reported to you. Then tailor your representation of that data to your liking in Quicken.

Jim_Harman

OK, here is more detail. From what you have said, your account does not have a publicly traded security such as a mutual fund so we will create a special security in Quicken to track it and pretend that it is a mutual fund.

-- Go to Tools > Security List and click on Add Security.
-- Give the new security a name like My IRA that does not match any real security.
-- Click on the Click Here link at the bottom to create the security manually
-- Enter the name again as My IRA and set the security type to Mutual Fund, click Next
-- Specify the asset allocation mix and click OK
-- Un-check Download asset classes
-- Click OK

You now have a security in Quicken that you can buy in the IRA account.

-- Set up the IRA account with no initial balance or securities (I assume you know how to do this) 
-- Go to the account and transfer in the cash from where ever it came from. I think you said $70,000.
-- Buy 70,000 shares of My IRA, using up the $70,000 in the account.
-- When you get the April 30 statement, say it shows your balance as $70,123. In Quicken Add 123 shares at $1.00 per share, total cost $123 on 4/30.
-- Say the next month your balance is 69,900. In Quicken Remove 223 shares at $1.00, total cost $223 on 5/31

Jennifer L Johnson

Thanks to Jim_Harman and Rocket J Squirrel for your responses! I think I'm going to go with Rocket's idea. It does seem weird to me that major financial institutions like BBVA Compass and Global Atlantic are not in Quicken's list of available downloads.