Savings Goals Impact Account Balances

A1MB1G

My only gripe with the Savings Goals functionality in quicken is that money is physically taken out of the bank account and placed into the Savings Goal account. The reason it's a bit of a gripe is that the bank account no longer reflects the actual account balance at the bank.

How is everyone dealing/handling this? I would like to use this feature more but wondering if there's a more intuitive way to think about it that would allow me to get over this issue?

For example, I want to put aside $7,500 for my daughter's tuition due next July 2020. I wish there was a way, similar to envelope budgeting, where you can still setup the savings goal but the money isn't physically removed from the account. Any suggestions?

NotACPA

"How is everyone dealing/handling this?"

They're not using Savings Goals ... which are functioning exactly as designed, by removing the appearance of money from the account so that you don't spend it on something else.

AND, when you reconcile the account (you DO that, don't you?) the money will re-appear to make the reconciliation work... but then disappear again when you've completed the reconciliation.

A1MB1G

I was not aware that when reconciling the accounts, the money re-appears and then disappears again, that makes more sense. I'm new to Quicken 2019 so trying to figure out how best to handle future expenses that require that I save a little bit each month so that when the time comes, I'll have the money set aside for it.

Right now, I'm debating between using the rollover feature on the budget screen to ensure I have enough in the future for those items or setting up a savings goal, haven't yet decided which way makes more sense. Thanks for the feedback.

Sherlock

A1MB1G said:

My only gripe with the Savings Goals functionality in quicken is that money is physically taken out of the bank account and placed into the Savings Goal account. The reason it's a bit of a gripe is that the bank account no longer reflects the actual account balance at the bank.

How is everyone dealing/handling this? I would like to use this feature more but wondering if there's a more intuitive way to think about it that would allow me to get over this issue?

For example, I want to put aside $7,500 for my daughter's tuition due next July 2020. I wish there was a way, similar to envelope budgeting, where you can still setup the savings goal but the money isn't physically removed from the account. Any suggestions?

Instead of using a Savings Goals, I would use a reminder.

A1MB1G

> @Sherlock said:
> (Quote)
> Instead of using a Savings Goals, I would use a reminder.

If I use a reminder, how would I track any progress towards that goal? The reminder is good because I can see it in the forecast and bills section, but there's nothing that really helps me isolate where I'm at with that particular savings goal? I like to put aside a little bit each month to achieve that goal.

For example, if there's 12 months left before I have to pay the $7,500, I want to set aside $625/mth towards that goal so that in 12 months time, I have the cash available for that expense. I'm so used to envelope budgeting that it's taking me a bit to wrap my head around how things work in Quicken.

Sherlock

A1MB1G said:

> @Sherlock said:
> (Quote)
> Instead of using a Savings Goals, I would use a reminder.

If I use a reminder, how would I track any progress towards that goal? The reminder is good because I can see it in the forecast and bills section, but there's nothing that really helps me isolate where I'm at with that particular savings goal? I like to put aside a little bit each month to achieve that goal.

For example, if there's 12 months left before I have to pay the $7,500, I want to set aside $625/mth towards that goal so that in 12 months time, I have the cash available for that expense. I'm so used to envelope budgeting that it's taking me a bit to wrap my head around how things work in Quicken.

There are a variety of way to track progress toward a goal using a reminder.  You could use a transfer reminder to fund a Savings Goal account, if hiding the funds is what you desire, or a cash account.  Or, you may allow a reminder to be past due and accumulate.  The accumulation may be observed in the register or in the various Bill views.  My preferred approach is to view the accumulation in the Projected Balances view.

For your example, I would create a manual bill reminder set to $625/month for 12 months clearly identified as being for the goal.  To get a feel for how this works, save a backup (press Ctrl + B) you'll restore when you're done playing and create a test reminder with an initial due date on 1/1/2019.   On the Projected Balances view, select the source account and select a date range of say 90 days.  You should see the projected impact of the $5000 accumulation of the 8 overdue reminders on the account balance both graphically and in the sortable table view as well as the impact of 3 of the 4 remaining reminders for the next 90 days.  When you no longer need the reminder, you may simply delete it.  

richard13

> @A1MB1G said:
> ...Right now, I'm debating between using the rollover feature on the budget screen to ensure I have enough in the future...
>

This is how I have been doing long term funding (for instance, for Electronics and Vacation). But it also feels a little weird to have a ton of money in your budget that really has nothing to do with month to month expenditures. I was considering using Savings Goals for these but I don't know how I'd feel about having balances in my account(s) that aren't true either. I suppose I could try it.

In your case I think either approach would work just fine. You are saving for a goal that explicitly ends in a year. Whereas I'm just stacking money for some purchases "sometime in the future". Also, I find that going more than a year in Budgets with rollover leads to balance problems (due to bugs). So I may just do something like Sherlock suggested and put this money aside in a specific bank account and do monthly transfers instead of either Budgeting or Savings Goals.