Export Investment account to Import in a different Quicken file

Question

I have an old Quicken file covering years 1991-2020.  Due to some significant life changes I started a new Quicken file in 2020, with the intention of using the old file only to track some investment accounts.

I now wish to move a couple of investment accounts from the old file to the new one, and hopefully retain lots and cost basis.

I found a forum post from early 2024 providing one possible way: (1) Make a copy of the old file; (2) Delete all accounts except the ones I want to transfer; (3) export the result to .qxf; (4) import the .qxf to the new file.

The problem here is that over the course of 30 years the old file has accumulated over 200 accounts, most of which have zero balances and are hidden (think old assets, bank accounts, credit cards, etc) and deleting everything except the 2 accounts I want to transfer is going to take a very long time.

Is there a simple way to accomplish what I need, which is:

* Export 2 investment accounts with lots and cost basis
* Import those 2 accounts into a different Quicken file

Can this be accomplished with the QIF export format?  I've exported the three files (2 investment accounts plus a cash account linked with one of the investment accounts) but it's not clear how they can be imported "together".  Is it possible to merge the three files, possibly with some adjustment?

Boatnmaniac · Answer

@jhg - Sorry to hear of the loss of your 1st wife.  I can't imagine what that was like for you.  Glad to hear that you've been able to make a new life with another love.

I think you have confused QXF with QIF when it comes to exporting.  QXF exports the entire data file (i.e., all accounts) which would create quite an issue for you.  But as @mshiggins stated, QIF exports 1 account per export file so you can select just those two accounts (2 separate exports) that you want exported.

One other comment:  In the file you want to import the accounts data to into you will need to first add the manual offline accounts.   During the QIF file import process you will need to select which account to import the data into.

mshiggins · Answer

You can choose an account to export QIF for. Since you have two investment accounts you want to transfer, you’ll need to do two exports, one for each account.

When you try the import, I recommend you only import one or two transactions from the QIF as a pre-test. If those few imported transactions look good, import the rest. Of course, back up before making any significant changes to your data file.

jhg · Answer

Sigh…

The old and new Quicken files are totally different universes.  I've looked at what gets exported and it's not pretty.  It includes ALL accounts and All securities.  Importing this without some cleanup will pollute the new file with 30 years of accumulated — and no longer meaningful — detritus.

So yes, there are use cases for massaging QIF to include only what you want.  It's a shame Intuit doesn't recognize the life changes that cause these problems.  If you must know: Married 27 years — Widowed — Remarried after 5 years — Merged finances, at which point I started a new joint Quicken file.  The only prior data that remains meaningful now is two investment accounts in the old file, which I'd now like to merge into the new file without losing lots and cost basis.