This is tough but should be doable.
My mortgage is through Rocket Mortgage, an Intuit company. I pay half my monthly note every two weeks. This way, twice a year, a full biweekly payment is paid strictly to principle. That occurs whenever there are three payments in the same calendar month. I think this is pretty standard.
The problem is that when I make the first payment of the month (always on a Friday in my case), it doesn't affect the loan. The mortgage company "holds it" until the full payment has been received. So the loan balance should not change. On the second payment, the two payments are now credited to the loan. However, the payment occurs early, on the thrid or fourth Friday of each month. In the month when there are three Fridays, that last payment of the month is credited as going towards principle. This involves a huge hassle to get it right.
I created a category I called Mortgage Accrual and the payment accrues to that account. I have a loan bill reminder the originates with the loan account in my Quicken file. But it doesn't work like it should. Obviously, Quicken has no mechanism to "pay" my mortgage out of the Mortgage Accrual category. Instead it creates a transaction to pay it from my checking account. So, I end up cutting that transaction from my checking and pasting it into the loan. Then I have to diddle with the split because I need the funds to come out of the Mortgage Accrual "account" and get applied to the loan. Also, I have to adjust the interest payment because things are being done that Quicken doesn't understand. Finally, I go in and adjust the next payment date so that the bill reminder will post on the proper date.
Given that this is a common occurrence in the mortgage industry and given that both Quicken and Rocket Mortgage fall under the same Intuit umbrella, why is this so hard? The method I'm using came straight out of my Accounting 101 class forty years ago. Sure, Quicken isn't a double entry accounting system, but it can almost act like one.
Thank you everyone who reads this and feels the same frustration I do. Please vote for this.
Peter
