Conversion from MS Money Plus Sunset issues

Unknown
Unknown Member
edited October 2018 in Investing (Windows)
I have been using Microsoft Money Plus Sunset (and older versions before that) for many years.  I just recently purchased Quicken Premier 2018 and I was successful at importing my data from MS Money.  However, it did some funny things.  For one thing, with my options positions (puts and calls) I noticed that all of the transactions where I had sold to open a put or call and then had that put or call expire worthless, Quicken didn't import that correctly.  It correctly showed that I had "ShtSellX" (sold short) to open, but the closing transaction wasn't "Expire" (Quicken doesn't seem to have an "Expire" type of transaction), but instead recorded that as "SoldX".  This had the effect of doubling the position size instead of closing it.  I figured out a way to fix these... I just had to change the "SoldX" transaction in each case to "CvrShrtX" (cover short) with a price of 0.  That was a huge pain as I had many cases where a short put or call had expired worthless.  Clearly the import messed this up.

The other issue that I've run into (and I don't really know how to fix this) is that my retirement investment accounts (IRAs and 401(k)) all have contributions accounts (cash accounts) attached to them (which is expected), but in each case the cash accounts are marked as "Spending" accounts rather than "Retirement" (the Account Intent setting), and it will NOT let me correct this.  Consequently, all of that cash appears to be included in the "What's Left" number on the Home page.  I have huge amounts of cash in my IRAs and 401(k) which I cannot touch unless I want to pay a 10% penalty plus taxes.  So this really distorts that number and doesn't give me a very true notion of how much cash I have available to spend today.  (NOTE:  some of that cash is actually locked up in my IRA account because there are written puts that are cash-secured).  What's the best way to remedy this situation?

Thanks,

Dan

Comments

  • q_lurker
    q_lurker SuperUser ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited May 2018
    The other issue that I've run into is that my retirement investment accounts (IRAs and 401(k)) all have contributions accounts (cash accounts) attached to them (which is expected), but in each case the cash accounts are marked as "Spending" accounts rather than "Retirement" (the Account Intent setting), and it will NOT let me correct this.  .. 
    While you might find it expected that the retirement cash components became separate but linked cash accounts in Quicken, the Quicken-only user would not have that expectation.  Generally in Quicken, for whatever reason, retirement accounts are not allowed to have linked cash accounts.  The MS-Money converts are the exceptions.  I recall series of discussions around that aspect back in 2009/10 when Money sunsetted and Quicken (with Microsoft's support) built-up the current conversion routines.  My recollection is that is the way it stayed (cash as a linked account) with no possibility of change.  Whether such discussions are still available would be an open question.  

    As far as changing the display option intent to retirement (or investment), that is a weakness of Quicken for all of us, not related to your conversion.  As far as I can tell, the linked cash accounts can never be relocated from Spending, though they can be undone for the non-converted.  

    My only thought on furthering your setup would be to create a new Retirement account and transfer all assets from the old (and from the old linked cash) to the new.  Then you could close out the old account(s).  While it is pretty simple to transfer all long positions, transferring short positions such as you may have with your puts may be challenging.  You might also have to get used to not having the linked account.  But you probably have a lot of other aspects to get used to as well.  

    HTH
  • q_lurker
    q_lurker SuperUser ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited September 2019

    The other issue that I've run into is that my retirement investment accounts (IRAs and 401(k)) all have contributions accounts (cash accounts) attached to them (which is expected), but in each case the cash accounts are marked as "Spending" accounts rather than "Retirement" (the Account Intent setting), and it will NOT let me correct this.  .. 
    While you might find it expected that the retirement cash components became separate but linked cash accounts in Quicken, the Quicken-only user would not have that expectation.  Generally in Quicken, for whatever reason, retirement accounts are not allowed to have linked cash accounts.  The MS-Money converts are the exceptions.  I recall series of discussions around that aspect back in 2009/10 when Money sunsetted and Quicken (with Microsoft's support) built-up the current conversion routines.  My recollection is that is the way it stayed (cash as a linked account) with no possibility of change.  Whether such discussions are still available would be an open question.  

    As far as changing the display option intent to retirement (or investment), that is a weakness of Quicken for all of us, not related to your conversion.  As far as I can tell, the linked cash accounts can never be relocated from Spending, though they can be undone for the non-converted.  

    My only thought on furthering your setup would be to create a new Retirement account and transfer all assets from the old (and from the old linked cash) to the new.  Then you could close out the old account(s).  While it is pretty simple to transfer all long positions, transferring short positions such as you may have with your puts may be challenging.  You might also have to get used to not having the linked account.  But you probably have a lot of other aspects to get used to as well.  

    HTH
    PS:  A search on on this site using "MS-Money AND conversion" yields 702 discussions, so there is background history available if you need to dig.  Other keywords can of course shrink or expand that list.

    At that time frame, Intuit used a different support site than the current get-satisfaction version.  While many of the discussion topics have been carried over to this new version now under Quicken, Inc.'s control, links within those old discussions are likely broken.  
  • mshiggins
    mshiggins SuperUser ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited September 2019

    The other issue that I've run into is that my retirement investment accounts (IRAs and 401(k)) all have contributions accounts (cash accounts) attached to them (which is expected), but in each case the cash accounts are marked as "Spending" accounts rather than "Retirement" (the Account Intent setting), and it will NOT let me correct this.  .. 
    While you might find it expected that the retirement cash components became separate but linked cash accounts in Quicken, the Quicken-only user would not have that expectation.  Generally in Quicken, for whatever reason, retirement accounts are not allowed to have linked cash accounts.  The MS-Money converts are the exceptions.  I recall series of discussions around that aspect back in 2009/10 when Money sunsetted and Quicken (with Microsoft's support) built-up the current conversion routines.  My recollection is that is the way it stayed (cash as a linked account) with no possibility of change.  Whether such discussions are still available would be an open question.  

    As far as changing the display option intent to retirement (or investment), that is a weakness of Quicken for all of us, not related to your conversion.  As far as I can tell, the linked cash accounts can never be relocated from Spending, though they can be undone for the non-converted.  

    My only thought on furthering your setup would be to create a new Retirement account and transfer all assets from the old (and from the old linked cash) to the new.  Then you could close out the old account(s).  While it is pretty simple to transfer all long positions, transferring short positions such as you may have with your puts may be challenging.  You might also have to get used to not having the linked account.  But you probably have a lot of other aspects to get used to as well.  

    HTH
    From C. D. Bales:

    Regarding the Quicken linked checking accounts:

    Here's a link to another discussion on the subject (in the linked discussion, user, "Quicken DanG", is the ex-Money programmer who wrote the Money-to-Quicken converter):
    https://getsatisfaction.com/quickenco...

    I believe the best way to deal with those converted retirement checking accounts is to redo the conversion.

    - Make a copy of your Money file.

    - In that Money file copy, change your retirement accounts to non-retirement accounts.

    - Convert that Money file copy that has no retirement accounts to Quicken.

    - In the resulting new Quicken file:

    --- Edit the ex-retirement accounts to NOT "Show cash in checking account".

    --- Edit the ex-retirement accounts to be "Tax deferred".

    --- Click the newly displayed "Convert to 401k/IRA/529" button and complete the conversion to the appropriate retirement account type.

    Quicken user since Q1999. Currently using QW2017.
    Questions? Check out the Quicken Windows FAQ list

  • q_lurker
    q_lurker SuperUser ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited January 2018
    q.lurker said:

    The other issue that I've run into is that my retirement investment accounts (IRAs and 401(k)) all have contributions accounts (cash accounts) attached to them (which is expected), but in each case the cash accounts are marked as "Spending" accounts rather than "Retirement" (the Account Intent setting), and it will NOT let me correct this.  .. 
    While you might find it expected that the retirement cash components became separate but linked cash accounts in Quicken, the Quicken-only user would not have that expectation.  Generally in Quicken, for whatever reason, retirement accounts are not allowed to have linked cash accounts.  The MS-Money converts are the exceptions.  I recall series of discussions around that aspect back in 2009/10 when Money sunsetted and Quicken (with Microsoft's support) built-up the current conversion routines.  My recollection is that is the way it stayed (cash as a linked account) with no possibility of change.  Whether such discussions are still available would be an open question.  

    As far as changing the display option intent to retirement (or investment), that is a weakness of Quicken for all of us, not related to your conversion.  As far as I can tell, the linked cash accounts can never be relocated from Spending, though they can be undone for the non-converted.  

    My only thought on furthering your setup would be to create a new Retirement account and transfer all assets from the old (and from the old linked cash) to the new.  Then you could close out the old account(s).  While it is pretty simple to transfer all long positions, transferring short positions such as you may have with your puts may be challenging.  You might also have to get used to not having the linked account.  But you probably have a lot of other aspects to get used to as well.  

    HTHThanks, C. D. I never would have recalled that sequence. 
This discussion has been closed.