How to set up a HSA account with security investments as well as savings?

Unknown
Unknown Member
edited July 2018 in Investing (Mac)
I have a HSA account set up as a savings account.  There is enough money in there now that I want to start investing some of it in securities.  I am not sure how to set that up.  Any help would be appreciated.
I am on a MAC with Quicken 2017 as well as Quicken 2018.

Comments

  • RickO
    RickO SuperUser, Mac Beta Beta
    edited June 2018
    You will need to set up an investment account of type Other. That's the only way to record securities transactions; you can't do it in a Savings account.

    Unfortunately, Quicken won't let you just change the account type from Savings to Investment/Other. So you will need to add a new Investment/Other account in Quicken. That leaves the question of what to do about the old HSA Savings account.

    The answer depends on how you've been recording transactions and how much of the history you want to keep. Here are some options....

    1) Create an Opening Balance in the Investment account reflecting the current balance in the Savings account, then delete the Savings account. This is the simplest, but you lose all history.

    2) Make a Transfer transaction in the Savings account to move the entire balance to the Investment account. Then hide the now-zero-balance Savings account. This is also simple, but preserves the transaction history in case you ever need to refer to it.

    3) Move the transaction history from the Savings account to the Investment account so everything is in one place. The totally-blank Savings account could then be deleted. If all the transactions in the Savings account are simple deposits and withdrawals, you can simply drag and drop them from the Savings register to the Investment register.

    However, if you have been showing the deposits to the Savings account as transfers from your paycheck transactions in your checking account, it is more difficult. You would need to edit each paycheck transaction in the checking account to change the destination of the transfer. You can do a search to bring up only the paychecks, but you can't batch edit split transactions; you have to edit them one by one.

    Let me know if you have questions.
    Quicken Mac Subscription; Quicken Mac user since the early 90s
  • Unknown
    Unknown Member
    edited June 2018
    Option 2 seems to be the way to go.  I have data going back to 2006 with transfers from paychecks ( meaning having to edit 300 some transactions).
    Thanks for the suggestion.
  • RickO
    RickO SuperUser, Mac Beta Beta
    edited June 2018

    Option 2 seems to be the way to go.  I have data going back to 2006 with transfers from paychecks ( meaning having to edit 300 some transactions).
    Thanks for the suggestion.

    Don't forget to deactivate downloads on the savings account before you hide it (if it's set up for download with the bank).
    Quicken Mac Subscription; Quicken Mac user since the early 90s
  • Crashmeister
    Crashmeister Member ✭✭
    edited June 2018
    We have a MasterCard linked to the HSA. Showing that in an investment account does not feel right.

    What I did:
    1. Have a Savings Account for the HSA. Deposits from paycheck, payments to doctors, pharmacy et.al. are in there.
    2. Have an Investment account to hold the securities.
    When investing, transfer from Savings to Investment. Reverse when withdrawing.

    This keeps the investment part separate and clearly defines what is happening in real life.
    Nothing is foolproof to a sufficiently talented fool.
  • Paul3
    Paul3 Member ✭✭✭
    edited June 2018

    We have a MasterCard linked to the HSA. Showing that in an investment account does not feel right.

    What I did:
    1. Have a Savings Account for the HSA. Deposits from paycheck, payments to doctors, pharmacy et.al. are in there.
    2. Have an Investment account to hold the securities.
    When investing, transfer from Savings to Investment. Reverse when withdrawing.

    This keeps the investment part separate and clearly defines what is happening in real life.

    I took the same approach, since the investment account is a distinct account at my provider as well.  Unfortunately I haven't found a way to connect Quicken to the investment account directly, since everything appears in the HSA web site, not in the underlying brokerage provider.
  • Fred L
    Fred L Member ✭✭✭
    edited January 2019
    REQUEST: add an HSA account type and associated tax entries.
    Quicken Mac 5.6.3
    Similarly, I have two HSA accounts set up in Quicken ... a checking account which includes BillPay transactions as well as use of the debit card, and a brokerage account ("other"). My question is, since HSAs are triple-tax sheltered (contributions, growth and distributions) why doesn't Quicken have this as an account type so that interest and dividends don't show up in the tax schedule report but contributions (5498-SA) do?
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