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Debt reduction planner has incorrect minimums

ewittersheimewittersheim Member ✭
in Budgeting and Planning Tools (Windows)
I'm trying to use the debt reduction planner in Quicken 2020. I have 2 loans that the minimum payments are higher than they actually are which makes the plan inaccurate. I have opened a ticket with Quicken and was told that it's a known bug. What is frustrating to me is this seems to have been a problem for many versions and Quicken is not fixing it. Does anyone know of a work around so I can get my plan set up correctly?

Answers

  • Quicken DianaQuicken Diana Moderator, Employee mod

    Hello @ ewittersheim 

    I did review the case details on the ticket, but to ensure I'm understanding the situation correctly I’d like to ask a few questions and provide screenshots.

    On the Identify Your Debt Step 1 are you able to manually enter the information? Does it look like this:


    On the following screen, Get The Details Step 2 are the details the same as you entered on step 1, or is this where minimum payment is higher that what it actually is, as you mentioned in your post?


    Please provide this information so that we can take the next step. If this is not the issue, please provide more detail and screenshots if you are able to assist in identifying the exact issue.

    Thank you

    -          Quicken Diana


  • Chris_QPWChris_QPW Member ✭✭✭✭
    @Quicken Diana  this problem has come up in the forums several times and it is really easy to reproduce.  If you look at your screenshots it shows the minimum monthly payment as $322.  Enter a value less than that amount and Quicken will prevent you from entering it.

    Why the developers thought they could calculate the "absolute" minimum monthly payment that a given financial institution might allow, and block any amount under it is beyond me.
    (I'm using the latest Quicken subscription version)
  • Quicken DianaQuicken Diana Moderator, Employee mod

    @ Chris_QPW, thank you for your insight on the matter, I was able to locate previous posts on the matter as you mentioned. I was also able to dig further into this, learning that the minimum payment seems to be based on the percentage interest rates.

    @ ewittersheim, I’d like to replicate exactly what you have on your Debt Reduction Plan. How many accounts do you have set up and what interest rates are set for those accounts? If I may, what is the minimum payment that you prefer Quicken to use for each account? As I said, I will attempt to replicate your situation exactly to investigate further, but would like to mention a possible solution, which is to adjust the interest rate accordingly to produce the desired minimum payment.

    Thank you 
    - Quicken Diana
  • Chris_QPWChris_QPW Member ✭✭✭✭
    @Quicken Diana Yes, adjusting the interest rate will change what Quicken considers the minimum payment should be, but changing it is useless.

    The whole point of the debt planner is to give the user information on when the debt will be paid off and what effect different payments have on that.  If you change the interest rate you completely change the pay off curve.
    (I'm using the latest Quicken subscription version)
  • Chris_QPWChris_QPW Member ✭✭✭✭
    edited May 29
    They shouldn't be restricting the minimum payment at all.  And yes at some point you are going to be paying so little that the curve reverse and you aren't paying  your debt down, instead it is increasing.  But that is useful information too, and it is up to the user and the people loaning them the money if that is "OK" or not.  Not some judgement call by some programmer at Quicken Inc.

    As an example here is a debt planner that I got off of the Internet.

    I can lower the amount until about $141 and the curve reverses (notice they flag this by making my payment amount red).


    Quicken should allow the same.
    (I'm using the latest Quicken subscription version)
  • Chris_QPWChris_QPW Member ✭✭✭✭
    edited May 29
    Well I found out where Quicken's number comes from.  For the above $10,000, 16.99% loan Quicken says the minimum is $242.

    The Suggested/Regularly Used formula is:
    1% of the loan plus the interest, plus any fees.  So make the fees zero and you get:
    $10,000 * .1 = $100
    $10,000 * (.1699 / 12) = 141.5833333333333

    $100 + 141.58 = $242.

    So that is where the number comes from, but this formula is not a law, it is suggestion/regular practices.  The actual law even allows for a "reverse curve" provide that the financial institution notifies the buyer of that in the loan documentation.
    (I'm using the latest Quicken subscription version)
  • ewittersheimewittersheim Member ✭
    Diana,
    I can't get to step 2 because I get the error that I opened the ticket and this post about. I have 10 line items in my plan, 2 of which are not allowing me to use the minimum payments that the banks have set. 1 is a car loan and the the other is a bank loan. I know I have them set correctly but Quicken refuses to let me enter the proper value. It looks like Chris might be onto something. For my car loan Quicken says my min payment is approximately $50 higher, for my other loan it's off by about $125. It's really frustrating.
  • Chris_QPWChris_QPW Member ✭✭✭✭
    @ewittersheim Until Quicken Inc puts in a fix for Quicken about the only thing you can do is accept the minimums that it is "suggesting/forcing".  Unfortunately if you are paying the minimum you will not get an accurate picture of when you will be able to pay off your debt.
    (I'm using the latest Quicken subscription version)
  • UnknownUnknown Member
    I'm having the same problem. I have two loans in my Debt reduction planner and both are telling me "Based on this Interest Rate your minimum payment must be at least $XXX"

    In both cases, what Quicken "thinks" the payment should be, and what both of the lenders have it set at are off by a couple of hundred dollars a month on one and a little less on the other.

    Quicken needs to fix this soon, and it's been like this for years, making the benefit of a tool like this almost useless. FIX IT ALREADY!
  • ewittersheimewittersheim Member ✭
    One thing I noticed was that each time I paid extra towards a loan and tried to update the plan, the difference between what the bank is and what Quicken thinks grew greater. I then removed one of the loans from the plan and added it back in and the amount updated to the correct amount in Quicken to match the bank.
  • UnknownUnknown Member
    Completely agree with posts that this needs to be changed otherwise feature promoted isn't usable. Was hoping to use this feature but had to remain using a spreadsheet. A Debt Reduction Plan isn't based on minimum payments, it is based on actual payments and interest. You could have an interest only loan where you are only paying monthly interest and maximizing payment on another loan as part of snowball or highest interest debt. Then once that loan is paid off the total amount of payment including interest is moved to next loan.
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