I track Roth IRAs and my Roth 401(k) the same way I do all of my other
broad investment / brokerage accounts:
Contributions credit the bank account and debit the Roth IRA.
At some periodicity (could be every 3, 6, or 12 mos), I change the
investment balances, which in a rising stock market has typically meant
debit the Roth IRA, credit Income:Nontaxable Investment Income. (I
understand other people may prefer a different credit account; this works
for me for tracking. David T says below "earnings are tracked in separate
income accounts for tax tracking purposes. Note that *nothing *on Roth
IRAs needs to be 'tracked' or reported in the USA, but perhaps David T
means "separate" from his/my *other *income accounts that do need to be
reported.)
When I eventually take distributions, no, I won't make "extra" entries to
track for the IRS, I will simply credit the Roth IRA account and debit the
asset account where I have sent the distribution.
Note that this is less involved than what I would do if I had REGULAR IRAs
or 401(k)s, as there I would be tracking eventual tax liabilities on growth
in those accounts, and then when I eventually take Required Distributions,
then the portion of the distribution that is taxable I would track into a
taxable income account. Here's an example for a REGULAR IRA. Say the
account balance was $500,000 at 2029-12-31 and I was required to withdraw
5% of it per the tax code in 2032. When I take that $25,000 required
withdrawal, I would record it as:
Credit Regular IRA $25,000
Debit Brokerage Account $25,000 [these two record the transfer of assets]
Credit Income:Taxable:IRA withdrawal $20,000 [this presumes a calculation
that my tax basis in the IRA as of the withdrawal date was 100,000, or 20%
of the balance]
Debit Income:Nontaxable:IRA Deferred Growth $20,000
Credit Liabilities:Taxes Due this year $8,000 [at 40% tax rate]
Debit Liabilities:Deferred Taxes on IRAs $8,000 (this account would have
been credited every year as the IRA grew from investment earnings)
On Thu, Jun 4, 2026 at 2:29 AM David T. via gnucash-user <
[email protected]> wrote:
Clint,
I don't see any other replies, so...
Our family has four Roth accounts-- one each for an IRA and an employer
retirement plan. I track all the contributions and earnings for those
accounts* (we haven't yet taken distributions **). That way, I can see
generally what our retirement savings look like.
Tracking actual daily value for these accounts is, frankly, more trouble
than it's worth. Our retirement plans mask the investment details, and only
provide generalized data, which makes tracking difficult. So, I mostly
check that the share balances are correct from year to year. This gives me
a broad sense of our progress toward the long term goals.
HTH,
David T.
* - Contributions are handled as standard transactions between asset
accounts, while earnings are tracked in separate income accounts for tax
tracking purposes.
** - IANAA, but I understand that when distributions are made, extra
entries must be made in GnuCash to allow you to track the distribution as
income for IRS tracking.
On June 3, 2026 9:22:21 PM GMT+05:30, Clint Chaplin <[email protected]>
wrote:
For those of you using GnuCash and having Roth accounts, do you use
GnuCash
to keep track of contributions vs. rollover/conversions vs. earnings, and
if so, how?
--
Clint (JOATMON) Chaplin
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