On Tue, 20 Sep 2005, Dennis wrote:
GnuCash is a double entry accounting system. If you want to model a
budget with that type of system, you simply create an account.
I love the double-entry accounting system style that GnuCash uses, and I
don't understand why all home accounting software doesn't do the same
thing. However, it still doesn't do the home "envelope-style" budgeting
that I'm looking for ...
Banks=Account1(Real cash account) Asset
Gas=Account2 (Virtual account that actually is just in the bank) Asset
Gas bills Account3 (account that records money you actually spend on
gas ) liability
If I do it this way, I have one of two problems:
(a) If Account2 is not a sub-account of Account1, then it's not easy for
me to glance at GnuCash and see the actual dollar amount of how much cash
I have in my real-life checking account. The ability to do this is useful
for various reasons, and I'd be hesitant to give it up.
(b) If Account2 *is* a sub-account of Account1, then I'm restricted to
having either only one "Real cash" account, or restricted to only
budgeting from a single account.
Example:
I have $150 in my real-world checking account. I have $300 in my
real-world savings account. I want to budget $200 for Groceries and $200
for Computers.
If I pick (a), I can easily glance and see that I have $200 left in my
grocery budget and $200 left in my computer budget, but I can't easily
glance and see the actual dollar amounts in my real-life accounts ($150
and $300).
If I pick (b), I can't have both Groceries and Computers budget accounts
be sub-accounts of Savings, because I only have $300 in my savings
account, and I can't have *either* budget accounts as sub-accounts of
Checking because I only have $150 there.
On Tue, 20 Sep 2005, Nicholas Leippe wrote:
Now, rather than do any sort of budgeting, I just do a speculative cash-flow
by inputing estimates of all of my known bills and expected income into my
gnucash accounts, to make sure it's all covered.
I actually do the same thing ... this is actually for the wife. She wants
to be able to easily glance and she how much she has left to spend in any
particular category, be it groceries or computer stuff or whatever.
~ Ross
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