YNAB You Need A Budget

[DeAnna2112]

I am new and confused. I have a collection debt i am needing to enter to payoff over time. I assume i add this as a off budget debt account right? but problem is it does not show up on my budget, just under the debt account? i need this to be included in my budget but from what i am reading if i am reading right that is, on budget accounts are for inflowing funds and off budget accounts are for outflowing funds right?
I want this included in my budget and also track it as it is paid down.

Also, under this account tab i see the scheduler. I entered a scheduled date and set it up for every other week. Why is no recurring schedules therefore showing up? when i click on the scheduled transactions nothing happens. I assumed it would show scheduled transactions but it only shows the current one i set up.

Thank you for any help!
DeAnna

[Malisa]

I am new and confused. I have a collection debt i am needing to enter to payoff over time. I assume i add this as a off budget debt account right? but problem is it does not show up on my budget, just under the debt account? i need this to be included in my budget but from what i am reading if i am reading right that is, on budget accounts are for inflowing funds and off budget accounts are for outflowing funds right?
I want this included in my budget and also track it as it is paid down.

It's not quite right that on-budget accounts are for inflow and off0budget for outflow. On-budget accounts are for accounts where you'll spend from (cash if you choose, checking, credit cards you're using, lines of credit.) Off-budget are for those where you won't be spending from (collection accounts, car loans, home loans, investment accounts.)

You definitely need to set up a category in the budget to make the payments to this debt. IF you want to see the balance in YNAB, then an off-budget account is the way to go. Off-budget accounts (debt in particular) don't work the same as on-budget credit cards do. You won't see the balance in the budget. Only the payments. You'll see the balance in the account. (The only reason you see the balance on on-budget debts in the budget is because if you're going to be having NEW charges affect the budget, you need a way for the OLD charges to affect the budget. It's weird, it's not intuitive, but it works.) All you need for an account that you won't be incurring new spending on (you won't be using a collection account to buy gas, groceries, etc. that need to be categorized) is a category in the budget where you can allocate some of your available to budget and where, when you make a payment via your checking account, or wherever, the payment will show up and zero out that category.

Also, under this account tab i see the scheduler. I entered a scheduled date and set it up for every other week. Why is no recurring schedules therefore showing up? when i click on the scheduled transactions nothing happens. I assumed it would show scheduled transactions but it only shows the current one i set up.

Scheduled transactions that are transfers only show up on one side of the transaction. So if you entered it in the scheduler of your checking account (as the outflow portion of the transfer) it won't show up in your off-budget account. Alternatively, you could enter it in the scheduler of your off-budget account (as an inflow). I keep all of my transfer transactions in the scheduler of my checking so I can see them in one spot.

ETA: Re-reading the last part of your quote, I may be misinterpreting what you're looking at or what your question is. I'll add that transactions in the scheduler just show the one, next transaction regardless of frequency. On the date of the scheduled transaction, they'll pop up into the register and require your approval. You can send them early if you choose by right clicking on them and choosing Send to Register Now (I think that's what it says). I can think of another way to interpret what you said. If I haven't answered your scheduler question with either of these, post back.

[tindelsurf]

Yes - your debt should be off-budget. Transfer your payment from your on-budget account to your off-budget account. Transfers to off-budget accounts require a category that will correlate to your budget.

The scheduler only shows the next payment that is due - not all of the payments. When the scheduler enters in the next transaction, it will also calculate the date of the next payment and place it in the scheduler.

Hope that helps!

[DeAnna2112]

So if i am understanding correctly, i simply just need to add a category in the budget after setting it up as a off budget account. Now when i pay this transaction and note it as being paid i do so through the checking acct and pick the category in the budget? guess i am confused as to how outflow of payment is gonna be noted for the off budget acct and the budget account when paying?

[DeAnna2112]

Ok i see what is going on..thanks guys didn't want to get to far ahead and have to redo a bunch of stuff. Thank you sooo much for your help!!!

[olafmoriarty]

So if i am understanding correctly, i simply just need to add a category in the budget after setting it up as a off budget account. Now when i pay this transaction and note it as being paid i do so through the checking acct and pick the category in the budget? guess i am confused as to how outflow of payment is gonna be noted for the off budget acct and the budget account when paying?

First, budget the money. If you want to pay $ 200 each month towards the collection debt, set up $ 200 in the "Collection debt" category in the budget.

When recording the transaction, in the Payee field, choose "Transfer: [name of the off-budget account you've created for this debt]". That's what you're doing here - even though the debt is off-budget, you're still just transferring money from one account to another.

However, since the debt is off-budget, you have to enter a category for it. That's where you enter the "Collection debt" category. That way, your budget will show that you have budgeted to spend $ 200 on collection debt, and the outflows column will show that those $ 200 have been paid. And both the Debt account and your Total Debts will have decreased with $ 200

[DeAnna2112]

Thanks so much you guys are great, yelp once i went there and looked again i saw the transfer tab and the light bulb went off!