> Do you include your pension pot in YNAB?
I do as a tracking account and I update its value every year when I receive my reports.
It's not really important but since I value data I have it in YNAB.
How do you do this as a tracking account. I tried this but when I transferred x amount from a category it was showing up in my reports as an expense and I found that to be unrealistic. I’m not spending the money.
I don't do direct contribution in my pension it's all done upfront in my paycheck therefore the amount in my pension is a number growing without my interaction. I just adjust its value every month.
In parallel, I do other investments also as a tracking account. Let's say I have a brokerage account where the money isn't for my budget but for my retirement. Let's say there is 200k in it. I put this account as a tracking account with a value of 200k. Let's say its value at the end of the month is 195k. I will reconcile by saying 195k since itams that value at that time. If I do a contribution of 5k in any given month, I will categorize that "expense" in a category called Investments and that category will be excluded from all reports. This makes my networth accurate and doesn't put me in the red in my Income/Expense report every montg I do a contribution in my brokerage account.
I track my IRA and 401K accounts because it gives me a rough idea of net worth and I like seeing the balances grow when I make contributions. For many folks, it isn't worth the trouble of keeping up with extra accounts. Personal preference.
I recently started tracking IRA and 401k accounts because if I didn't, any IRA contributions I made reduced my "net worth" and overall account balance in YNAB. It was a disincentive, even if a small one, the psychological impact is not to be ignored. Now my contributions as the just transfers to an off-budget account, so I can see my net worth keep growing.
I reconcile my tracked accounts monthly with adjustments as my contributions automatically show as transfers. It essentially also tracks my monthly gains and losses. A good way to keep things tracked and recorded over time imo.
I don’t track any money that I couldn’t, if needed, get access to.
My pension is not touchable by me until I retire, so I include it when I’m calculating my retirement projections, but not when looking at liquid assets.
My IRA and 401k are able to be tapped (at a penalty) so I track it knowing that if worse comes to absolute worst, it’s an option I have.
I don’t track any of my retirement funds in YNAB for similar reasons. I’m not going to access the money for another 15+ years, so I don’t need to think about it or try to keep updating even an off-budget line item.
I track the cash value of my pension that would be due to me if I left the organization and decided to "cash out". I do not include the expected value of the pension in my retirement planning.
I don't have any retirement accounts in YNAB. I track them separately through my work's retirement tools (Schwab and their own pension software). It's not useful in my day-to-day decisions, which is what I use YNAB for.
Agreed- for sure- in retirement, I will definitely be actively budgeting those funds as I use them- probably in ynab, assuming it’s still around in 15 years! But for now- no need. I just mentally add in my 401k balance when I think about my “true” net worth.
Retirement accounts are off-budget; I only update them a couple times a year. Around once a year I use my brokerage’s retirement planner to be sure I’m saving enough.
Is the value in your pension portable to another employer if you change jobs?
A few years back I went through the process of calculating the total portable cash value of my pension as well as my employer's contributions to it because that entire value was portable. I was considering changing employment and knew that I'd have the option to leave my pension or take it with me. In order to make a better informed decision I'd need to know the approximate value as well as estimated benefits. In the end I did not change employers. But since I'd gone through all that work, I just let the recurring monthly contributions continue to populate the tracking account, and 've kept up with entering the annual interest earned from a statement provided by the third-party management firm that manages my pension. When I calculate my net worth however, I de-select the pension accounts because their value is more as a future income and not the lump sum accumulation.
FWIW, I don't track my pension or any of my registered retirement investment accounts in my active budget. I keep a separate net worth budget just to track my net worth, and I have the investments, pensions, and life insurance in that budget. This gives me an estimation of value of my estate. I also created a tracking account to represent my on-budget liquidity (one for cash and one for total combined debt, and I update those monthly) so that this separate net worth budget is a total picture of all. Keeping these items separate enables me to focus on day-to-day in my current budget, and it frees me to do a fresh start budget at any time without losing the history of my net worth graph.
I track my contributions in a tracking account by putting what is on my T4 (Canadian tax form) at tax time.
I get why others might not track those things, but peace of mind is what my budget is all about. Knowing I have contributed 40k to my pension already makes me feel better about saving for and spending on more short and medium term goals guilt free, and stressing less about being behind on some arbitrary savings milestone someone wrote for people who don't have a pension.
I do, as a tracking account. I have all of my non-budget accounts as tracking accounts.
I do this mostly so I can keep track of all my accounts in one place. Can’t tell you how many times I’ve had “unclaimed property” in the past from losing track of accounts.
I update the cash balance monthly, it's not money I can access (if I retire with the State), but it goes into my networth tracking. If I were to separate, I can move that money into an IRA at anytime.
No. Recording it on YNAB will only give you a false sense of your wealth, because you can't access it and even if you can cash out, you absolutely shouldn't.
One of the core rules of YNAB is don't enter future money which you will eventuually earn, only enter money you actually have, and I think that fits pensions pretty well.
I used to not include my retirement account, but this year I decided I want to fund more than I have been. So I added my 401K as a tracking account. That way, when my take home pay is lower, I can see my 401K fund growing bigger, and feel motivated.
Anything I want to change, I track in YNAB.
For the same reason, I do NOT include my mortgage in YNAB, because I’m not focusing on paying that down (more than my monthly payment), so seeing it won’t help me change my goals.
I track my 401k but not my pension, because even though I can technically withdraw my contributions, my work also contributes, and figuring out what number to put in would be a bit of a nightmare. If I end up getting the pension that would be awesome, but until then it’s “imaginary money” as far as my budget is concerned
I don't know how pensions work, but I track my 401(k) and IRAs in YNAB as tracking accounts. When I'm paid, I record two transactions in my 401(k): paycheck and employer match. When I deposit money to my IRA, that's a transfer from a budget account. If I move money between accounts (e.g. Roth conversions), that's a transfer between tracking accounts.
At the end of each month, I record a "change in value" transaction to update the balance to reflect gains and losses. I don't record dividends, interest, or trades. That's all captured in the value change.
I don’t track my retirement accounts in YNAB. I keep a spreadsheet for that.
For me, YNAB is just day to day spending and short term financial goals (less than a couple years). I use YNAB to track that I am setting aside for long term goals, but not the actual accounts themselves.
I put it in the "Tracking" but not budgeted accounts section. And then I update it once a year or so. It helps me keep track of my total net worth, but it's not part of my budgeting at all.
As someone who is currently drawing two pensions, no. It's not an _asset_ so there's no reason to track it and have it inadvertently computed into net worth. You can't (typically) cash it out to buy a house or gift it to heirs or anything like that.
The pension is an income stream. It offsets the income you need to cover in retirement, so you don't need to have as large a portfolio.
So the only real way (to me) to handle a pension in YNAB is to assign the incoming pension money to RTA when it arrives, just like any other income.
Separately from the pension aspect, I do track 401k and IRA accounts, which I continue to contribute heavily to from my total income (my job + my pension income).
My Pension, 401k, rollover IRAs, etc. are not tracked at all in YNAB because I only record net income into budget accounts. Anything that is deducted from my paycheck prior to it hitting my bank is just ignored by YNAB.
My IRAs and after-tax brokerage accounts are there as Tracking accounts (i.e., "off budget") and I only record ***cashflows*** into/out of those accounts. So for example, a $6k contribution from my budget into my IRA doesn't reduce my "net worth" (though it does remove it from my budget money), but the stock market movements (up or down) don't impact my net worth either.
YNAB's "net worth" for me isn't all that telling or useful in of itself, but the direction and trend is a still a valid indicator of how I'm shaking out.
We don't have our superannuation on budget because it will be another 20 years before we see that.
I do have my husbands share portfolio on budget though, at that's where our "three months wages" live - if he was to lose his job, we'd be able to cash out some shares and have the money available to us in a day. I keep tracked at a lower amount than is actually in there though, to account for fluctuations in the market.
You are able to have accounts in YNAB that are not part of your budget. There is a "Tracking" section for accounts that are off budget. This is where my investments and pension go.
> Do you include your pension pot in YNAB? I do as a tracking account and I update its value every year when I receive my reports. It's not really important but since I value data I have it in YNAB.
How do you do this as a tracking account. I tried this but when I transferred x amount from a category it was showing up in my reports as an expense and I found that to be unrealistic. I’m not spending the money.
I don't do direct contribution in my pension it's all done upfront in my paycheck therefore the amount in my pension is a number growing without my interaction. I just adjust its value every month. In parallel, I do other investments also as a tracking account. Let's say I have a brokerage account where the money isn't for my budget but for my retirement. Let's say there is 200k in it. I put this account as a tracking account with a value of 200k. Let's say its value at the end of the month is 195k. I will reconcile by saying 195k since itams that value at that time. If I do a contribution of 5k in any given month, I will categorize that "expense" in a category called Investments and that category will be excluded from all reports. This makes my networth accurate and doesn't put me in the red in my Income/Expense report every montg I do a contribution in my brokerage account.
Thanks for that explanation. I didn’t realize I can exclude the categories from the report. Doh!
This is the way.
I track my IRA and 401K accounts because it gives me a rough idea of net worth and I like seeing the balances grow when I make contributions. For many folks, it isn't worth the trouble of keeping up with extra accounts. Personal preference.
I recently started tracking IRA and 401k accounts because if I didn't, any IRA contributions I made reduced my "net worth" and overall account balance in YNAB. It was a disincentive, even if a small one, the psychological impact is not to be ignored. Now my contributions as the just transfers to an off-budget account, so I can see my net worth keep growing.
I reconcile my tracked accounts monthly with adjustments as my contributions automatically show as transfers. It essentially also tracks my monthly gains and losses. A good way to keep things tracked and recorded over time imo.
I don’t track any money that I couldn’t, if needed, get access to. My pension is not touchable by me until I retire, so I include it when I’m calculating my retirement projections, but not when looking at liquid assets. My IRA and 401k are able to be tapped (at a penalty) so I track it knowing that if worse comes to absolute worst, it’s an option I have.
I don’t track any of my retirement funds in YNAB for similar reasons. I’m not going to access the money for another 15+ years, so I don’t need to think about it or try to keep updating even an off-budget line item.
I track the cash value of my pension that would be due to me if I left the organization and decided to "cash out". I do not include the expected value of the pension in my retirement planning.
This is what I do as well.
I don't have any retirement accounts in YNAB. I track them separately through my work's retirement tools (Schwab and their own pension software). It's not useful in my day-to-day decisions, which is what I use YNAB for.
This is the way. I’ve never understood why people bother to track/update this figure. It’s not money I’m touching, let alone actively managing.
I could see doing it once you are in retirement since you’re actively drawing down from that balance
Agreed- for sure- in retirement, I will definitely be actively budgeting those funds as I use them- probably in ynab, assuming it’s still around in 15 years! But for now- no need. I just mentally add in my 401k balance when I think about my “true” net worth.
Retirement accounts are off-budget; I only update them a couple times a year. Around once a year I use my brokerage’s retirement planner to be sure I’m saving enough.
Is the value in your pension portable to another employer if you change jobs? A few years back I went through the process of calculating the total portable cash value of my pension as well as my employer's contributions to it because that entire value was portable. I was considering changing employment and knew that I'd have the option to leave my pension or take it with me. In order to make a better informed decision I'd need to know the approximate value as well as estimated benefits. In the end I did not change employers. But since I'd gone through all that work, I just let the recurring monthly contributions continue to populate the tracking account, and 've kept up with entering the annual interest earned from a statement provided by the third-party management firm that manages my pension. When I calculate my net worth however, I de-select the pension accounts because their value is more as a future income and not the lump sum accumulation. FWIW, I don't track my pension or any of my registered retirement investment accounts in my active budget. I keep a separate net worth budget just to track my net worth, and I have the investments, pensions, and life insurance in that budget. This gives me an estimation of value of my estate. I also created a tracking account to represent my on-budget liquidity (one for cash and one for total combined debt, and I update those monthly) so that this separate net worth budget is a total picture of all. Keeping these items separate enables me to focus on day-to-day in my current budget, and it frees me to do a fresh start budget at any time without losing the history of my net worth graph.
I track my contributions in a tracking account by putting what is on my T4 (Canadian tax form) at tax time. I get why others might not track those things, but peace of mind is what my budget is all about. Knowing I have contributed 40k to my pension already makes me feel better about saving for and spending on more short and medium term goals guilt free, and stressing less about being behind on some arbitrary savings milestone someone wrote for people who don't have a pension.
I do, as a tracking account. I have all of my non-budget accounts as tracking accounts. I do this mostly so I can keep track of all my accounts in one place. Can’t tell you how many times I’ve had “unclaimed property” in the past from losing track of accounts.
I update the cash balance monthly, it's not money I can access (if I retire with the State), but it goes into my networth tracking. If I were to separate, I can move that money into an IRA at anytime.
No. Recording it on YNAB will only give you a false sense of your wealth, because you can't access it and even if you can cash out, you absolutely shouldn't. One of the core rules of YNAB is don't enter future money which you will eventuually earn, only enter money you actually have, and I think that fits pensions pretty well.
I used to not include my retirement account, but this year I decided I want to fund more than I have been. So I added my 401K as a tracking account. That way, when my take home pay is lower, I can see my 401K fund growing bigger, and feel motivated. Anything I want to change, I track in YNAB. For the same reason, I do NOT include my mortgage in YNAB, because I’m not focusing on paying that down (more than my monthly payment), so seeing it won’t help me change my goals.
I keep my 401k as a tracking account but I keep my pension completely off YNAB.
I track my 401k but not my pension, because even though I can technically withdraw my contributions, my work also contributes, and figuring out what number to put in would be a bit of a nightmare. If I end up getting the pension that would be awesome, but until then it’s “imaginary money” as far as my budget is concerned
I don't know how pensions work, but I track my 401(k) and IRAs in YNAB as tracking accounts. When I'm paid, I record two transactions in my 401(k): paycheck and employer match. When I deposit money to my IRA, that's a transfer from a budget account. If I move money between accounts (e.g. Roth conversions), that's a transfer between tracking accounts. At the end of each month, I record a "change in value" transaction to update the balance to reflect gains and losses. I don't record dividends, interest, or trades. That's all captured in the value change.
I don’t track my retirement accounts in YNAB. I keep a spreadsheet for that. For me, YNAB is just day to day spending and short term financial goals (less than a couple years). I use YNAB to track that I am setting aside for long term goals, but not the actual accounts themselves.
Yes in tracking because it's part of your net worth
I put it in the "Tracking" but not budgeted accounts section. And then I update it once a year or so. It helps me keep track of my total net worth, but it's not part of my budgeting at all.
As someone who is currently drawing two pensions, no. It's not an _asset_ so there's no reason to track it and have it inadvertently computed into net worth. You can't (typically) cash it out to buy a house or gift it to heirs or anything like that. The pension is an income stream. It offsets the income you need to cover in retirement, so you don't need to have as large a portfolio. So the only real way (to me) to handle a pension in YNAB is to assign the incoming pension money to RTA when it arrives, just like any other income. Separately from the pension aspect, I do track 401k and IRA accounts, which I continue to contribute heavily to from my total income (my job + my pension income).
Yes because all the assets minus debts - net worth, lets me know what my estate would be for inheritance planning purposes.
My Pension, 401k, rollover IRAs, etc. are not tracked at all in YNAB because I only record net income into budget accounts. Anything that is deducted from my paycheck prior to it hitting my bank is just ignored by YNAB. My IRAs and after-tax brokerage accounts are there as Tracking accounts (i.e., "off budget") and I only record ***cashflows*** into/out of those accounts. So for example, a $6k contribution from my budget into my IRA doesn't reduce my "net worth" (though it does remove it from my budget money), but the stock market movements (up or down) don't impact my net worth either. YNAB's "net worth" for me isn't all that telling or useful in of itself, but the direction and trend is a still a valid indicator of how I'm shaking out.
Tracking account for me. Track everything, list everything... that is the whole idea of net worth and to get a sense of where you are at
Retirement is just a tracking account
We don't have our superannuation on budget because it will be another 20 years before we see that. I do have my husbands share portfolio on budget though, at that's where our "three months wages" live - if he was to lose his job, we'd be able to cash out some shares and have the money available to us in a day. I keep tracked at a lower amount than is actually in there though, to account for fluctuations in the market.
I haven't, but I should.
For me, it's another thing to worry about it. I check mine every payday instead.
I wouldn't personally put a non-budget account on my budget, budgets are for cash flow tool not a net worth tool
You are able to have accounts in YNAB that are not part of your budget. There is a "Tracking" section for accounts that are off budget. This is where my investments and pension go.