The entry for my house purchase looks like this: 2014-12-18 Buy house Assets:Fixed:House $445,000.00 ; Selling price of house Assets:Current:XYZ Bank:Checking $455.76 Expenses:Interest:Mortgage Interest $390.60 Expenses:Taxes:Property Tax $282.49 ; Current qtr taxes Expenses:Taxes:Property Tax $2,154.00 ; Next qtr taxes Expenses:Utilities:Sewer $18.45 ; Current qtr sewer Expenses:Utilities:Sewer $141.48 ; Next qtr sewer Expenses:House:Warranty $32.10 Liabilities:Loans:Mortgage Principal $-427,750.00 ; PV of mortgage at t=0 Assets:Current:XYZ Bank:Savings $-20,500.00 ; Down payment Assets:Current:AnAssetAccount $-5,001.37 ; More money down Assets:Current:Escrow $960.49 Expenses:House:Settlement $440.00 ; Origination charges Expenses:House:Settlement $325.00 ; Appraisal fee Expenses:House:Settlement $75.00 ; Tax service Expenses:House:Settlement $50.00 ; Appraisal management Expenses:House:Settlement $2,301.00 ; Title services and lender's title insurance Expenses:House:Settlement $105.00 ; Owner's title insurance Expenses:House:Settlement $220.00 ; Government recording charge Expenses:House:Settlement $300.00 ; Survey
This establishes the "Liabilities:Loans:Mortgage Principal" account which tracks the loan balance. "Assets:Fixed:House" can be used to calculate your equity (as in home equity, not an equity account type). Various charges need to be paid at closing time: title fees, current and next quarter taxes, utility services, etc. It also categorizes "Expenses:Interest:Mortgage Interest" as a separate category from other types of interest, for tax purposes. Finally, it also seeds the "Assets:Current:Escrow" account which is the source account for paying all sorts of property tax and insurance expenses. A monthly mortgage payment might look like this: 2015-03-23=2015-04-01 (1000) Loan Servicing Company Liabilities:Loans:Mortgage Principal $585.63 Liabilities:Loans:Mortgage Principal $100.00 ; Pay a little extra principal every month Expenses:Interest:Mortgage Interest $909.08 Assets:Current:Escrow $1,024.48 Assets:Current:XYZ Bank:Checking $-2,619.19 This set up has tracked my mortgage payments and balances for several years, down to the penny. On Fri, Feb 19, 2021 at 8:40 AM Alex Branham <alex.bran...@gmail.com> wrote: > Thanks for the responses! So it sounds like your monthly payments look > something like: > > 2021-03-06 foo > liabilities:mortgage:principal $ -X > expenses:interest $ -X > assets:checking > > I'm having trouble figuring out what the initial house purchase entry > should look like, though. Did you create something like an "assets:house" > account with 1 house in it? Or did you balance against "equity:house" or > something else? > > 2021-02-06 someone > assets:house 1 > house > liabilities:mortgage $ -X > assets:checking $ -X > > Thanks! > > On Mon, Feb 8, 2021 at 2:42 AM Alan Schmitt < > alan.schm...@polytechnique.org> wrote: > >> On 2021-02-06 23:31, Yuri Khan <yuri.v.k...@gmail.com> writes: >> >> > On Sat, 6 Feb 2021 at 22:46, alex.b...@gmail.com < >> alex.bran...@gmail.com> wrote: >> > >> >> How do people track their housing/mortgage/interest in ledger? Do you >> recommend just a simple "Expense:Mortgage" account or a more micro level >> with e.g. "Expenses:Interest:Mortgage" and "Equity:House" for the >> interest/principle? >> >> >> >> Any and all thoughts/tips/tricks welcome, thanks! >> > >> > I did pretty much that. The principal is a Liabilities subaccount >> though. >> >> I do the same thing: I have a Liabilities account were the loan was >> initially deposited (which balanced getting the cash in my account) and >> an interest Expenses account. Each monthly payment is dispatched between >> the two, slowly decreasing the Liabilities that remain. >> >> Best, >> >> Alan >> >> -- >> >> --- >> You received this message because you are subscribed to a topic in the >> Google Groups "Ledger" group. >> To unsubscribe from this topic, visit >> https://groups.google.com/d/topic/ledger-cli/lFCcgPbPV1A/unsubscribe. >> To unsubscribe from this group and all its topics, send an email to >> ledger-cli+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. >> To view this discussion on the web visit >> https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/ledger-cli/87wnvjovjs.fsf%40m4x.org. >> > -- > > --- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "Ledger" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to ledger-cli+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. > To view this discussion on the web visit > https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/ledger-cli/CACV%2BV6%3D65FzEMjBq%2BRkXiQAOa8BunexELHSwtN%2BWqA8NOUoKvQ%40mail.gmail.com > <https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/ledger-cli/CACV%2BV6%3D65FzEMjBq%2BRkXiQAOa8BunexELHSwtN%2BWqA8NOUoKvQ%40mail.gmail.com?utm_medium=email&utm_source=footer> > . > -- --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Ledger" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to ledger-cli+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/ledger-cli/CALfY4%2B-2UAjnAYjOyd8jRsHpPbGMW4MoKPs_Jb5TsZw7grw0jA%40mail.gmail.com.