|
Posted by Andrew on December 28, 2006, 6:13 pm
Please log in for more thread options Jim S wrote:
> Hi everyone..
>
> I'd like to start tracking 401K performance in Quicken, but don't want
> to enter 10+ years of transaction data and am looking for a
> workaround.
> I only care about performance data going forward (1/1/2007 on). So,
> can I just do a one-time "buy" for each fund in the 401K, where the
> number of shares would reflect what I owned on 12/31/06? (Eg: I own
> 1000 shares at $20 of Fund X on 12/31. On 1/1, I do a one-time buy
> [using cash from a 'dummy' fund that I create] of 1000 shares of Fund
> X at $20/share)? If I do that, will Q track performance for that
> fund for 2007 and onward "correctly"?
>
> I'm trying to avoid the dreaded "placeholder" entries, as it seems
> like Q can only calculate performance (even for the current year,
> right?) if I go back and enter ALL transaction data - and this would
> take me days (literally) as I have both my wife's and my 401Ks to
> enter.
> This seems logical to me, but I'm wondering if I "lose" anything (eg:
> cost basis data) with this approach vs. entering 10+ years of data for
> both of our 401Ks?
>
> Thanks..
>
> Jim
"... but I'm wondering if I "lose" anything (eg: > cost basis data) ".
It is highly likely that you do not have a cost basis as most 401K plans are
funded by employee pre-tax and employer pre-tax contributions. Yes, you'll
lose
historical data as well as (assuming Q has this ability) to differentiate
between your monies you put in and any matching employer contributions.
Personally, I don't care about that as the statements I get from my 401k
plan admin are much more detailed than Q could provide anyway.
I think your method would work as long as you don't include the original
purchase in your date range, as obviously that will skew the results. Also,
I think you need to have at least one year's worth of real transactions to
make the IRR calculations (performance) meaningful, as extrapolating a full
year's IRR with only a few months of data can lead to erroneous results (ie:
if your fund goes up somewhat in one week, that doesn't mean it will
continue to do so at the same rate for the next 51 weeks!).
--
-------------------------------------------------------------
Regards -
- Andrew
| 
Yahoo! 
Google 
Windows Live 
del.icio.us 
digg 
Netscape 
XML Sitemap