The purpose of the Investment budget is to assist you in allocating funds from your budget towards investments each month, and tracking your progress against this goal over time. (Remember Billroo is for budgeting, it doesn't track your account balances).

When you transfer money from your regular bank account into an investment account, such as a brokerage, record this as a negative transaction categorized as an Investment. This reflects that it is money coming OUT of your accounts to an investment.

Let’s say you decide to invest $5,000 into shares. Here’s how you would record this transaction:

• Record the -$5,000 transaction from your bank account categorized as Investment.

• This will then show as a positive $5,000 under Investments, indicating the amount you have invested. You can compare this to the amount you are budgeting to allocate to Investments over time.

It’s important to note that if you receive money back from your investments, such as dividends or proceeds, this should typically be categorized as Income, not Investment.

If you own rental properties:

• An initial deposit paid would usually be categorized as Investment, although you can categorize it as an Expense if you prefer.

• Any income generated from these properties should be categorized under an Income category.

• Record the mortgage repayment and any other expenses related to the property as Expenses.

• Any interest charges relating to the mortgage should be labelled as Transfer. This means they will not be counted in totals. This avoids double-counting.

To effectively track and filter the income and expenses for a specific rental property or investment, you have a couple of options:

• Create individual income and expense categories for that property e.g. Expense - George St. However, this method may not make it clear for you what the income or expense was (e.g., maintenance, rates, etc.)

• Alternatively, use tags to group all transactions related to that specific rental property or investment. This method keeps them in their individual expense categories but allows you to filter by the specific investment.

Any questions or problems, please don't hesitate to reach out to support@billroo.com, we are here to help!