symlink account?

[JIm]

Andrew Gelvin Burley Grimes wrote:

> Is there a way to create a Gnucash expense account that actually acts
> like something of a symbolic link in Unix?  Here's what I mean --
> 
> 
> 
> 
> I have a placeholder expense account, "Insurance," containing
> subaccounts "Auto" & "Homeowners"
> 
> I also have a placeholder expense account "Taxes," containing
> subaccount "Property Tax" (among others)
> 
> I would like to create an expense account "Escrow," with subaccounts
> "Homeowners Insurance" and "Property tax," so I can keep track of what
> I have paid into escrow on my mortgage.  However, these accounts
> already exist under their other respective parent accounts.  Is there a
> way to set up an account such that it looks over into another account
> to get its balance?  Or, is it possible for an account to have two
> separate parent accounts?
> 
> Am I conceptualizing this whole thing incorrectly?
> 
> 
> 
> thanks for your thoughts,
> 
> Drew
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Drew Grimes
> North Carolina State University
> http://www4.ncsu.edu/~aggrimes
I think you are conceptualizing things incorrectly.

Escrow is not an expense.  It is more like you putting money into a savings
account to make payments from later.  

The way I do it is:
The monthly mortgage payment is split between principal, interest and
escrow.  The escrow amount goes into an asset account "escrow", the
principal goes into reducing the liability account "mortgage ", the
interest goes into the expense acount "mortgage interest".

When the bank makes payments to the insurance company or for property taxes
(they show on my mortgage statement), I enter those as transactions between
the escrow account and the appropriate expense account.  Same thing when
the bank pays interest into my escrow account, I have a transaction between
the income account "escrow interest" and the asset account "escrow".

This way all the expenses and interest income is properly tracked and I can
look at my mortgage statement and verify that my escrow, principal and
interest paid match my records.
-- 
Jim