Help with setting up for the first time

[Josh Sled]

"Ryan G. Tumbagahan" <rtumbagahan at gmail.com> writes:
> When I create an asset account and set its opening balance, do I create
> the transaction in the asset and put "equity:opening balances" in the
> Transfer column, or do I start with the Equity:Opening Balances account
> and transfer to the asset account?

Either way; they're basically equivalent operations.


> I may have made a mistake doing the first approach mentioned above
> because now my asset accounts have positive values and so does the
> equity account. Can anyone help please?

That's correct.  If you start the books with $1000 in your checking (Asset)
account, then you have an Equity of $1000, right? :)

Note the setting {Edit > Preferences > Accounts > Reverse Balanced
Accounts}.  By default, "Credit" accounts (Credit Cards/Liabilities, Equity,
others) are sign reversed.

See
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double-entry_accounting#An_explanation_of_debits_and_credits>
for some more detail about "debit" and "credit" accounts, and how debits and
credit affect them.

-- 
...jsled
http://asynchronous.org/ - a=jsled; b=asynchronous.org; echo ${a}@${b}
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