How to account for a house purchase

[John Ralls]

Ron,

You made the right choice. Barring a price-to-market accounting requirement that never applies to individuals, the book value is what you actually paid. When you get around to selling you’ll get taxed on the difference between the net selling price and that purchase price.

If you want to see the “funny money” of market value you can create a “house” security and make Assets:House contain one of them, purchased at the price on the contract. Then you can get updated market price estimates and put them in the pricedb. The supposed market value will then show up on the Accounts page and in various reports.

Regards,
John Ralls

> On Feb 17, 2018, at 9:01 AM, Ronal B Morse <ron at morsehouse.com> wrote:
> 
> That's what I did. I also had to set up a corresponding liability account for the mortgage, but that's a separate issue.
> 
> I wasn't sure if I should use the purchase price or the appraised value as the value of the asset, but since I do everything else on a cash basis, I decided to use the cash price.  That does have some impact on net worth calculations, but I'll live with that.
> 
> RBM
> 
> 
> On 02/17/2018 07:56 AM, Robert Heller wrote:
>> At Sat, 17 Feb 2018 21:31:54 +0700 Tony Vanson <tonyvans70 at gmail.com> wrote:
>> 
>>> Hi all,
>>> Hopefully someone can point me in the right direction on how to account for a house purchase in GNUCash.
>>> I have contracted to buy a house and have paid a 10% deposit from my bank account, with the remainder becoming due within 2 months. I understand that the deposit amount is a debit against my bank account but I have no idea what the corresponding  double-entry should be. I assume when this purchase is completed it will be an asset?
>>> Regards
>> How about Assets:House ?
>> 
>>> 
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