[GNC] Starting from scratch

[David Cousens]

Clint,

You can certainly reset the starting balances as you work your way
through imposrting data. I did that when I shifted from MYOB to GnuCash
many years ago now.The starting balances are just a normal
transactionbetween the account and an equity account usually named
Opening Balances  and can be edited like any other transaction in
GnuCash

If your previous program can export in CSV format then you should be
able to import the data into GnuCash in that format.If it was a
database based program you may be able to query the data directly with
SQL to export it in  a CSV form.






On Mon, 2026-04-27 at 08:12 -0700, Clint Chaplin wrote:
> Hi, (soon to be) new user here.  I have almost 40 years of
> transactions, in
> programs that are incapable of exporting, so I'll have to start
> entering
> them in manually.
> 28/04/2628/04/26
> What strategies have people used in the past when starting up
> GnuCash?  I
> sorta understand for normal "cash" transactions I can probably just
> start
> entering in transactions for the current year, but can the starting
> balance
> be changed as I work my way backwards?
> 
> For stocks and mutual funds, should I start at the beginning and work
> my
> way forward?  I'm not sure just how clean it is to start entering
> current
> transactions and then work my way backwards, especially given that
> account
> fees are taken FIFO from the first purchase in the mutual fund.
> 
> Mortgage may be interesting, or simple.
> 
> BTW, USA user.
> 
> Any advice would be greatly appreciated.  Thank you.

-- 28/04/2628/04/26
David Cousens