Debt repayment is not an expense?

Question

Since PRINCIPAL repayments aren't an expense when you track them in Quickbooks, how do I track them in a way that lets me know what my monthly cash flow is? ( as in the amount of money I can put in my pocket each month)

Most RE investments calculate the principal as an expense for monthly cashflow purposes. BUT it really is just an internal transfer to a long term liability and never shows up on your P&L statement. Is there a way to make it show up as a line item on my P&L so I can quickly see what my cashfow is with or without it?

are you with me???

Steve Babiak · Answer

Quickbooks allows you to create custom reports, so just create a report for cash flow by class.

Andy Collins · Answer

"cash flow" doesn't include increased equity, its not cash.

I understand what your wanting, and you can just add the amount of principal you pay each month/quarter/year to the cash flow report to get what your looking for,,but increased equity isn't current "cash"

Shawn M. · Answer

Right now I have most of my properties in one account with each set up as a different class. When I do a Profit & Loss by Class, I get all the breakdown I need, It just shows Debt repayment as a profit, which won't buy me dinner.

Xing Zhu · Answer

The easiest way to track the cash flow from each property is to set up a dedicated bank account for each property.

Shawn M. · Answer

Hi Derek,

Thank you this makes sense, but I don't see that option under the quickbooks reports. I see a "statement of cash flows" option but that doesn't really give me a breakdown per property.