Managing joint accounts in PocketSmith

There are different ways you can manage joint accounts in PocketSmith. How this is achieved within PocketSmith depends on your circumstances and personal preference!

A few key things to consider are:

• whether you want to share access to your PocketSmith account with the other joint account holder
• the impact of the joint accounts on your net worth
• if you want distinct budgets
• whether the other joint account holder's personal accounts will also be tracked

Background

This guide is perfect for those who love keeping tabs on their personal and joint accounts.  

For the Net Worth and Budgeting impact sections, we have assumed that the ownership of the joint accounts is 50:50 and that you are seeking a way to track only your share of the joint accounts. This is a generalization, and we appreciate this will not be the case for everyone. 💡

We definitely understand that some of our users will prefer a more relaxed approach.  🏖️ No worries! If you're not phased by 'who-owns-what' and 'who-owes-who' with your other joint account holder, then you can simply go ahead and add your personal and joint accounts to your PocketSmith account and let the magic happen. The 'Shared access' section below will be of relevance for you. 

Joint account setups can be as unique as our users. The ideal setup for you will ultimately depend on your case's unique needs and dynamics.🎢

Shared access

Using PocketSmith with others is easy with our Advisor Access feature, which allows for shared access without sharing your login details on the web app. ✨

This is suitable if you are wanting someone else to be able to see and help manage all the data in your PocketSmith account. Great for those who share everything with the other joint account holder.

For the details on setting up Advisor Access, head to this guide: Shared access on your PocketSmith account.

Adding another set of credentials

If you're managing everything together as a team, you may want to add both your own personal accounts and the personal accounts of the other joint account holder into one PocketSmith account.

If your personal accounts are both with the same bank, you'll be adding accounts from the same bank but with different credentials for a bank feed (i.e., different login details). Our guide will step you through this here: Adding more than one set of credentials to an existing bank feed.

Net Worth Impact

When adding a joint account to PocketSmith, the account's total balance is shown throughout PocketSmith, as if you are the sole owner. This is suitable for those managing the accounts as a team, but what if you want to monitor just what is yours? 

The ability to split ownership of an account so that, for example, only 50% of a joint account balance is displayed as the account's total balance in PocketSmith is not possible.

There are a couple of different options available depending on whether you want to track the account as a bank feed or not.

Option 1 - tracking a joint account with a bank feed

Tracking a joint account with a bank feed is useful if you want to track the transactions within the account.

What to do if the joint account is overstating your net worth

If you add a joint account with a positive balance, this will increase your net worth by the account's total balance.

To counter this, you could add a debt for 50% of the account balance so that your overall net worth is correct. See: Adding a debt to Net Worth.

For example, if your Joint Bank Account balance has a positive balance of $3,000 then you can add a debt for ($1,500).

As the balance of the joint account will fluctuate, you will need to regularly update the value of the debt to reflect the changes in the account balance accurately. Just head to the Calendar and follow our guide here: Updating the value of an asset or debt from the Calendar page.

What to do if the joint account is understating your net worth

If you add a joint account with a negative balance, this will decrease your net worth by the account's total balance.

To counter this, you could add an asset for 50% of the account balance to correct your overall net worth, as shown in this guide: Adding an asset to Net Worth.

For example, if your Joint Bank Account balance has a negative balance of ($4,000) then you can add an asset for $2,000.

As the balance of the joint account will fluctuate, you will need to regularly update the value of the asset added to reflect the changes in the account balance accurately. Just head to the Calendar and follow our guide here: Updating the value of an asset or debt from the Calendar page.

Option 2 - tracking a joint account using an asset or debt

Instead of adding the joint account as a feed account, you could track it as an asset or debt instead. This option is great if you are not wanting to track the transactions within the account.

This way, you can simply set the balance of the joint account to your share of the ownership.

For example, if your joint account contains $2,000, you could add an asset for $1,000 and name it Joint account balance (my share) for example. To keep things simple, you can set the 'Original value and purchase date' to today's date and so the 'Current value' will be the same amount.

This will need to be regularly updated to accurately reflect your net worth.

Budgeting impact

If you are managing the accounts as a collective, then your budgeting needs can be met by our other Learn Center Guides, such as: Tips and tricks for creating budgets in PocketSmith.

For those wanting the budget to reflect what they need to contribute, there are two different approaches we can recommend.

Budgeting for the whole expense and treating money received as income

If you make whole payments for shared expenses, you may want to budget for 100% of the expense. This ensures you can budget for the full balance needed within your account. 💸

However, as you also receive income from your partner, this extra income offsets the expense you paid. When viewing your account forecasts, the additional expenses will be balanced out by the additional income 📈📉. As such, you may want to set an income budget for a new category, such as 'Partner's Contribution', and set an income budget for this totaling the regular repayment you expect from your partner.

Budgeting for half the expense and treating money received as a reimbursement

If you would prefer your budget to only show your share of the expenses, you can instead budget for your portion of the expense only. When viewing your account forecasts, only your 50% share of the expenses will be included.

For example, if you have a shared expense category, such as electricity ⚡ and the average monthly expense is $400. You would create a monthly repeating budget of $200, assuming a 50% share of the electricity bill.

Then make sure that the Category Type of the Electricity category you're assigning the transactions to is set as: No, this is an expense category (any income is a refund).

You can then assign the original payment transaction of $400 and the reimbursement transaction from your partner of $200 to the same Category. This way, any reimbursement from your partner towards the expense will be subtracted from the expense total in that Category. ✨

Setting up distinct budgets

If you are looking to create distinct budgets for joint expenses and personal expenses, you may like to consider using parent/sub-categories. You can find more about this here: Sub-categories and nesting.

With this, you could arrange your Categories to reflect the purpose they relate to, and have entirely separate budgets on each of the sub-categories.

Example below:

To set up your categories in a similar way:

1. Head to the Categories (Manage > Categories) page
2. Create any new categories you need: Adding new categories
3. Restructure the categories as needed: Change the category order

Viewing joint and personal accounts separately

A number of areas of PocketSmith, such as the Budget page, will show you your combined earning and spending for all of your accounts/categories you have added to PocketSmith.

To help keep your personal and joint finances separate we have some tips below!

Using the Dashboard

You could set up two 'Dashboards' - one showing personal and one for joint. You can find more on this feature here: Using your customizable Dashboard.

You can customise and configure the widgets shown on each Dashboard to reflect only your joint or personal accounts and categories.

You can find more on the different ways to customize your widgets here: Configuring individual widget settings. A great one worth checking out is the: Earning & spending widget.

Using the Income and Expense Statement

You can also use our Income & Expense statement side navigation bar to select only certain accounts to analyze.

You can find out more about this here: Selecting the account you'd like to view.

Need more help

If you want to see some examples of joint account setups, head over to our Learn Center Guide: Managing Joint Accounts Examples.

If you have a joint account setup question not covered by the above, please get in touch with us. We'd be happy to see if we have something suitable to suggest.

When reaching out, include details such as:

• Is the ownership of these accounts 50/50 in terms of their balance and transactions or a different split?
• Does the other bank account owner repay their portion of their spending into the account as one lump sum or as individual transactions (e.g., single transactions to pay their share of power, rent/mortgage, etc.)?
• Do you think you'll link the other joint account holder's personal accounts into this PocketSmith account too?