GF and I maintain nearly separate finances. And we have separate computers with separate Quicken Delux 06 on each.
We have one checking account and one savings account which are community property. Currently, I maintain the Quicken accounts for these two but that means she has to pass her charges through me for recording. It would be very convenient to let either of us update the common, shared file. Is this possible in Quicken? Is the required file and record locking in place?
Or, does someone out there have a solution to this very common problem?
I'm assuming your are both on a LAN. This may be too simplistic, but can't you just put the shared file in your shared documents folder. Your GF can tell Quicken where the file is located. I'm pretty sure Windows will not allow simultaneous access to a shared file.
Bob
We have one checking account and one savings account which are community property. Currently, I maintain the Quicken accounts for these two but that means she has to pass her charges through me for recording. It would be very convenient to let either of us update the common, shared file. Is this possible in Quicken? Is the required file and record locking in place?
Or, does someone out there have a solution to this very common problem?
Bob, Is the "shared documents folder" something in Win2KP or Quicken???? I'm hoping for a solution that lets either of us startup our Quicken and go about our business without having to manually move any files or alert the other person ("I'm changing the joint accounts now!").
The other option is to just right click on your Quicken folder and share that over the network.
I don't have a Win2KP machine to check, but your GF would open your file by telling Quicken to go to My Network Places, Entire Network, Microsoft Windows Network, Workgroup, Quicken, your file.
After she opens it once, it should just be in the MRU list.
Darn! Forgot to address sharing. As I recall, you had to create your own shared documents folder in Win2KP. No big deal, I would just create a c:\Shared Documents folder to be consistent with WinXPP. But I would then share it as "Documents" also for consistency with WinXPP.
As I noted earlier, you may just want to right click on your Quicken folder, and share it as Quicken, make sure you give her rights to modify files.
Quicken doesn't have a good solution to sharing a Quicken database because Windows doesn't offer good file sharing semantics. What Quicken needs is a true database but it doesn't have that.
As for commingling funds, if she's your GF then you'd be wise not to be doing that. Such things are for married people. ;-)
I've read the responses so far, but I'm not sure they address the question as I understand it (and perhaps I'm misunderstanding it).
Are you saying you want GF to be able to access ONLY those two accounts in "her" Quicken? Or are you looking for an easy way for her to get into "your" Quicken so that she can update those two accounts on her own?
I assumed you meant the former, in which you would have a Quicken file with accounts A,B,C,D,E and F, and she would have a Quicken file with accounts G,H,I and J as well as E and F. In other words E and F would be the joint accounts, while A,B,C and D would be your assets and G,H,I and J would be her assets. And you're looking for a way for both of you to access and change accounts E and F in such a way that the changes would show up in the other person's version of Quicken. Is that what you meant? Boy, that'd be cool if you could do that. I don't think that could be done, but then there are some smart people on this list who may know otherwise.
A question: Are the joint accounts accessible online? The fact that you both can download transactions would at least ease the data-entry burden. But each of you would still have to categorize many transactions once they've been downloaded.
Thanks for your comments, Andrew, but I wasn't looking for your judgments! However, our setup is a very easy way to keep track of how much we each contribute to the joint expenses. When the joint checking account gets low, we each kick in $200. This avoids nickel-and-dime calculations.
Comingled funds is what is desired for certain things. But I want to be certain that any scheme with Quicken does not give access to the private accounts. At least one bank (Digital Federal Credit Union) was totally incapable of setting up accounts in their bank that way!
BTW, I was married for 18 years and understand quite a bit about separating things when the divorce occurs. But this is a Quicken forum and I suggest we keep it to that.
Every bank account must have one "owner" for tax reasons. They owner is the one who must do the downloads. Either of us should be able to enter normal transactions.
I understand the hers, his and our concept. How about setting up a third company file (ours) that is located on a shared drive so that either one of you can open the file and entering your respective transactions? Keep the his and her accounts in separate company files on your respective computers if you are concerned with privacy issues.
There is no way to do what you are requesting save perhaps setting up a
3rd Quicken database that you put the shared stuff in, thus making it equally difficult for both of you!
Off topic happens all the time. Again, if you want to comingle stuff then get married. Note that getting married does not solve your Quicken problem! :-)
My previous answer assumed a separate Quicken file that ONLY contains the joint savings and checking accounts.
Have you considered opening a joint brokerage account at, say Fidelity, so you'd be earning 3% on your idle "checking account" cash?
I don't like moving money in and out of money market funds to keep up with scheduled withdrawals and checks, so I tend to keep a pretty big cash balance.
Of course, you'd have to keep a balance of at least $2,500 to avoid maintenance fees.
A solution just came to me that may work. It assumes that you have the joint accounts at a FI different from your private accounts or that the FI you use allows different users to download different accounts (so you can DL yours and the joint accounts and your GF can DL hers and the joint account).
In that case set the joint account up in both files. Then both of you can use things such as fund transfers and you'll both get to download transactions initiated by the other party.
Close. Except that her bank doesn't offer online tranaction download and mine changes $9.95 per month for the service. The thing that is clever about this solution is two users (machines) can download and get a Quicken account updated!
Thanks, Laura. Having to log into the third computer seems awkward. I hope to find a solution that doesn't involve any more than clicking on My Checking or Joint Checking etc. Mike (next msg) has a solution that works but costs more money.
The creation of a third company file does not require a third computer. Just pick one of your 2 computers to be the holder of the file. As long as you are networked and both computers are on then either one of you can get access to that file and update it on a weekly basis.
And remember that Intuit virtually guarantees that using a Quicken data fileset over a network will corrupt that fileset. Sooner, or later. (Sooner being more likely.)
I'm not sure what you mean there. No matter who the owner is, whoever has the user ID and password can log in and download. As far as I know, no FI uses some kind of identification procedure where it checks the computer that's doing the downloading to see if things are kosher. There's no reason I can think of why you and your GF can't both download info from the same account from the same FI (as long as you don't do it at the same time). Hell, if you posted your user ID and password on this list, everyone here should be able to download from that account. Just an example, of course.
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