Overview

"Stephen Nelson's previous For Dummies guides to Quicken have sold more than 900,000 copies Quicken has more than 16 million active users and 75 percent of the personal finance software market Shows people how to get their finances under control quickly and easily using Quicken Covers online banking and bill paying, tracking credit cards, managing loans, maximizing investments, calculating interest, preparing payroll, setting up accounts, creating reports, and more Completely updated to cover the latest features and enhancements in the new version of Quicken Published in conjunction with the release of Quicken ""X"""

Full Product Details

Author:   Stephen L. Nelson
Publisher:   John Wiley and Sons Ltd
Imprint:   John Wiley & Sons Ltd
Dimensions:   Width: 18.40cm , Height: 2.20cm , Length: 23.10cm
Weight:   0.578kg
ISBN:  

9780470046005

ISBN 10:   0470046007
Pages:   384
Publication Date:   19 September 2006
Audience:   Professional and scholarly ,  Professional & Vocational
Format:   Paperback
Publisher's Status:   Active
Availability:   In Print  
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Table of Contents

Introduction 1 About This Book 1 How to Use This Book 1 What You Can Safely Ignore 2 What You Should Not Ignore (Unless You’re a Masochist) 2 Three Foolish Assumptions 3 The Flavors of Quicken 3 How This Book Is Organized 3 Part I: Zen, Quicken, and the Big Picture 3 Part II: The Absolute Basics 4 Part III: Home Finances 4 Part IV: Serious Business 4 Part V: The Part of Tens 4 Part VI: Appendixes 5 Conventions Used in This Book 5 Special Icons 5 Where to Next? 6 Part I: Zen, Quicken, and the Big Picture 7 Chapter 1: Setting Up Shop 9 Installing and Starting Quicken 10 Finishing Setup If You’ve Used Quicken Before 11 Finishing Setup If You Haven’t Used Quicken Before 12 Running the Quicken New User Setup 14 Steve’s Overview 19 Starting Quicken for the second time 19 Using Quicken document windows 19 Navigating with financial activity centers’ QuickTabs 20 Solving Tricky Setup Problems 20 Did somebody say Macintosh? 20 The mysterious case of the missing Quicken data files 21 Migrating from Microsoft Money 22 Chapter 2: Introduction to the Big Picture 23 Boiling Quicken Down to Its Essence 23 Tracking tax deductions 24 Monitoring spending 24 Printing checks 25 Tracking bank accounts, credit cards, and other stuff 26 Planning your personal finances 26 Banking online 26 Setting Up Additional Accounts 27 Setting up another banking account 27 Hey, Quicken, I want to use that account! 31 Whipping Your Category Lists into Shape 31 Subcategories yikes, what are they? 34 Category groups double yikes! 35 Four tips on categorization 36 Ch-ch-changing a category list 36 Do You Need a Little Class? 41 Chapter 3: Maximum Fun, Maximum Profits 43 Should You Even Bother with a Budget? 43 Serious Advice about Your Secret Plan 43 Your personal Secret Plan 44 Two things that really goof up Secret Plans 44 Setting Up a Secret Plan 47 Introducing the Budget window 47 Entering budgeted amounts 50 Reviewing the options 51 Reviewing your budget 52 What to do after you enter your budget 53 Part II: The Absolute Basics 55 Chapter 4: Checkbook on a Computer 57 Getting Started 57 Finding Your Checkbook 58 Recording Checks 60 Entering a check into the register 60 Changing a check you’ve entered 62 Packing more checks into the register 63 Working with a kooky (and clever) little thing named QuickFill 64 Recording Deposits 65 Entering a deposit into the register 66 Changing a deposit you’ve already entered 68 Recording Account Transfers 68 Entering an account transfer 68 Working with the other half of the transfer 70 Changing a transfer you’ve already entered 71 Splitting Transactions 71 Steps for splitting a check 72 Editing and deleting split categories 75 Steps for splitting deposits and transfers 75 Deleting and Voiding Transactions 76 The Big Register Phenomenon 77 Moving through a big register 77 Finding that darn transaction 77 Pop-Up Calendars and Calculators 81 Attaching Flags, Notes, and Images 83 Chapter 5: Printing 101 85 Printing Checks 85 What if you make a mistake entering a check? 88 Printing a check you’ve entered 89 What if you discover a mistake after you print the check? 92 A few words about check printing 93 Printing a Check Register 93 Chapter 6: Online and In Charge 97 What Are Online Account Access and Online Bill Payment? 97 Wise Whys and Wherefores 98 Banking with Online Account Access and Online Bill Payment 98 Finding an online bank — online 100 Paying bills 101 Transferring money between accounts 102 Updating your Quicken accounts 103 Chapter 7: Reports, Charts, and Other Cool Tools 105 Creating and Printing Reports 105 Printing the facts, and nothing but the facts 105 Reviewing standard reports 110 Finding the report you want 114 Going to the printing dog-and-pony show 114 Editing and rearranging reports 117 Charts Only Look Tricky 120 QuickReports: Last but Not Least 121 Chapter 8: A Matter of Balance 123 Selecting the Account You Want to Balance 124 Balancing a Bank Account 125 Telling Quicken, “Hey, man, I want to balance this account” 125 Giving Quicken the bank’s information 125 Explaining the difference between your records and the bank’s records 127 Ten Things You Should Do If Your Account Doesn’t Balance 131 Make sure that you’re working with the right account 131 Look for transactions that the bank has recorded but you haven’t 131 Look for reversed transactions 132 Look for a transaction that’s equal to half the difference 132 Look for a transaction that’s equal to the difference 132 Check for transposed numbers 132 Have someone else look over your work 133 Look out for multiple errors 133 Try again next month (and maybe the month after that) 133 Get in your car, drive to the bank, and beg for help 134 Chapter 9: Housekeeping for Quicken 135 Backing Up Is Hard to Do 135 Backing up the quick-and-dirty way 135 Deciding when to back up 137 Losing your Quicken data after you’ve backed up 138 Losing your Quicken data when you haven’t backed up 140 Working with Files, Files, and More Files 141 Setting up a new file 141 Flip-flopping between files 143 When files get too big for their own good 144 Using and Abusing Passwords 148 Setting up a file password 148 Changing a file password 150 Chapter 10: Compound Interest Magic and Other Mysteries 151 Noodling Around with Your Investments 152 Using the Investment Savings Calculator 152 Trying to become a millionaire 153 The Often Unbearable Burden of Debt 155 Using the Loan Calculator to figure payments 155 Calculating loan balances 157 The Refinance Calculator 158 The Retirement Calculator 159 The dilemma in a nutshell 159 Retirement planning calculations 160 If you’re now bummed out about retirement 163 Retirement roulette 163 Cost of College 164 The College Calculator 164 If you’re now bummed out about college costs 165 Planning for Taxes 166 The Other Planning Tools 169 Part III: Home Finances 171 Chapter 11: Credit Cards, Petty Cash, and PayPal 173 Tracking a Credit Card 173 How to Set Up a Credit Card Account 174 Adding a credit card account 174 Selecting a credit card account so that you can use it 178 How to Enter Credit Card Transactions 178 Touring the credit card register 179 Recording a credit card charge 179 Changing charges you’ve already entered 181 Paying credit card bills 181 Reconciling That Crazy Account 182 What the nasty credit card company says 183 Ouch! Did I really spend that much? 185 If you record a transaction wrong, do this 186 Oh, that explains the difference 186 If you’re ready to finish 187 If you want to postpone the inevitable 187 Paying the bill as part of the reconciliation 188 The Online Banking Hoopla 189 Should you even bother? 189 How to use Online Account Access with your credit card 189 Petty Cash and Mad Money 190 Adding a cash account 190 Tracking cash inflows and outflows 191 Recording checks you cash instead of deposit 192 Updating cash balances 193 PayPal Can Be Quicken’s Friend 193 Chapter 12: Other People’s Money 195 Should You Bother to Track Your Debts? 195 How Do You Get Started? 196 Setting up a liability account for an amortized loan 196 Fixing loan stuff 202 Delivering a Pound of Flesh (Also Known as Making a Payment) 206 Recording the payment 206 Handling mortgage escrow accounts 207 Your Principal-Interest BreakdownWon’t Be Right 210 So you can’t change the world 210 Think this adjustment business is kooky? 211 Automatic Payments 212 Scheduling a payment 212 Working with scheduled transactions 214 Checking out the Calendar 216 Chapter 13: Mutual Funds 217 Deciding to Use Investment Features 217 Are your investments tax-deferred? 218 Are you a mutual fund fanatic? 218 Some investors don’t need Quicken 218 Many investors do need Quicken 219 Tracking a Mutual Fund 221 Setting up a mutual fund investment account 221 Recording your initial investment 224 Buying investments 228 Recording your profits 231 Selling investments 232 Correcting a mistake 234 Working with slightly tricky mutual fund transactions 236 Reconciling an account 238 Trying reports 238 Using menu commands and other stuff 238 Updating Securities Prices 239 Chapter 14: Stocks and Bonds 241 Setting Up a Brokerage Account 241 Recording your initial share balances 244 Working with brokerage accounts 245 Setting up security lists 245 Working with cash 247 Recording other not-so-tricky transactions 253 More Quick Stuff about Brokerage Accounts 255 Monitoring and updating securities’ values 255 Researching investments 255 Adjusting errors 256 A few words on the investment account window 257 Online Investing with Quicken 259 Part IV: Serious Business 261 Chapter 15: Payroll 263 Getting Ready for Payroll 264 Getting Quicken ready 264 Getting the taxes stuff right 270 Paying someone for a job well done 271 Working with other taxes and deductions 274 Recording a payroll check 275 Depositing Taxes 278 Filing Quarterly Payroll Tax Returns 280 Computing Annual Returns and Wage Statements 282 Doing the State Payroll Taxes Thing 283 Chapter 16: Profits, Losses, Receivables, and Payables 285 Tracking Profits and Losses 286 Tracking Customer Receivables 286 Tracking Customer Invoices and Payments 288 Recording customer invoices 288 Recording customer payments 290 Tracking Your Receivables 291 Discovering a dirty little secret about A/R reporting in Quicken 291 Producing an accurate balance sheet 292 Getting a list of what customers owe you 293 Preparing to Track Vendor Payables 295 Describing your vendor payables 295 Tracking vendor payables 296 Explaining how Quicken handles payables 297 Part V: The Part of Tens 299 Chapter 17 : (Slightly More Than) Ten Questions I’m Frequently Asked about Quicken 301 What Are Quicken’s Best Features? 302 Does Quicken Work for a Corporation? 302 What Happens to Stockholders’ Equity in Quicken? 303 Does Quicken Work for a Partnership? 303 Can I Use Quicken for More Than One Business? 304 What Kinds of Businesses Shouldn’t Use Quicken? 305 Can I Use Quicken for Real Estate Investing? 306 Can I Use Quicken Retroactively? 307 Can I Do Payroll with Quicken? 308 Can I Prepare Invoices? 308 Can I Import Data from an Old Accounting System? 308 What Do You Think about Quicken? 309 Chapter 18: (Almost) Ten Tips on How Not to Become a Millionaire 311 Ignore the Fact That You Can Build Wealth by Investing in Ownership Investments and Earning Average Returns 313 Ignore the Fact That You Can Get Much, and Maybe Most, of the Money from Tax Savings and Employer Matching 314 Don’t Tap Your Computer’s Power to Develop Wealth-Building Insights 316 Give Up Because It’s Too Late to Start Anyway 317 Get Entangled in at Least One “Get-Rich-Quick” Scheme 318 Fake It with False Affluence 319 Give In to the First Big Temptation of Wealth Building 319 Give In to the Second Big Temptation of Wealth Building 320 Chapter 19: (Almost) Ten Troubleshooting Tips 321 Tactics #1 and #2: Use Quicken’s Help File and This Book 321 Tactic #3: Visit Quicken’s Product Support Web Site 322 Tactics #4 and #5: Check Microsoft’s or the Hardware Vendor’s Product Support Web Site 322 Tactic #6: Contact Intuit Directly 323 Tactic #7: Try a Quicken Newsgroup 323 Tactic #8: Install and Use Antivirus Software 324 Tactic #9: When All Else Fails 324 Part VI: Appendixes 325 Appendix A: Quick-and-Dirty Windows 327 What Is Windows? 327 Starting Windows 328 Starting Programs 329 Choosing Commands from Menus 330 Choosing commands with the furry little rodent 331 Choosing commands by using the Alt+key combinations 331 Using shortcut-key combinations 332 Disabled commands 333 Working with Dialog Boxes 333 Text boxes 333 Check boxes 335 Tabs 336 Option buttons 336 Command buttons 336 List boxes 337 Stopping Quicken for Windows 338 A Yelp for Help 338 The Quicken Help command 339 The Current Window command 341 The Add Business Tools command 341 The Unlock Again command 342 The Product And Customer Support command 342 The Submit Feedback On Quicken command 342 The What’s New In Quicken command 342 The Learn About Next Steps After Set Up and the Learn About Downloading Transactions commands 343 The User Manuals command 343 The Ask A Quicken User command 343 The About Quicken command 343 The Privacy Statement command 343 Quitting Windows 344 Appendix B: Glossary of Business, Financial, and Computer Terms 345 Index 353

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Author Information

Stephen L. Nelson is a CPA in Redmond, Washington. Nelson has an undergraduate degree in accounting, a master of business administration degree in finance, and a master of science degree in taxation. He’s spent more than two decades helping individuals and businesses manage their finances — usually, in part, by better use of computer systems such as Quicken. More recently, he’s worked as a sole proprietor. When he wasn’t doing CPA-type work, he served as controller of a small, 50-person computer software company, and then as a book publisher. As corny as it sounds, Steve truly enjoys writing books that make using personal computers easier and more fun. In fact, a substantiated rumor that appeared first in The Wall Street Journal says Steve has written more than 150 computer books. Steve is the best-selling author on the Quicken product. In fact, Wiley recently tallied up Steve’s Quicken For Dummies sales — and lo and behold if we haven’t printed more than one million copies!

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