End of category - home buy expenses
I'm new to YNAB. I stared using whilst buying my first home.
So, I have a 'home buy expenses' category which is now just sitting there.
Can I just leave it there and hide it? Or is it best to delete it? But where do I transfer those expenses to?
Thoughts appreciated
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You can hide the category once done. One of the options on a category name edit window is to "hide". It will show up in a "hidden categories" group in reports, but otherwise won't be in your way. If you ever need it, you can unhide it.
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Hide it. Temporarily unhide it if you want to see it in a spending report.
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dakinemaui good to know.
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Hi Tomato Drill !
We don't suggest deleting any category with transaction history. It will uncategorize the transactions that were in those categories, require you to select a new category for them and then budget funds to cover the spending in the new category.
Hiding the category is the way to go here. :)
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That's great to know. I had just read the Wish Farm blog post and got into the thought that dormant categories are bad somehow.
Cheers
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Tomato Drill Dormant categories can be clutter; but if the category has zero Available and you don't expect to use it again, it's safe to delete any goal associated with that category and then hide the category.
In prior versions of YNAB, every few years I would look at my hidden categories and closed/hidden accounts, then chop down my history to start some date after the last use of several of them. Once that process was done, I could safely delete the accounts and categories no longer used. In theory, this process could still work in nYNAB; but because there is no "save as" or "restore from backup" facility, the risk of making a mistake when I do this rather labor intensive manual process outweighs the modest benefit from budget cleanup. (YNAB expects me to do a Fresh Start for this purpose, but I prefer to maintain some rolling history.)
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is it wise to transfer any remaining available money out? My example is a pet's dental surgery that came in slightly underbudget. should I just Move the money or adjust down the budgeted amount and Hide?
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BradleyW Pet dental care seems like it would be an ongoing expense so I would probably leave the money there, not hide it and continue to fund it for the next time your pet needs a tooth pulled or whatever.
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jenmas I see your point. though in this case it was saving for a specific surgery. are you just suggesting repurposing the category for more general care and funding it with less in the future? what about categories for specific vacations? reuse those too?
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BradleyW Yes. I like reusing my categories, when possible, to reduce clutter. One scheduled surgery implies there will be more. I would continue to save for the next one, starting today. You never know what will come up next.
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BradleyW In my personal situation, it's a mix. I have several vacation categories: General Vacation, Annual Beach Week, Hawaii, and Cruise 2021. I've been doing my annual beach week since 1995, the costs are known so I budget the same amount to that category every single month. Hawaii is my dream vacation, I've saved up a ton of money for it, now I just need to go. Same for Cruise 2021, I had a windfall in March of this year, so I just funded the whole thing in one go so I don't have to think of it anymore. General Vacation is for other things that I do. It gets funded at a static amount every month and funds weekend getaways or last summer's trip to Puerto Rico or whatever.
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jenmas MsTJ thanks for the advice y'all!
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