How to add an asset in Beyond Payday

An asset is anything you own that has value — a bank account, a brokerage account, your home, a car, even a crypto wallet. Add one from the Assets page, and it counts toward your net worth right away; mark it for retirement and it also joins your retirement projection.

Steps

1. Go to Assets (opens in a new tab) and select Add Asset (it reads Add Your First Asset before you've added one).
2. Under What type of asset?, choose a category. There are 51 types across six groups:
   • Checking — checking accounts
   • Savings — savings accounts, money market accounts, CDs
   • Investment — 401(k), 403(b), 457, and their Roth versions; IRAs, SEP/SIMPLE IRAs, TSP, pensions, annuities, brokerage accounts, bonds, HSAs, 529s, UTMA/UGMA accounts, and stock compensation
   • Insurance — life policies (term, whole, universal, variable universal, indexed universal) plus disability, long-term care, homeowners, condo, flood, renters, auto and umbrella policies. See add insurance policy details
   • Physical Asset — real estate, vehicles, RVs/boats, precious metals, collectibles, jewelry, and other valuables
   • Digital Asset — digital wallets and crypto wallets
3. Enter the value. The field label adapts to the type — "Current Market Value" for real estate, "Current Balance" for a bank account, and similar.
4. Fill in the institution field if it applies (its label also adapts, like "Which bank?" or "Who manages this account?") and Last 4 Digits. Real estate, vehicles, and a few other physical categories skip both.
5. Set Asset Owner: pick one person, pick more than one for joint ownership, or leave it blank to assign the asset to the household.
6. Turn on Emergency Fund if this account is your primary emergency savings, or Retirement if it should count toward your retirement projection — see below for which types offer each toggle.
7. Select Add Asset to save.

Balance history

Every time you save an asset's value, Beyond Payday records that day's balance. Under the value in the edit window, a short line shows your progress once there's enough history — "Up $3,100 since Jan 12" and, once you have at least 3 balances spanning 90 days, "About $360/mo". Select that line, or the trend line under the value on the Assets page, to open the history window. The Business Equity asset a business creates has no history of its own, since its value is worked out from the business.

The history window shows a chart or a table of every balance you've saved, newest first. From there you can add a past balance from an old statement, paste several at once (one "date, balance" per line), confirm that today's value hasn't changed, or edit and delete past entries. Changing history never changes the asset's current value.

How it works

• Beyond Payday keeps the current value, optionally an original/purchase value, and a dated balance history recorded from every save. Household-level history over time also comes from Snapshots.
• The Retirement toggle covers twelve account types, not just brokerage: checking, savings, money market, CDs, brokerage, bonds, digital wallets, crypto, precious metals, collectibles, jewelry, and other. Turning it on tells the retirement projection to include that balance. Retirement-native accounts (401(k), IRA, HSA, and similar) are already included and don't show the toggle; real estate and vehicles don't offer it either.
• Emergency Fund only appears on four types: checking, savings, money market, and digital wallet accounts. The months it covers use your household's share of every bill, savings contributions included, the same as the emergency fund goal and the Money basics checklist.
• Roth % is 401(k)-only. If your 401(k) is part Roth, enter what percentage so Beyond Payday can split it correctly. For IRAs, pick the Roth IRA or Traditional IRA category directly instead — there's no split field there.
• Three types can link to a debt: Real Estate, Vehicle, and Recreational Vehicle. Linking shows your equity right on the asset — see the guide to tracking your home and mortgage for the full walkthrough.

Good to know

• Business-owned assets are added from a business's own Assets tab, not this page — that's a Pro feature.
• The equity asset Beyond Payday creates for a business owner is managed by the business valuation. To change that value, open the business's Settings page and choose Manual Entry (or another valuation method); the generated equity asset's value is not changed from the personal Assets page; manage that value in business Settings.
• The Asset Owner field is hidden if your household is just you and you have no businesses — the asset is assigned to you automatically.
• You can edit or delete an asset any time from the Assets page.