Thanks for the feedback. Post back with issues as you tackle this.

"thefourthwall" <4thwall[at]nycap.rr.com> wrote in message
news:1104520614.375659.67420[at]z14g2000cwz.googlegroups.com...
- quote -

Gentlemen,

First, I apologize for the delay in reply -- work this week has been a
real bear and I haven't been in the group since beginning of the week.

Thank you for your replies; I appreciate them and will make more
effective use of the search functions.

Dick I see your point about losing performance data by not manually
entering *all* data, and agree after taking a close look at my
statements that they do provide enough performance data for my needs.

Good point about Add Shares to create the starting investment balances,
think I'll go that route.
Thanks to you both for your help.

-thefourthwall

I wouldn't enter any activity in the 401k beyond that which I have
investment cash account contribution transactions to reconcile with. If you
just create Add Share transactions at the previous statement to that point,
I think you'll be fine. The only thing you'll lose is some performance
reporting data. Your statements and/or other sources probably meet that need
as well of better. You've entered 2004's contributions. Use Add Shares from
the last of 2003 to create the starting investment balances, create Buys for
all of the contributions for 2004, then just do an Account Update (from the
account summary page) with your next quarterly statement to get the gains
(current holdings> sum of Buy transactions) in line.

"thefourthwall" <4thwall[at]nycap.rr.com> wrote in message
news:1104186411.224898.34450[at]f14g2000cwb.googlegroups.com...
- quote -

In microsoft.public.money, thefourthwall wrote:

- quote -

There is no benefit except for being able to better analyze past
performance.

There is more than one way to handle things. At one end of the
spectrum, you enter all transactions. You enter contributions and
Buy and Sells of funds, enter any fees and so forth.

At the minimal end, you just update the net value.

A really neat way to find prior postings in this group is to use the
Google Usenet Groups archive.

http://groups.google.com/advanced_group_search enter words that you
think would be in relevant posts into the "all of the words" box.
Enter microsoft.public.money into the newsgroup box. Consider
selecting Sort By Date.

Here is an example search:
http://groups-beta.google.com/groups...04&safe=images

Realizing I need to be more responsible financially led me to buy Money
05 Deluxe and get all my banking records in order.

That's done, but now I want to add my 401(k) information.

I have been contributing (through payroll deductions) to the 401(k) for
about 3 years now; I should also mention I have most of my paper
statements since the plan began.

I did enter payroll deduction info for this year -- hopefully that will
make tax time more bearable -- and part of that was tracking each
paycheck dedcution going to my 401(k).That having been said, is there
any benefit to being anal about the data and entering by hand 3 years
of quarterly statements, _as opposed to_ just creating a new account in
a week when I get my next quarterly statement (Q4, 2004)?

And yes, I should have read the posts about how much M05 sucks before
buying it ... hindsight, as they say ...
Any insight would be appreciated.

-thefourthwall