Track money you lent or borrowed

When you lend money to a friend or borrow from family, Pennyweight keeps a running balance of who owes whom. Each person gets an account of their own, and every loan or repayment you record for them moves that balance. See split a dinner bill and track who owes you.

How to do it

1. Add the person. Tell your AI their name and whether they owe you or you owe them. You can also use Add a person on the People page in the web app. For accounts in general, see add a manual account.
2. Record the loan on the person's account: the amount, the date, and the account the money came from or went to.
3. Ask your AI to record the other side on your own account, such as checking or cash, and link the two. If the money already shows on that account, ask it to link to that transaction instead of adding another one.
4. Record each repayment the same way: one entry on the person's account, linked to its side on your account.

If the payment already shows in checking, a card or cash, you can skip steps 2 and 3: have your AI attach it to the person (see below).

What you'll see

For the first prompt, your AI adds Priya as someone who owes you, records $200 on her account and $200 out of Everyday Checking, and links the two. Priya's balance is then $200 that she owes you. For the second, it reads Sam's balance and tells you what he owes you. For the third, Sam's balance goes down by $50, and the $50 lands in Everyday Checking. For the fourth, it adds $75 out of Everyday Checking, attaches it to Sam, and says Sam now owes you $375.

Signs on a person's account

A person's balance comes from their transactions. It has no starting balance. To bring in a loan from before you used Pennyweight, record it as one entry.

• Someone owes you. Money you lend is positive. A repayment is negative. The balance is what they still owe you.
• You owe someone. Money you borrow is negative. A repayment you make is positive. A negative balance is what you still owe.

Your own account moves the other way. Lending $200 from checking is −200 there and +200 on the person, so lending leaves your net worth unchanged. For the full sign rules, see why a credit card shows a negative balance.

Attach a transaction you already have

Your AI can attach a transaction from one of your own accounts to a person. Pennyweight reads it as your side of the loan and moves the person's balance the opposite way. $200 that left checking for a friend adds $200 to what they owe you. A $50 repayment that arrived in checking lowers it by $50. For someone you owe, money you send them lowers what you owe.

• Record each movement one way. Use an entry on the person's account or an attached transaction. If you have both for the same money, link them so it counts once. Unlinked, it counts twice.
• Attaching doesn't change spending. The transaction counts in spending and cash flow as it did before.

On the web

The People page lists everyone in two groups, "Owes you" and "You owe", with a total for each at the top. Select a person to see what was lent and repaid, a note, and each entry. The only change you can make on this page is adding a person, with a name, a direction and a currency. Loans, repayments, attached transactions and the note go through your AI.

Good to know

• Link the two sides. Once linked, both entries are left out of spending and cash flow, and each still moves its own account's balance. An entry on a person's account that isn't linked counts as income or spending in cash flow. A link needs two different accounts and opposite signs. See link the two sides of a transfer.
• Keep a note. Ask your AI to add a short note on what the loan is for, such as "Helped with an apartment deposit". It shows in the person's details on the People page. Your AI can change or clear it later.
• Each currency is kept apart. Lend someone euros and dollars, and their balance has an amount in each currency, never one total. The totals at the top of the People page count one currency. When some people are in another currency, the page says how many it left out.
• It isn't cash. What people owe you is not part of your cash total. See see your accounts and balances.