I bought an old car two years ago for 4000$. Now I am selling it for 2000$. Meanwhile I had much repairs which exceeded all the prices. Determining the value of such an old car is hard.
Once upon a time, I put the following transaction of 4000$ into Expenses:Transportation:Car
from my bank account.
Today I put $2000 into my bank account but the question is: Where to put the other transaction?
My question is (partially) answered in: https://lists.gnucash.org/docs/C/gnucash-guide/ch08s08.html However, I have a couple of questions here:
It seems to be a hassle to create an account for everything I own ... and particularly an older car will only depreciate in value. I am not sure if it is fair to call this "Asset" and to account for it as such.
But if so, ... if I account for House and Car I own like this ... where does it end? TV for 4000$? TV for 200$? Mobile phone? Laptop? All these things have sort of "value" but only depreciate and either I sell them at some point at a very low price or use them until they die. And for all of them, assessing the "market value" is hard and it's a pain to keep track of it.
In the end, I always put things that I bought (including this 4000$) in Expenses
.
What is the proper way to do this? Is it just "definition" that this is done for real estate and cars but not TVs, laptops, phones, furniture?
Furthermore, in the linked tutorial the house is sold for a lower price than it was bought (as said, this will be the case for nearly everything else that's used). Still - in the tutorial it is put as NEGATIVE value into Income:Realized Gain:House
. But that's clearly not an income - it's the opposite. Why?
Income:Realized Gain:House
in the tutorial linked? – divB Jan 22 '18 at 21:22Expenses:Phone
? An entry inIncome:Phone
?Income:Sold Stuff
? – divB Jan 22 '18 at 23:50