First time I’m actually trying to thoroughly use Stessa (Pro User here - the Cash Management feature is the killer!)
With that said, as I finish cleaning up my transactions, ALL of my Mortgage Payments it imported (through the payments that my bank account did) is P&I + Escrow. Of course, Escrow is an estimate of the property taxes and insurance.
What’s the best way to use this data, as well as ACTUAL/REAL Property Tax and Insurance values (that I later get from individual Insurance accounts and Tax sites to let my accountant know exact Insurance/Tax amounts paid)?
Should be enter those in manually (since we pay them, at least an estimate, through Escrow)? If so - are we supposed to mark them as “paid from escrow”?
Hopefully you’ve already figured this out but your question showed up in my search so it may benefit another user down the road. I don’t think the “paid from escrow” box actually creates another transaction, which is a bummer. While entering your mortgage payments you should be entering the escrow payment as a transfer, either into the General Escrow or specific categories, if you statement has those(mine do not). When your mortgage company makes a direct disbursement to your insurance company, taxes, etc., you need to create an expense transaction and also a CREDIT transaction to the appropriate escrow account.
Example:
Transaction #1
Geico Insurance
Money Out
-$5000.00
Liability Insurance
Property A
Transaction #2
Geico Insurance
Money In
$5000.00
Transfers > General Escrow Payments
Property A
At least that’s my understanding. If you don’t record the credit to the escrow then your escrow balance will keep growing and throw off your balance sheet.
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