How a loan balance works
A loan's balance starts at the Starting Balance you entered. It goes up when you record money you borrowed, and goes down only when the principal part of a payment is tagged to the loan, typically as a Liability Adjustment. Interest is tagged to an expense category and never changes the balance.
Work through the checks below in order. To see everything that is affecting the loan balance, go to the Accounts page, click the loan, and choose View Transactions.
1. Is the payment tagged as an expense instead of a Liability Adjustment?
This is the most common cause. If the whole payment was tagged to an interest or loan expense category, it shows up on your Profit & Loss and the loan balance never moves.
Fix: Itemize the payment into principal and interest, and tag the principal as a Liability Adjustment to the loan. See Tagging Loan Payments (or Tagging Mortgage Payments for a mortgage).
2. Was the principal split out?
If the whole payment is tagged to the loan, the balance drops too fast and your interest expense isn't properly tracked.
If the whole payment is tagged as interest, the balance doesn't go down at all.
Use your loan statement or lender portal to find the exact principal and interest for each payment.
Don't see Itemize? If the payment is already matched or tagged as a transfer, remove that first, then itemize. See Unlinking Transfer Tags.
Does your lender only report interest at year end? If you tag each full payment to the loan during the year, the balance will run low until you record the year's interest in the loan account's register. See the year-end section of Tagging Loan Payments.
3. Is it tagged to the right loan?
Two accounts for the same loan (for example, one added by hand and one from a bank connection): payments may be split between them. See "If you have both a connected and a manual account for the same loan" in Adding a Loan Account.
Several loans with the same lender: select View Transactions on each loan account and retag any payments on the wrong one.
4. Are the Starting Date and Starting Balance right?
The Starting Balance should be what you owed on the Starting Date. See "Which Starting Date and Starting Balance should I use?" in Adding a Loan Account. If a payment happened on the Starting Date itself, see Finding Your Account's Starting Balance.
If you tag payments dated before the Starting Date, they lower a balance that already included them, so the loan ends up too low.
If the Starting Balance came from a statement dated later than the Starting Date, your first payments are counted twice.
The amount can be right but the direction wrong. See "Check the Starting Balance direction" in check 5.
Fix: To change the Starting Date or Starting Balance, go to the Accounts page and click the loan. In the Details section, click the dollar amount shown for the Starting Balance. Enter what you owed on the Starting Date and update the Starting Date if it's wrong. Check that the dropdown next to the Starting Balance says Liability (Credit), then click Save. If you've already reconciled the loan, see Changing or Undoing a Reconciliation before you make changes.
5. Is the balance going up?
A deposit tagged as a Liability Adjustment to the loan raises what you owe. That's correct for money you borrowed (or a line of credit draw), but not for a payment.
Check the Starting Balance direction. If the loan's balance shows with a minus sign (for example, -$85,000), the Starting Balance is probably set to the wrong direction. Each payment then moves the balance further from $0 instead of closer to it. On the Accounts page, select the loan and click the dollar amount next to the Starting Balance. The dropdown next to the Starting Balance should say Liability (Credit). If it says Contra-Liability (Debit), change it to Liability (Credit) and save.
Look for Adjust Balance entries that you or someone else added by mistake, or with the wrong direction.
Check whether a transaction you entered by hand has the wrong sign (for example, a positive amount instead of a negative one).
6. Are transactions missing?
Payments made from an account that isn't connected to Ambrook, like a personal account or a second bank, won't show up on their own. See Recording Loan Payments That Didn't Come From Your Bank Account.
For excluded transactions and other missing-transaction checks, see Troubleshooting Account Balance Discrepancies.
7. Does it still not match your lender's statement?
Reconcile the loan account against your statements month by month, in order. See How do I reconcile in Ambrook?. Small differences are often timing: your lender may post a payment a few days after it leaves your bank, or add interest that builds up after the statement date. If your payment includes escrow for taxes or insurance, split it into its own line item (see Tagging Mortgage Payments).
Avoid using Adjust Balance to force the balance to match. It usually hides a missing, duplicated or mistagged transaction and puts the wrong numbers on your books. If you've reconciled and still can't find the difference, contact our support team.
Paid off the loan but still see a balance?
Work through the checks above before you close the account. Once the balance is $0, see Closing or Reopening an Account.