Transcript:
In today’s training, we’re going to review how to enter cash savings into the Voyant software.
To begin, go to the plus button in the bottom-right corner of the screen and select the Savings & Investments section.
From there, select the Savings option.
Under the Type dropdown, you’ll have the option to create either a Checking Account or a Savings Account.
Both of these account types sit higher in the software’s liquidation hierarchy because Voyant will generally use available cash first to fulfill expenses in the plan.
The software will first use available employment income, pension income, or other income sources. If additional funds are needed, it will then begin drawing from checking and savings accounts before moving further through the liquidation order.
In this example, we’re going to enter a cash savings account.
This account will be jointly owned, so we’ll add Nora as a joint owner.
We’ll name this account “Emergency Fund.”
The current balance of the account is $20,000.
Next, we can choose how this account grows over time.
You can either model growth using a portfolio allocation or apply a fixed interest rate.
In this example, we’ll use a fixed interest rate.
We’ll also model ongoing contributions into the account.
In this scenario, the clients are contributing $1,000 per month.
Once you enter a contribution amount, the software will prompt you to update the Timing section. This tells the software how long those contributions should continue.
For this example, we’ll set contributions to begin at Plan Start and end at Johnny’s retirement.
Next, let’s review the Fees section.
In this example, we are not modeling any fees on this account type. However, if fees are needed, you can edit those settings directly here.
Now let’s review Withdrawal Limits.
Because this account is intended to function as a true emergency fund, we may want to restrict how the software accesses it.
There are a couple of ways to do this.
You can select Do Not Allow, which prevents the software from ever withdrawing from the account.
Or you can select Minimum Balance.
In this example, we’ll use Minimum Balance and specify that the account balance should never fall below $20,000.
This means the software can withdraw any excess funds above $20,000 if needed, but it will preserve the minimum balance requirement.
Once complete, click Done to save the account.
Now let’s take a look at how this appears in the charts.
If we turn on the Details view in the Cash Flow chart, you can see that in the first year of the plan the software is using $29,797 from the savings account to help fulfill expenses.
If we then go into Year View and scroll to that year, you can see the withdrawal flowing from the Emergency Fund.
In the Investments section, you can review the withdrawal directly on the account itself.
You can also move backward through the plan to review annual contributions and estimated end-of-year balances over time.
Clicking directly into the account will allow you to review additional modeling details as well.
I hope this has been helpful.
If you have any questions, feel free to reach out to us at support@planwithvoyant.com.
You can also click the client’s name in the top-right corner of the plan and select Request Support to contact us directly from within the software.
Thank you for listening.