Security Deposits

[evers...@gmail.com]

Hello,

My name is Dale and I have a small brokerage in mid-west Ohio where I manage a little over 200 units. I am new to Buildium and have started with them Jan 1st 2019. I had been using a program called Tenant Pro 6 for the past 18 years operating on a cash basis. I'm hoping that someone out there has transitioned from the same program. In that program I was able to receive a security deposit and immediately turn around and use that deposit to pay expenses or send it to the owner as part of his owner draw. I was able to track that money in the security deposit liability account while the money existed in the operating account. I have two problems. The first is with the beginning balance of all the existing tenant security deposits. The money for all 200 plus tenant liabilities does not physically exist in any account as it has been used for expenses or sent to the owner. So in Buildium I had to create a fake asset account labeled Owner held security deposits. A charge was then created for the tenant's deposit and then credited to the security deposit liability account. The problem I have is that once the deposit or a portion of that deposit is retained it is converted to income and therefore available cash in the system but in fact there is no cash that exist. So when I do an owner draw the system is telling me there is more available cash than actually exist in the ledger for that property. The second problem is going forward. When I receive a security deposit the money goes in to the operating account but cannot be used for expenses until retained and converted to income. Many of my small owners that have one or two units need that money during a transition from one tenant to another to pay expenses with. Is there a way to make this money available while still tracking it as a liability. Any advise anyone can lend me that operates in this manner would be greatly appreciated. Thank you!