Liabilities

A liability is a debt you want to track in your structure — a mortgage, a loan, a credit card, a tax debt. Recording it as a liability lets you give it a name, say who is responsible for it, and show which assets it relates to. Liabilities reduce net worth: they count against the assets in a structure.

When to Use a Liability

Use a liability when a debt is worth tracking in its own right — when you care about who owes it, who the lender is, or which asset it relates to.

If all you want is a single "what's this worth after its loan" figure, you can instead record the debt directly on the asset as embedded debt (see Separate Liability vs Embedded Debt below).

Liability Types

Choose the type that best describes the debt. The type sets the icon shown on the record and in diagrams.

Type	Typical use
Mortgage	Property loans
Personal Loan	Personal or consumer lending
Business Loan	Commercial or operating debt
Credit Card	Revolving card balances
Line of Credit	Overdrafts, redraw facilities
Tax Debt	Tax office liabilities
Other	Anything not in the categories above

Recording a Liability

When you create a liability you provide:

Liability Name — what you call it (e.g. "CBA Home Loan", "Business Overdraft").
Liability Type — one of the categories above.
Outstanding Amount — how much is owed. Enter it as a positive number; it counts against net worth automatically.

You can also add, when you have them:

Lender / Creditor
Account / Reference
Interest Rate (% p.a.)
Maturity Date
Repayment Terms

On a diagram, these extra details sit under a Loan details section so the main fields stay front and centre. You can drop a liability onto a diagram first and fill in the amount later.

Who Is Responsible

Just as an asset has owners, a liability has the people or entities responsible for it — its obligors. You choose how responsibility is shared:

Sole — one obligor is responsible for the whole debt.
Joint & several — responsibility is shared equally, but each obligor can be pursued for the entire debt. The diagram shows each obligor's equal share (for example, two obligors = 50% each), and flags that the full amount can fall on any one of them.
Several — each obligor is responsible only for their own share.

The "joint & several" vs "several" choice is a real distinction in who can be chased for the money — pick the one that matches the actual arrangement.

For a joint & several debt, set the number of obligors on the liability, and each is assigned their equal share.

Linking a Liability to an Asset

You can link a liability to the asset it is secured by or was used to acquire — for example, linking a home loan to the property it's against.

Open the liability and use the Associated Assets picker to choose the asset (from an asset record, the same control appears as Associated Liabilities).
On a diagram, the connection appears as an Associated link (relationship type associated_with), drawn between the asset and the liability. To create one by drawing, drag a link from the asset to the liability and pick Associated with in the type dropdown.
The link is a relationship, not a value transfer — it records that the debt relates to that asset. It does not change either record's value.
Links save on their own, as soon as you make them.

You can only link a liability to an asset (not to another liability, individual, company, or trust). To say who is responsible for the debt, set its obligors instead (see above).

Separate Liability vs Embedded Debt

There are two ways to represent a debt, and they serve different needs.

Embedded debt — a debt amount recorded directly on an asset (for example, a property recorded with its mortgage as one figure). Use it when you only need a quick "value after the loan" number. It can't capture the lender, who's responsible, or which asset it relates to — because it's just a number on the asset.

A separate liability — the debt as its own record, with a name, type, lender, obligors, and links to the assets it relates to. Use it whenever any of that detail matters.

Don't record the same debt both ways. Embedded debt already reduces the asset's value; a separate liability reduces net worth on its own. Capturing the same loan in both places would count it twice. Pick one: embedded debt for a simple net figure, a separate liability when you need the detail.

You'll find embedded debt covered in Asset Entities.

How Liabilities Appear

Net position: liabilities count against assets, so the Assets & Liabilities page shows asset and liability subtotals and an overall net position. An entity's detail page lists its assets and liabilities separately, with that entity's own share of each.
Colour: liabilities and their links show in red across the stencil, canvas, legend, and inspector, so a debt reads as a debt at a glance.
Filtering: on the Assets & Liabilities page you can filter to liabilities only, or by liability type.

Creating a Liability

On a diagram: open the stencil and drag New Liability onto the canvas (next to New Asset), then fill in its details in the inspector.

From the create dialog: use the Create New Liability action and complete the same fields.

Either way, you can assign obligors and link associated assets once the liability exists.

Troubleshooting

"A liability requires an outstanding amount greater than zero." Enter the Outstanding Amount before saving the liability's details. (You can place a liability on a diagram before entering an amount, but saving its details needs a figure.)

My joint & several liability shows 50%, but everyone is liable for the whole debt. That's expected. The share shown is each obligor's equal slice; "joint & several" means any one of them can still be pursued for the full amount. The diagram surfaces the full-exposure note so it isn't lost.

I can't link my liability to a company or person. Associated links connect a liability to an asset only. To record who is responsible for the debt, set its obligors instead.

My net worth looks too low / a debt seems counted twice. Check you haven't recorded the same debt as both embedded debt on an asset and a separate liability. Use one or the other.

Best Practice

Use a separate liability when detail matters — lender, responsibility, or which asset the debt relates to. Use embedded debt only for a quick net figure.
Set responsibility deliberately — "joint & several" and "several" describe genuinely different arrangements.
Link liabilities to their assets so "this mortgage is against that property" is visible on the diagram and detail pages.

Help & Documentation