Liabilities

A liability is a debt you want to track as its own record, such as a mortgage, credit card, tax debt, or overdraft. A liability has its own balance, responsible parties, creditor details, terms, files, and associations with relevant assets. Liabilities reduce the financial position.

When to Use a Liability

Use a liability when a debt is worth tracking in its own right: when you care about who is responsible, who the creditor or lender is, which assets it relates to, or its terms and documents.

If all you want is a single "what's this worth after the amount owing" figure, record Amount owing directly on the asset.

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

The liability inspector is arranged in the same order in which the information is usually understood.

Liability details

Liability name — what you call it (e.g. "CBA Home Loan", "Business Overdraft").
Liability type — one of the categories above.
Responsibility method — Sole, Joint & several, or Several.
Responsible parties — the current number of responsibility relationships.
Allocation status — the percentage of responsibility not yet allocated.
Number of responsible parties — shown for Joint & several responsibility.
Description — optional general information.
Purpose or reason — why the liability was incurred.

Debt details

Amount owing ($) — the current balance. Enter it as a positive number; it counts against net position automatically.
Creditor or lender — optional plain-text name. This does not create an entity relationship.
Account or reference — optional account number or descriptive reference.
Associated assets — assets that the liability funded or otherwise relates to.

Terms (optional)

Interest rate (% p.a.)
Repayment terms
Maturity date

Entity files & links remains at the bottom of the inspector. Files and links belong to the liability record and save independently of the main liability fields.

Who Is Responsible

Just as an asset has owners, a liability has responsible parties. You choose how responsibility is shared:

Sole — one responsible party is responsible for the whole debt.
Joint & several — responsibility is shared equally, but each responsible party can be pursued for the entire debt. The diagram shows each party's equal share (for example, two parties = 50% each), while retaining the full-exposure meaning.
Several — each responsible party 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 responsible parties on the liability. The inspector shows Responsible parties and Allocation status so you can see whether the configured responsibility is complete.

Linking a Liability to an Asset

You can link a liability to an asset it funded or otherwise relates to — for example, linking a home loan to the property it helped acquire. This association does not by itself mean that the asset is security for the debt.

Open the liability and use Associated assets to choose the asset. From the asset, use Associated liabilities.
Optionally record the Nature of relationship, such as "Funded the purchase" or "Working capital facility related to this asset".
On a diagram, the connection is labelled Associated. Entity-facing relationship lists may describe the two ends as Related asset and Related liability.
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.
Associated links and their descriptions save independently of the liability form.

You can only associate a liability with an asset. To record who is responsible for the debt, use responsibility relationships instead.

Association does not mean security

An association can mean "funded by", "relates to", or another connection recorded in Nature of relationship. It does not mean that the asset legally secures the liability. Formal loan security is managed from a Loan using Securities.

Asset Funding vs a Separate Liability

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

Asset funding — Amount owing, Creditor, and Account / reference recorded directly on an asset. Use it when you need a quick net asset value without a separate debt record.

A separate liability — the debt as its own record, with a name, type, responsible parties, creditor or lender, terms, files, and associated assets. Use it whenever that detail matters.

Don't record the same debt twice. An asset's Amount owing already reduces its net asset value; a separate liability contributes its own balance. Clear the asset amount when an associated liability represents that same debt.

You'll find asset funding fields covered in Assets.

How Liabilities Appear

Net position: liabilities count against assets, so Assets & Liabilities shows asset and liability subtotals and an overall net position. An entity's detail page shows its share of assets and liabilities, plus Loans receivable (see Inter-entity Loans and Debts below) and Debts payable (see Inter-entity Loans and Debts below).
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 responsible parties and add Associated assets once the liability exists.

Troubleshooting

"A liability requires an outstanding amount greater than zero." Enter the Amount owing 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 responsible party's equal allocation; Joint & several means any one of them can still be pursued for the full amount.

I can't link my liability to a company or person. Associated assets only connects a liability to an asset. To record who is responsible, add responsibility relationships instead.

My net worth looks too low / a debt seems counted twice. Check you haven't recorded the same debt as both an asset's Amount owing and a separate liability. Use one authoritative balance.

Best Practice

Use a separate liability when detail matters — creditor, responsibility, documents, terms, or lifecycle. Use an asset's Asset funding section for a quick net asset value.
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