You lent a friend money for a ticket, borrowed from your parents for a deposit, and a month later nobody remembers the exact amounts. This guide shows how to keep track of debts in Budgie: who owes you, whom you owe, how much has already come back, and what is still left.
Money you lend to friends rarely comes back in one piece. It returns in parts, by card transfer, in cash, sometimes with a little extra. A note on your phone does not add up those parts, and your bank statement shows only a transfer to a person, not what it was for. To know who owes you, every loan and every repayment has to land in one place.
In Budgie that place is a debt account. It works in both directions: money you lent and money you borrowed. The money itself still moves through your real accounts, while the debt keeps the score: how much in total, how much has been returned, and how much is left.
If part of an older debt has already been paid back, enter that part in the “Already returned” field (“Already repaid” for money you borrowed) and Budgie starts from the real remainder.
The same form has a “From account” field (“To account” for a borrowed debt). Choose the card or cash wallet the money actually left or arrived in, and Budgie records a real expense or income on it, filed under the Lending or Borrowing category. Your balance stays correct, and that month’s statistics show exactly where the money went.
Leave the field empty and the debt stays a plain record with no transaction behind it. That suits old debts whose money moved before you started using the app.
Already received a loan and it shows up as an ordinary income? Long-press that income in the transaction list, choose “Attach debt” and then “New borrowed debt”. Budgie creates the debt for that amount and links the income to it in one step.
When a friend sends part of the money back, it lands in your account as ordinary income. You do not need to enter it twice: long-press that transaction in the list and choose “Attach debt”, then pick the debt it belongs to.
The same action sits in the menu on the transaction’s own screen. The picker lists only your debts, each with its total, so it is hard to pick the wrong one.
Open a debt and the big number at the top is what is still due: “To receive” for money you lent, “To repay” for money you borrowed. Next to it is the share already settled in percent, and below are two lines: how much has come back and how much was lent or borrowed in total. Underneath you see every transaction linked to this debt.
If more comes back than was owed, the debt does not go negative. The remainder stops at zero and a separate “Overpaid” line shows the extra, so you can settle up with a clear figure.
Home groups debts into two sections: “You owe” and “Owed to you”, each with its own subtotal. Every card shows the remainder out of the total, a progress bar and the percent settled. When a return date is less than a month away, the card counts down the days, and an overdue debt turns red.
Purchases you pay off in parts also appear under “You owe”. They have their own payment schedule, covered in installment tracking.
Once the last repayment is attached, the debt screen switches to a paid-off view: a green check, “Returned” or “Repaid” as the headline, the amount paid back and the total. The debt then disappears from Home on its own, so settled loans do not clutter the list.
The same screen has an “Archive” button. An archived debt also drops out of account pickers and totals, keeps its history, and waits under Settings → Archived Accounts, where you can restore it. More on this in account management.
A new debt is left out of your net worth by default. Turn on “Include in Net Worth” on the debt and the remainder counts: money owed to you adds to it, money you owe subtracts from it. As repayments come in, the effect shrinks until it reaches zero.
Everything else about debts, from contacts to debts in another currency, is on the debt and loan tracking page.
No. A debt is your own record. The contact you pick is just a name from your phone so you can see who the debt is with; nothing is sent to that person.
They count as real money movements: lending is an expense in the month you gave the money, a repayment is income in the month it came back. Both are filed under Lending or Borrowing, so you can tell them apart from everyday spending.
Yes. Create the debt without choosing an account: enter the total and what has already come back, and Budgie tracks only the remainder, without inventing past transactions.
There are no push reminders. The date shows on the debt card instead: within the last month it counts down the days, and once it passes the card shows how many days the debt is overdue.
The remainder stops at zero, the debt counts as settled, and a separate “Overpaid” line shows the extra amount.
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