Old Asset needs to be removed

Hey there, @mhcostigan.

You can delete the old transactions that shows in the Balance Sheet report. This way, you can completely remove them in your company file.

Here's how:

1. Open the Balance Sheet Standard report.
2. Look for the Software Cost and double-click its amount to view the transactions.
3. Double-click the old transaction that you wanted to be remove.
4. Once opened, click the Delete icon and click OK.

Please take note that if this transaction has been paid (partially or in full), it will cause the payments to be unapplied. 

If you have any other concerns or questions, just tag my name in the comment section. I'll get back to you as soon as I can. Have a great day and stay safe.

This actually has 10 transactions - one for each year from 2004-2014.  Recorded as depreciation or ammortization entries for year-end.  I don't think I should be deleting each of those?  Is there another way to get it off the balance sheet?

I've got the help that you need in getting off the depreciation or amortization entries from your Balance Sheet, @mhcostigan.

You need to make sure that the transaction date of the depreciation or amortization entries is based on their intended year. This way, it will no longer show up on your current balance sheet report.

To do that, just click on the said entries from the report and edit the date from there. It will also ensure that your records are accurate.

For your reference, I'm also adding here a link that you can check out to give you more tips in customizing your financial reports in QuickBooks Desktop: Customize company and financial reports.

Know that I'll be around to help if there's anything else that I can assist you with. Have a good one!

I have the same issue:

 - fixed asset (truck) that was sold years ago

 - bank accounts that were closed 

The truck has no transactions since the sale in 2016, yet still appears under my fixed assets on my current balance sheet.

The bank accounts were all cleared in 2021, with transactions dated in the years previous (2 were never actually real bank accounts, the transactions were incorrectly recorded - they were reversed in 2021 using the dates of the original transactions.  The third bank account was closed last summer and has been 0 since).

How do I get these off my balance sheet for 2022?

I have a similar issue. We purchased a computer years ago and depreciated it. This continues to show on our Balance Sheet (see screenshot). Even if you click "hide zero balance" entries, it STILL shows because of the two entries (cost and depreciation). I don't like the idea of deleting something historical, so there has got to be a better way to handle this. I tried to "make inactive" the two accounts in Chart of Accounts, but since they're not zero, you get a warning about adjusting transactions that will be made. Sigh. C'mon QBO Support, figure this out! 

I'll share details and help with your question about removing data from the Balance Sheet reports, recyclingrules.

At the moment, the only option to remove the entry from the Balance Sheet is to delete it. This is because the amount is not zero so we can't completely remove it from there. You can use this article as a guide on how to delete it just in case you decide to do that: Void or Delete Transactions in QuickBooks Online.

Our engineers are always open to feedback and product suggestions. They are always reviewed when updates are made. Here's how to send feedback inside QBO: 

1. Go to the Gear icon and select Feedback.
2. Type in your feedback and suggestions about this in QBO.
3. Click Next to submit them.

Additional references when running reports can also be found here: 

• Customize Reports in QuickBooks Online 
• Run a Balance Sheet by Class or Location in QuickBooks Online 

Please don't hesitate to reach out to us again if you have more questions for us. We're always here to guide and help you again. 

We have rental property and have sold about three of them.  I have tried what some of the other individuals regarding making the properties inactive, but they still show up on the balance sheet.  My accountant is getting very frustrated with me each year when I just cross through the properties with a note stating they have been sold, and is telling me I need to get them off the balance sheet!  How do I remove them?

Thank you for joining the thread, KSN Inc.

I'll share some information about the inactive transaction in QuickBooks Desktop (QBDT). Regardless of whether the account or transaction is inactive, they will still appear on your reports.

With this, you want to export the report into an Excel file and manually remove the following transactions you are referring to. Here's how:

1. In QuickBooks, go to the Reports menu and choose Reports Center.
2. Find and open any report and select Excel on the toolbar. You can also choose Print or Email to save the report as a PDF.
3. To create a new Excel workbook, click Create New Worksheet. If you want to update an existing workbook with the data in the open report, select Update Existing Worksheet. Choose Browse and then find the workbook on your computer. Keep in mind, this overwrites the existing workbook.
4. If you want to format the data a specific way, select Advanced. This is optional.
5. Note: The report must have less than 256 columns.
6. If you see a message that says your report has too many columns, select Advanced. Choose and uncheck the Space between columns checkbox, then select OK.
7. You can also save your report as a CSV instead of an Excel workbook and have more columns.
8. When you’re ready to export, click OK. To open the report in Excel, you can also select Export.

For detailed information, you can utilize this article: Import and export data in QuickBooks Desktop.

You can also visit this article to know how to import or export info with QBDT:  Customize reports in QuickBooks Desktop.

If you have any further concerns about your reports, don't hesitate to post them here. Have a great day!

I'm neither an accountant nor a professional bookkeeper.  I'm a small business owner who keeps my own books.  Here's what works me.  It may be a similar (or same) approach to one of the earlier answers.

This works great for me and my business needs and removes old or sold fixed assets from my balance sheet.

First, I create two Equity accounts.  These two accounts will handle all old and sold assets that I want to remove from my balance sheet.

1. Removed Assets (Cost)

2. Removed Assets (Accumulated Depreciation)

When I have an old or sold asset that I want to remove from my balance sheet I create two journal entries in the year prior to the year I want to remove the asset from the balance sheet:

1. One journal entry zeros the accumulated depreciation of the asset and moves it to the Removed Assets (Accumulated Depreciation) account.

2. The other journal entry zeros the cost of the asset and moves it to the Removed Assets (Cost) account.  The cost in this case will be either the original cost of the asset or the remaining cost left over after selling the asset.  If you sold the asset, I'm assuming you book the sell of the asset in the same account where you track the original cost of the asset.

This technique nicely removes my old and sold assets from the balance sheet.  Yes, this technique adds two rollup accounts.  But, I find these rollup accounts useful for checking that all my assets have been fully depreciated.  I suppose that if you don't like the idea of seeing two equity accounts on your balance sheet, you could create just one equity account for both total cost of total accumulated depreciation of all your old and sold assets.  This single account should ideally net to $0 and then could be removed from the balance sheet.

Hope this helps.