Assets vs Liabilities

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What are Assets and Liabilities? Once you understand how the terms assets and liabilities are used in business, you can use that knowledge to your benefit in your personal life as well.

In accounting, assets and liabilities are terms that you will find on the balance sheet. What you own is on the left: assets. What you owe is on the right: liabilities and equity. Let’s work through some examples of assets and liabilities.

⏱️TIMESTAMPS⏱️
0:00 What are assets and liabilities
0:13 Assets and liabilities in accounting
0:25 Examples of assets and liabilities
2:00 Return on assets
2:48 Debt and cost of borrowing
3:11 Assets and liabilities in personal life
4:10 Earning assets
4:46 Assets vs wealth

Now that you understand the picture of assets, liabilities and equity on the balance sheet, let’s think of the dynamics going on in a company. A company will try to generate a return on assets. If the revenues generated (from selling goods and services) are bigger than the expenses (such as labor, materials, and depreciation of manufacturing equipment), then the company generates a profit. Return On Assets relates the amount of profit made to the assets needed to generate that profit. Some companies need very few assets to generate a substantial profit. Other companies may need a lot of assets to generate only a modest profit. Increasing ROA is generally a good thing.

On the liability side, having debt generates a cost of borrowing. The amount of interest that a company pays depends on the amount borrowed and the interest rate. If a company improves its financial health, its cost of borrowing tends to go down. In general, it is good to have a Return On Assets that far exceeds the cost of borrowing.

Let’s apply what we learned about #assets and #liabilities to assets and liabilities in your personal life. What if you own a house? That’s an asset. However, if you rent a house as a tenant, then you wouldn’t put the house on your balance sheet as an asset, as you don’t own it. What if you own a car? That is an asset as well. If you lease a car, you wouldn’t put the car on your balance sheet as an asset, as you don’t own it. What about cash? That is an asset. Unpaid creditcard bills? A liability. A portfolio of stocks? An asset. A loan agreement with a bank (for example the mortgage loan on your house)? A liability. There is one more element, which fits in the bottom right corner of the balance sheet: equity. You can calculate it by taking the total value of the assets minus the total value of the liabilities.

Within the assets in your personal life, there can be items that we call (potential) “earning assets”: cash in a savings account that pays you interest, and stocks in an investment portfolio that pay a dividend or go up (or down!) in value. Just like companies monitor their cost of borrowing closely, you should also keep track of your cost of borrowing on various types of debt you might have outstanding. Chances are that the unpaid creditcard bills carry the highest interest rate, and therefore should get the highest priority in paying down!

So what is financial wealth in somebody’s personal life? A lot of people mistake wealth for assets. We tend to think that the more assets somebody has, the wealthier that person is. But what if that beautiful yacht as well as that fancy sports car are all debt-financed? Assets increase (the person owns more), but liabilities also increase (the person owes more). The more debt you add, the more fragile you get. The true measure of financial wealth, which is often not visible to the outside world, is the amount of equity that somebody has! Assets minus liabilities. Looking at somebody’s assets without knowing how they are financed, might be deceiving. It might actually be the person with the smaller house and the older car, but with very few or even no liabilities, that is the more financially wealthy!

Philip de Vroe (The Finance Storyteller) aims to make strategy, finance and leadership enjoyable and easier to understand. Learn the business and accounting vocabulary to join the conversation with your CEO at your company. Understand how financial statements work in order to make better #investing decisions. Philip delivers finance training in various formats: YouTube videos, classroom sessions, webinars, and business simulations. Connect with me through Linked In!
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thankyou so much for this, it helped me so much for college.

rawanrezk
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Thank you for this clear explanation :) I have a few questions!
1) At 2:43 you mentioned "increasing ROA is generally a good thing", when would be the case when it's a bad thing?
2) At 3:22 regarding renting not being considered an asset, I assume it's also not considered a liability.
a) Is this because the rent payments are being payed off quickly versus Accounts Payable which may take longer to pay off?
b) When does a payment (ex. rent payment) become considered a liability?
c) If it's not an asset nor a liability, what is it? Is it some term like "cost of operations"?

sizzlingsausage
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According to robert Kyosaki a house and a car is not an asset because they both take money out of your pocket

georgegabourel
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Thank you for this simple and clear explanation!

Devagrace
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Thank you for this amazing explanation

vonvon
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wow i love this explanation. I owe 40K only and i earn 26k, own a polo vivo, own a plot no house yet as i still stay with my mother. I am not so bad after all. I dont wana make loans immidiately. One question. Is salary regarded as Asset?

DjStuntO
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Well explained 👏. Thank you! Keep it up! Good luck 👍

faichalayeva
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I'm confused on the "Equity" part. If equity is Assets-Liabilities, why wouldn't "equity" go in the "Assets" column?

TerryOnDemand
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Unbelievable you still reply till today😱. Great vid I learned a lot.

shueybosman
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Iv'e seen liabilities like cars become assets. Attention can drive traffic. Traffic can be converted into cash flow. Also, If you put the car in the name of an entity that you control such as an LLC, then you could deduct the car and maintenance from your taxable income. Therefore, a liability can also be turned into an asset! Flex..

brotherbashir
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HI FST, i don't understand why we add liabilities and assets together to get equity, surely you want to Take away liabilities away from assets so you are left with equity ?

craigtaylor
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what if the assets is bigger than liability and equity combined? cant seems to balanced it

mbh
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Hello sir, your video is certainly well expounded! Although I have an inquiry. If it’s true that a person’s true financial wealth is based upon their equity, how can you know if a person has low or high equity? It’s not possible to ask a wealthy person straight up if their sports car or mega yacht is a liability or not. How can you communicate in a way to find out exactly if people are financially wealthy?

menghokhim
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5:01 : As well as that Fanski Sports Car

reecefuller
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Can u pls make a video on IGCSE paper solving

shubhramendonca
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What can i do, if my Girlfriend is my biggest liability?

antonio
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Can you please explain buisness transaction clearly ..

annkudhungana
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Cash is like water if you don't put it into a solid and limited resource it will evaporate.

brotherbashir
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Ur accent is too strong I couldn’t understand.

Adam_share