I downloaded a number of loan amortization schedules from the free templates.
However, I am not able to put in 5.5 for the loan period in years. Why not? I
have tried changing the custom number format but to no avail. I'm really
getting frustrated. HELP!

Hi,
try one of the Microsoft web you can enter 5.5

http://office.microsoft.com/en-ca/te...tion&av=TPL000

if this helps please click yes, thanks

"Lacey" wrote:

I downloaded a number of loan amortization schedules from the free templates.
However, I am not able to put in 5.5 for the loan period in years. Why not? I
have tried changing the custom number format but to no avail. I'm really
getting frustrated. HELP!

"Lacey" wrote:
I downloaded a number of loan amortization schedules from
the free templates. However, I am not able to put in 5.5 for the
loan period in years. Why not?

The simple answer is: the templates you are looking are not designed to
handle fractional years.

If you want to talk about a specific template, please provide the URL.


I have tried changing the custom number format but to no avail.

Formatting has nothing to do with the problem.

PS....

The Microsoft template at
http://office.microsoft.com/en-ca/te...CT101172751033
seems to handle fractional years somewhat. Descriptive title: Mortgage
amortization schedule. Provided by: TemplateZone by KMT Software Inc.

You can enter 5.5 into E6. The rounded integer is displayed, but the other
calculations use the fractional years converted to months (66). If you
wish, you can change the format of E6 to Number with some number of decimal
places.

Note: Entering fractional years might not be accurate. I did not try 5
years plus 1 or 2 months, for example, which must be entered as 5.083...3 or
5.16...67.

I did check the figures for 5.5 years. They appear to be sufficiently
accurate.

I disagree with the way that some figures are computed, namely interest. So
my numbers are slightly different. But the difference is less than 50 cents
in this example.

Also, the template does not correctly blank out the years following the last
loan year, as it does when whole-number years are entered. There might be a
simple fix for that, if it matters. But it is just an aesthetic error.


----- original message -----

"JoeU2004" wrote in message
...
"Lacey" wrote:
I downloaded a number of loan amortization schedules from
the free templates. However, I am not able to put in 5.5 for the
loan period in years. Why not?

The simple answer is: the templates you are looking are not designed to
handle fractional years.

If you want to talk about a specific template, please provide the URL.


I have tried changing the custom number format but to no avail.

Formatting has nothing to do with the problem.

Most of the MS Office Templates for loan amortization have Data Validation
in place for number of years.

Remove the Data Validation and put in what you want.

No guarantees on accuracy<g


Gord Dibben MS Excel MVP

On Mon, 24 Aug 2009 09:35:01 -0700, Lacey
wrote:

I downloaded a number of loan amortization schedules from the free templates.
However, I am not able to put in 5.5 for the loan period in years. Why not? I
have tried changing the custom number format but to no avail. I'm really
getting frustrated. HELP!