Moving transfer funds to balance?

Hi there,

I was wondering about this last night.

Let's say the chairman gives me £100m to spend on transfers and my balance is around £30m.

I would like to say something like "I think the team is already good enough and I don't need any more players" or "I'll take £50m just to be safe and you can spend the other half in other areas".

I don't know if it works that way but it would be a nice feature.

ive been wanting that for a few years. It would be a lot better if you could pay off long term loans if you would rather make the club more stable

Hi there,

I was wondering about this last night.

Let's say the chairman gives me £100m to spend on transfers and my balance is around £30m.

I would like to say something like "I think the team is already good enough and I don't need any more players" or "I'll take £50m just to be safe and you can spend the other half in other areas".

I don't know if it works that way but it would be a nice feature.

ive been wanting that for a few years. It would be a lot better if you could pay off long term loans if you would rather make the club more stable

That would be good too.

The transfer budget is only what the chairman will give you to spend. regardless of your balance. You may only have £30m balance but he can give you £100m to spend.

The club still only has £30m, not £130m. Hence if you spent the £100m you would be £70m in the red. It's your decision whether to spend it or not based on whether the successes you think you will acheive will pay it back

It's a risky game for chairmen to play but they are willing to put the club into temporary debt if it means future success, it's your decision how far to take their generosity

The transfer budget is only what the chairman will give you to spend. regardless of your balance. You may only have £30m balance but he can give you £100m to spend.

The club still only has £30m, not £130m. Hence if you spent the £100m you would be £70m in the red. It's your decision whether to spend it or not based on whether the successes you think you will acheive will pay it back

It's a risky game for chairmen to play but they are willing to put the club into temporary debt if it means future success, it's your decision how far to take their generosity

Good point.

It would be a great feature if we could use excess transfer budgets and put them into the club's bank balance, definitely. If we could do that, we would then be able to improve other areas like facilities, as it was mentioned before. A thumbs up from me.

Thing is, the money isn't "excess", it's money you don't necessarily have. CMOZZA sums it up pretty well.

At the end of the day it has to be the boards job to decide on tranfer budget.

Of course, you can decide not to spend it but if you fail to achieve the board's expectations, they won't be happy. On the other hand, if you don't spend it and overachieve then they will be delighted.

There really is no need to change things in my opinion because you already have some control when you sign a new contract ie choosing your budget/wages or demanding improvements to the stadium/training etc.

Thing is, the money isn't "excess", it's money you don't necessarily have. CMOZZA sums it up pretty well.

Indeed. I didn't thought about it that way. I guess that settles it then

Not sure I understand. I don't mean about the excess part, that's fine.

You're given a sum of money to spend. You should be able to choose whether you use that money to increase the club's balance or spend it all. The chairman might prefer you spend it all, but you insist on improving the club's balances instead of spending it all. After all, you are the manager and should have a say in the matter to a certain degree.

Not sure I understand. I don't mean about the excess part, that's fine.

You're given a sum of money to spend. You should be able to choose whether you use that money to increase the club's balance or spend it all. The chairman might prefer you spend it all, but you insist on improving the club's balances instead of spending it all. After all, you are the manager and should have a say in the matter to a certain degree.

If the transfer budget exceeds your balance, then it is money you DON'T have but the chairman is willing to risk to bring success. You cannot use this money to improve the balance as it doesn't really exist. The chairman expects you to make this money back in future seasons with future success.

If the transfer budget exceeds your balance, then it is money you DON'T have but the chairman is willing to risk to bring success. You cannot use this money to improve the balance as it doesn't really exist. The chairman expects you to make this money back in future seasons with future success.

The bolding made it clear. I blame the long day.

Thanks.

Edit: On a second thought, for clubs with balances that exceed the transfer budget, it should be a viable option, though. At least it makes sense to me.

The money is withdrawn from the balance when it is spent, so it doesn't really make a difference.

The money is withdrawn from the balance when it is spent, so it doesn't really make a difference.

I'm just having a horrible day, aren't I?

Carry on, fellas.

I still like the idea of asking the chairman to channel it into debts - this would be the case where the transfer budget was under the balance otherwise you'd be going into debt to service the debt

Maybe if we could choose to use the transfer budget to, say, build a youth academy or something.

I still like the idea of asking the chairman to channel it into debts - this would be the case where the transfer budget was under the balance otherwise you'd be going into debt to service the debt

but it doesnt make sense to do that...you have a balance, and that is all the money you have. You dont get a transfer budget on top of that, if you dont spend the budget, you will have a better balance and the board might be able to consider building an academy

Depending on the chairman's attributes, if you have money in the bank they may decide to pay off some of your debts with it at some point, so that side of the game seems to be well covered. I think the balance at the moment is pretty good. You're the manager, not the chairman, so although you can request some changes (improve youth/training facilities etc) the best you can do for the financial health of the club is to watch what you spend and hope the board aren't morons.

It would be a nice feature, I'm Man Utd with ~£350m in the bank and a Transfer budget of ~£230m.

I'd much rather the money be spent paying off loans but I realise that some loan clauses penalise you for early repayment, It would still be a nice feature tho as i really really won't ever spend that much on players. I guess my average spend on players / season is ~£20m/season. (Infact i just calculated it over my 11 seasons at being an average of £23.5m a season).

Yes they should incorporate this in next versions

ive been wanting that for a few years. It would be a lot better if you could pay off long term loans if you would rather make the club more stable

Yes they should incorporate this in next versions

Your the Manager of a football club, NOT the owner, NOT the Financial advisor. There is more than enough detail in FM. If you start going into controlling finances, it may as well be called FCO (FOOTBALL CLUB OWNER)

While moving transfer funds to balance obviously isn't gonna be possible, since it's not real money, I as well would love to be able to tell my board to pay off a set amount of debt if we have the balance to do so.

Imagine a club with £70M debt with payments running for another 20 years. But the club have been successful over the last years and the balance is £200M. What'd I'd like then is to be able to ask the board to pay off the whole debt so it's done with. Like Shanksie1975 says.

I dunno if this is already sort of in place, maybe the board will automatically do this if the balance gets high enough? But I've never seen it happen at least.

*edit* Maybe someone could make another thread about this particular thing, it may be a bit lost in this thread.

If you got £100 million with a balance of £30 million the name Leeds (Damned) United springs to mind. Saying that i'd probably get over-excited and spent the lot and go bust.

Transfer budget is already incorporated into the balance. You cannot add it to the balance because it is already in the balance. All you can do is just not spend it.

i can see their point, im now 8mill in the profit towards the end of the season with no transfer budget, i want them to pay off some more of the loans

Your the Manager of a football club, NOT the owner, NOT the Financial advisor. There is more than enough detail in FM. If you start going into controlling finances, it may as well be called FCO (FOOTBALL CLUB OWNER)

Arsena Wenger, since he took over arsenal in 1996 he's worked with the board in many aspects of the clubs finances. ie diverting money he could've invested in the team into building the emirates & a world class youth academy.

More detailed interaction with the board would be a nice feature in that respect, rather than being given a transfer budget outright for the season.

Currently it's like (Using Man U Season 1 Budget as an example):

Target: Win League/Title Challenge

Budget: £74m/£60m

Wages: £1.8m/£1.6m

I think it would be a nice feature if say it was like (Obviously only after spending a certain amount of time with a club or becoming an Icon or Legend):

Target: Win League

Budget: £74m

Wages: £1.8m

Or after your requests during the season the board have offered these as alternatives and your budget will be scaled down accordingly:

Build new State of the art youth academy: £20m

Transfer Budget: £59m

Wages: £1.7m

Build New Stadium: £600m

Transfer Budget: £20m

Wages: £1.5m

The Board wishes to advise you that due to the heavy financial implications of building a new stadium your transfer & Wage Budget will be restrained to a maximum of x amount per season for y amount of years in order to offset the costs. These budgets may vary based on the teams success on the field on a season by season basis. They have also advised that z% of any money you generate through player sales will also be used to help fund this project

That way you are not controlling the finances as such, but are having more of a say in where money is allocated if you think it can raise the stature of the club, but also keeping in mind the future implications it may have on your ability to strengthen the team.

Football coaches do not give career businessmen financial advice no matter how good they are at building teams on a shoestring budget. Stadium expansions, new stadium builds, budgets etc. in the Premier League have nothing to do with managers. Their financial advice is irrelevant as they know nothing of real finance.

Managers will obviously meet with the board and will no doubt be asked as to their opinion on certain issues and likewise give their opinion and ask questions in return, but they are not going to walk up to the chairman with a dossier and say "I have figured out how to finance a new stadium".

On the contrary, it is far more likely that the board will inform the manager that they are planning to restrict his budget in order to develop faciliaties that will benefit the team in the long run, and ask his opinion as to whether he thinks he can succeed on such a budget or what is the minimum budget he will require in the short term to achieve his basic ambitions. This will then be considered at the next board meeting.

While greater involvement in stadium and facility building would be an interesting addition to FM, it is a complete fallacy to think that it is realistic. Non league, junior, amateur sides etc. may have an "old boys club" where the manager is a part of the top level decision making, but that does not occur in the Premier League where top level executives are for the most part experienced and highly educated businessmen.

The current system in FM is far more realistic than any hands-on CEO gameplay, but it would be interesting to see this system greatly expanded to include suggestions for stadium facilities, training ground facilities, club house facilities etc.

Football coaches do not give career businessmen financial advice no matter how good they are at building teams on a shoestring budget. Stadium expansions, new stadium builds, budgets etc. in the Premier League have nothing to do with managers. Their financial advice is irrelevant as they know nothing of real finance.

Managers will obviously meet with the board and will no doubt be asked as to their opinion on certain issues and likewise give their opinion and ask questions in return, but they are not going to walk up to the chairman with a dossier and say "I have figured out how to finance a new stadium".

On the contrary, it is far more likely that the board will inform the manager that they are planning to restrict his budget in order to develop faciliaties that will benefit the team in the long run, and ask his opinion as to whether he thinks he can succeed on such a budget or what is the minimum budget he will require in the short term to achieve his basic ambitions. This will then be considered at the next board meeting.

While greater involvement in stadium and facility building would be an interesting addition to FM, it is a complete fallacy to think that it is realistic. Non league, junior, amateur sides etc. may have an "old boys club" where the manager is a part of the top level decision making, but that does not occur in the Premier League where top level executives are for the most part experienced and highly educated businessmen.

The current system in FM is far more realistic than any hands-on CEO gameplay, but it would be interesting to see this system greatly expanded to include suggestions for stadium facilities, training ground facilities, club house facilities etc.

I agree, and I'm not suggesting that you should have the option to approach the board with ideas of how to finance such things because that would be ridiculous. I'm just saying that if you make certain requests that are denied during the season the board should be able to come up with some proposals if they can be financially viable when proposing Transfer budgets in the close season. But only if you have reached a certain stature at the club so that your opinion is respected and the board can be assured you have the teams best interest in your thoughts.

Whilst i agree that as manager you shouldn't be asking them to pay off debts. You technically could say that you don't plan to invest heavily into the team and that the balance is best spent elsewhere. Whether the board decide to pay off debt or expand the stadium or upgrade facilities is up to them.

On a related topic to where this conversation is going now:

After the board stow away money into a "reserve investment fund" in FM10, do they later actually use that money to pay back loans or buy a new stadium?

there should be the option of suggesting to you how much things cost and then you can plan ahead to have the money so that those things can be done. Eg. Stadium Expansion costs 30m so you can plan to have the money and when you do you can say to Chairman, here is 30m towards the stadium expansion. This would be preferred. Also with loans, when you have the money and the loan is still there why cant you suggest to Chairman to pay it off or indeed why cant he just grab the money to pay off the loan? Eg. 10m loan to be paid by 2029 at 250k a year yet you have 30m in funds unused. Surely it makes sense to pay off the 10m and leave you with 20m. Clubs restructure loans all the time so this makes sense imo.

Clubs restructure loans all the time so this makes sense imo.

Yes they do, but normally extending the repayments. In the case of most loans, there are financial penalties for paying off the debts earlier as banks miss out on interest