When a plant asset is purchased for cash, its acquisition cost is simply the agreed on cash price. When you first purchase new equipment, you need to debit the specific equipment (ie, asset) account.And, credit the account you pay for the asset from. The journal entry is a credit to Accounts Payable (to increase it, since it's a liability) and a debit an expense account. The acquisition cost of a plant asset is the amount of cost incurred to acquire and place the asset in operating condition at its proper location. In the second entry, we debit the cash account and the credit accounts receivable account.