Money Matters
jtmh2012
mod
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Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
If you have questions about this, please email help@theknot.com.
Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
End of year cleanup/documentation....
Since it's getting to the end of the year, I thought I'd toss this out there....
What is your process for purging paperwork clutter? Do you have a list to guide you on what to keep and what can be purged? I used to keep virtually everything. Finally hit the point where a lot of it needed to go and I did a big purge. Last several years, I Google around to find lists of what to keep/purge and no two lists seem to agree. So I thought I'd see what everyone's process/thoughts were...
The other thing I've been looking into is trying to document our financial life for my wife in the event something happens to me. Seems to be a lot of info on what info needs to be around, but little to none on how to organize it. How do you all do it?
Re: End of year cleanup/documentation....
So at the end of the year I buy an accordion folder and pull them out, label the stack by what it is or is for, then clip it together and toss it in the folder.
As for electronic items, I have various folders on the Onedrive in my e-mail and at the end of the year I throw that folder into one main one labeled the year. Then I create new ones for the next year like online orders, insurance, bills, etc. That way I can find things by what year the transaction happened if I absolutely had to.
Not sure if this helps, but we have a "if we die" folder in our safe. It's actually what Dave Ramsey teaches about in his Legacy Journey book.
http://www.daveramsey.com/blog/legacy-drawer-keep-your-family-prepared
Hopefully this link works, but here's what information he recommends to have in it.
TTC since 1/13 DX:PCOS 5/13 (long, anovulatory cycles)
Clomid 50mg 9/13 = BFP! EDD 6/7/14 M/C 5w6d Found 11/4/13
1/14 PCOS / Gluten Free Diet to hopefully regulate my system.
Chemical Pregnancy 03/14
Surprise BFP 6/14, Beta #1: 126 Beta #2: 340 Stick baby, stick! EDD 2/17/15
Riley Elaine born 2/16/15
TTC 2.0 6/15
Chemical Pregnancy 9/15
Chemical Pregnancy 6/16
BFP 9/16 EDD 6/3/17
Beta #1: 145 Beta #2: 376 Beta #3: 2,225 Beta #4: 4,548
www.5yearstonever.blogspot.com
Things I do not keep:
- Paystubs
- Old insurance policies (unless there is a pending claim from that year)
- Bills/bank statements/mortgage statements (if I need them I'll log on and get them)
- Prospectus and annual reports from our investments (again, it's online)
Things I keep in the filing cabinet:- Retirement statements (only because I haven't decluttered this pile yet...it is on the chopping block)
- Current insurance policies
- Current estate planning documents for us and my parents
- Home ownership/original mortgage docs (after our refi I only kept copies of documents showing the previous mortgage was paid off - not the entire file. If I need the original mortgage for some reason I can download it from the registry)
- Jewelry appraisals, marriage certificate, random originals of docs you hardly every need but can't throw out.
- Old taxes (only need about 7 years, but ours don't take up much room so I think I currently have 10 years in there..)
I also have an expanding file that I keep downstairs because it manages the piles until I can deal with a document or file it. In here I also keep:We used to hoard paperwork as well, but now we just do the following:
- Keep 4 years worth of tax returns
-In our safe we have our important docs like passports, marriage license and our wills
- We changed all of our bills to email billing, so we hardly get any mail anymore...If I can't access a company online to see bills then we keep it coming via mail and file it. My thought is that if it's accessible online, we don't need a paper copy.
- All our bank info is online, we don't want anything of that nature in the house except for the checkbook
- We keep our car repair receipts for easy access since those aren't online.
- We also keep town/state receipts Ex.car taxes, town taxes etc
- We keep record for any charitable giving's for tax time
- I keep all our household item purchase/repair receipts as well
I think that's everything in a nutshell that I can think of
I need serious help in this area, lol. I have a hard time letting go of the "paper".
I just keep it all, but I'm horrible with organizing. It is one of my goals for this year.
Here is my plan, but would love to hear what other people do and/or if there are any potential issues with my plan:
-Keep everything electronically and saved to two different places. Bills, cc statements, paycheck stubs, receipts, legal documents (leases, property deeds, warranties, etc.)
-Keep hard copies of receipts and legal documents. Each property will have its own manila folder and appropriate receipts will go in there. All other receipts will be put in a monthly envelope.
One of my problems is I hate scanning stuff. Plus my home personal scanner only does one page at a time. Despite the cost, I'm almost tempted to get whichever Adobe product lets me combine PDFs. So at least I can combine pages for items with multiple pages.
http://download.cnet.com/PDFill-Free-PDF-Tools/3000-18497_4-10435051.html?tag=mncol
Yes! Thank you! I'll try it when I'm at home. Even if the link doesn't work, I'm sure I can find it from the name.
People have problems, other PPs have solutions. One of the many reasons I love this board
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I either scan or toss everything else. Things like tax records I scan and keep on a thumb drive (stored in my emergency bag) with a cloud back-up. I don't keep originals.
FYI copies are fine in most legal situations. My entire law firm is paperless, except for certain probate records. I have to admit I use my firm's scanner every now and then when I have a pile of stuff to scan. Otherwise I use a quality home scanner. Having a good scanner makes paperless organization much easier. Having a good shredder (diamond/cross-cut) is also important. My office has a huge shred bin, so when I have a lot to shred I bring the originals into the office and dump them there.
For charitable donations I have a google spreadsheet that I just add to every time we make a donation, and a few times a year I update my TurboTax account so it's already entered when I file our taxes in January.
In terms of end-of-life stuff, H and I have a google doc with coded passwords/hints that are seemingly random (but that we understand) with a list of all accounts. If one of us died the other would know to use that list, and they could get into/manage everything. We haven't left explicit instructions about what to do, but it seems fairly obvious to us... things like our mortgage is automated and will always be paid on time. Credit cards can be accessed with the spreadsheet and paid off. Then we would call one of our friends to help with probate.
I try to organize quarterly, but it tends to be more like every 4-6 months.
Currently I have a file cabinet and most of the important stuff is in the top drawer, but I also keep a bunch of stuff in Quicken which wouldn't be easy for my wife to get to. Although, I could write out the steps and stick it in a folder I suppose.
The reason my law firm has gone paperless is because physical records are expensive to store and in practice, they actually get destroyed more often than digital. We used to rent off-site storage, but if there was a flood, fire, or even too much humidity they would be damaged, mold, or fade. Our digital records are preserved as soon as they are scanned, and their quality never deteriorates like paper. Seriously, try reading a document that was stored in a box in 1980, and you never know what you might get.
In terms of personal papers, there is very little that needs to be kept forever. Warranties expire after a few years. Tax records/justification only need to be kept until you are past the audit period. Insurance policies are mailed to you every year they are renewed. Even birth certificates and passports can be duplicated, it's just a pain to do. The only thing I can think of that needs to be kept forever as an original is a current will/POA/medical directive (even this depends on the state). I would also keep medical records and receipts for medical expenses that I have not submitted to my HSA for reimbursement in digital form forever.
I actually had a big problem with this. The state of Louisiana, about 2-3 years ago, suspended my driver's license because they claimed I hadn't filed a return for the Year 2000. I never got a notification. They said they sent one. But, even per their records, they sent the notification past the "7 years" people are always told to keep that stuff.
When I pointed this out, they said that is only true when people file their taxes. But how can I prove I filed my taxes if I've thrown the paperwork out? I didn't have much choice but to go on a payment plan for money I didn't owe in order to get my license re-instated. They had my income records for how much I owed for that year...yet, magically, not the records for how much I'd already paid through my paychecks. They also said I hadn't filed in 2009. Oh, but I did. At least I still had THOSE records to prove it.
At any rate, I don't care what is usually said about tax records. I will forever keep every single, stupid W-2 I ever get and the main pages of my returns. Even if I just keep it electronically. That was a lot of money and unnecessary heartache. Maybe I'm an odd case. Maybe all the other states aren't completely dysfunctional. But I don't trust any facet of Louisiana gov't. further than I can throw it.
But yes, keeping proof that you filed a tax return is very important. I should add that to the list of things that can/should be digitally archived forever. If you don't file a tax return then the audit period remains open forever.
I don't keep full copies of old returns, but I do keep copies of electronic receipt notifications, and in years where I send in returns by snail mail I send it certified so that I get a signed copy of my receipt back. It's really easy to falsify an old return - I can go on my state's website and get forms going back to 2005. So I keep other proof to show the return was filed on time with the first couple pages scanned, and then I throw away the rest of it after the audit window closes. The IRS and my state both keep electronic transcripts of old returns so if I ever needed them for some reason I can always order copies.
That being said, I suspect Louisiana is a lot more dysfunctional than most other states! I can see every tax return I've ever filed in Alabama online, and my state is not exactly high tech...
We keep individual files for each of the vehicles to track maintenance records/repairs.
We keep a file for the dog...I guess this is probably just a waste of space but my dad keeps files for everything as far as I can tell and he always kept a pet file. I guess I'm crazy.
We keep a file containing the letters for our paid off student loans.
All of our W2s and tax return copies, it doesn't take up a ton of space in the filing cabinet (for now) so we've held on to them.
Utility bills. We prefer to use bill pay rather than give permission to allow the companies to just auto-withdraw whatever and the paper bills help us keep track.
Mortgage documents and the bills from major home repairs to keep track of what we did and when for when we sell and need to put together the disclosure.
Birth certs, marriage license, medical records and other personal documents (we really need to buy a safe for this stuff).
We have an appointment to get our will finalized tomorrow so we'll keep a paper record of that. Also yay us for meeting another 2016 goal!
ETA: We've been trying to take time once a year to dump a bunch of stuff we don't necessarily need to keep and we keep a trash can of documents we need to burn. It hasn't been cold enough yet this year for a fire in the fireplace.
And @labro, I have files for my dogs too. Makes it easy to keep track of their vaccination records, like for a kennel, and also for the two that have microchips. Reminds me, need to update one dog's microchip information, whoops.