Tip Tuesday – Archiving Actions

Following up on last week’s post about creating your reference folders, there will, of course, be some papers that you’ll want to hold on to “just in case.” These are what I call “ARCHIVE” papers.

They are papers that you:
DO NOT need to take any ACTION on
DO NOT need to REFER to
DO NOT want to save for MEMORIES

These papers are usually related to financial matters such as taxes, investments, or real estate documents. Sometimes they are medical or legal papers. You may want to save them “just in case,” and, for peace of mind, I encourage you to do so.

I suggest these “just in case” papers go into a Bankers Box labeled boldly with the year. Store this box deep in an attic or basement, as you should not need quick access to it. I am creating a 2018 box now and planning to shred my 2007 box at my next local event opportunity. Before the box gets stored, I make absolutely sure that everything in it can be shredded in ten years’ time.

You do NOT need to spend a lot of time organizing these papers. As long as they are all together it is fine.  Chances are you will not need to look into this box again. I assure you, IF you got audited you would be motivated to go find the box with this information and sort through it to get the documents you are looking for.

So do this NOW: Gather up all of the “just in case” papers from 2018 and ARCHIVE them. You (and your future self) will be glad that you did!