Although I had just about the messiest room known to man when I was a child/teenager/two days ago, I truly enjoy cleaning one thing : paperwork.
I spent half a day organizing BF’s paperwork from the past 10 years into a nice file holder for him, and most recently took my own financial papers, bought a cheap file organizer and put my own paperwork into it. I am not quite sure why it brings me such joy to create labels, organize things by date, etc., but it really does feel good. Not to mention the Queen of PF (Gail Vaz-Oxlade) wrote in a Money Sense article that people in debt are often messy with money, and that one needs to clean up his/her paperwork, bank accounts, etc, in order to properly control the flow of money. She say’s,
“The key to being organized is ensuring that everything has a place. Get all your paperwork together and create a file folder for each of your bank accounts, forms of credit, home, insurance, estate and taxes. Set them up in a drawer or box.”
So I did just that. It’s all in a bright pink (yes I am THAT girl) folder, neatly labelled. I will be switching to paperless bills for my cell phone and potentially my bank loan eventually, but I still plan on keeping my taxes and other such important paperwork in there. If you have not organized your financial statements, I definitely suggest you do! It feels so much better that now if there is a paper I need to find, I can actually find it, it’s not just floating around the house somewhere.
P.S. I’m also in the middle of creating my own budgeting worksheet. When I do my month-end budget update I will be using this; although I feel that it will likely take a few months to work out the kinks completely.
How do you organize your financial statements/budget?
I am possibly the messiest person on earth. I can actually hide stuff from myself and never find it. It’s that bad!
haha ! I am getting much, much better as I get older. As a kid, I was a huge mess. Now, I do usually have a slightly messy room despite cleaning it 3 times a week, solely because I like to throw clothes on the floor. haha. I do have a similar problem to you though, when I put things “in a safe place” I always remember that I put it somewhere safe, but it takes me forever to remember where that place is, if I ever do find it!
I keep a Google Docs spreadsheet of my bills, when they are due, when I pay them, etc. I have fallen behind but I always make sure there is enough money in the bank to cover them and I have yet to have a problem. I have paperless billing for everything and organize the email notifications about payment by Gmail’s label system (LOVE LOVE LOVE IT). I keep paystubs, tax documents, other paperwork like that in an organizer folder like yours!
Ugh…since moving to my new apartment, my paperwork and financial statements are all over the place. I really need to take some time like you did to get everything in order. That would make for a good weekend project (among the others ones I need to do). Lol. Finding a brightly colored folder is awesome! :)
Maybe it happens to everyone when they move because I just moved too? It takes forever to get in order (depending on how many statements you have) but it really helps ! Thanks for commenting :)
I recently organized all of our financial documents too! Previously they were all in the same spot, but it was a drawer…so they were all just piled up in any random order. I decided to go with a file box rather than folder, because it seemed easier to store. I do enjoy labeling things! haha
Ah, it’s so difficult with them all in piles in a drawer right? I got so sick of having to wade through everything to get to whatever I needed. Plus once it’s organized it takes two seconds to add a few more pages into the folder. And labeling is fun. (We may both be slightly OCD :P)
We have one file folder for current bills and shred them when the next one comes. For long term financial info we have a 3″ binder with will and funeral info, investment info and statements etc. We learned our lesson the last time we moved and had to dispose of a massive amount of old bills. Do I need to know what I paid for phone service in July 1997? I do keep an excel file with all the info from my electric bills. We heat and cook with electric so it is interesting to track and is good feedback for usage. One month I was making bread a few times a week and my electric bill was more than double. I was amazed. Now I am much more careful about what I am cooking in the oven and when.