Jill Russo Foster

Tips for Successful Personal Finances

You are here: Home / Archives for Every Day Finances / Family Finances

Decluttering Your Financial Records

By

Since we have all been at home for months and doing things around the home, I thought I would rerun this appropriate newsletter about what you need to keep and toss for your financial records.

Here is what you can get rid of:

Paystubs – Do you have a stack of them?  You can get rid of last year’s because you have a W-2 that summarizes what you’ve earned.  Keep the W-2.  Make sure they match before shredding.

Bank Statements – If your bank gives you an annual summary or statement, then you can get rid of all the monthly or quarterly statements, but keep the annual summary / statement.

Tax Returns – Generally, you can get rid of tax returns that are seven years old or more (2013 and older) along with the supporting documentation.  However, you will want to check with your tax preparer if you:

  • bought, sold, and/or own a home
  • hold certain investments
  • received certain gifts
  • have any other special circumstance that requires you to keep related paperwork indefinitely.

In other words, check with your tax preparer before shredding your returns.

An alternative to paper files

Keeping your records on your computer is a great alternative to paper files. We had a lot of paper clutter hanging around, so I started the process of scanning my records as pdfs.  If you need a piece of documentation, it’s much easier to locate and open a single pdf than it is to search through a big, cluttered file full of paper. The best part is, that you don’t have to refile the pdf after you’re done looking at it. It’s also easier to fax or email a pdf if needed. Think of all the times you’ve needed to share information about insurances, taxes or rebates. Computer files are great to work with.  Remember to keep a back up of your files.  You wouldn’t want to lose them if your computer crashes.

Make sure to shred

Remember when I say “get rid of”, I mean for you to shred each and every document that has your personal information on it before throwing it away.  You don’t want to offer dumpster divers an opportunity to steal your identity.

Call your tax preparer to see what you need to keep and start to go through your paperwork to eliminate what you don’t need.  Happy Shredding!

Simplifying By Making Choices

By

This stay at home time, we have made changes to our routine.  Bills are still coming in and some are higher, but income stayed the same or was even reduced.  Something had to change.

For our electric bill that went up (even more now with summer air conditioning), we unplugged.  Think shutting the strips on the TV ‘s when not in use, unplugging the computers and printers when not is use, unplugging the kitchen appliances, and more.  By doing this we have reduce our bill by about $15 a month.  AARP has an article on lowering your electric bill during summer.

Previously, we have reduced our cable bill, by reducing it to basic TV service and internet.  Now we add whatever paid service that works for us – and only one at a time.  We have smart TV’s and can access programming through the internet apps that are free.  We use our local library’s digital collection for free.  Right now, we are using Sling TV for other channels.  In total, we spend about $110 a month total, by reducing the cord.  Hopefully, one day we can totally cut the cord!

We have also not renewed most magazine subscriptions and cancelled memberships.  For our warehouse club, I had to go into our profile and uncheck automatic renewal.  If you do this, remember to check that you are not being automatically being changed when you shouldn’t be.

Simplifying Buying When Not Needed

By

How many times have you gone out and made a purchase only to come home to find out that you already had the item?  This used to be us. 

Simplifying the kitchen is good thing makes what we need easier to locate when needed.  Simplifying and organizing has been our mission.  Now our kitchen cabinets and grouped together – one shelf for condiments, one for soups and other canned goods, one for pastas, etc.  Kitchen cabinets a mess. Items put on any shelf and not grouped together.

Now it’s so much easier to see what is needed before going shopping and not may unnecessary purchases (all while saving money).

Simplifying One Times Use Items

By

Next, we are simplifying by getting iod of items the are one-time use items.

What items are in our kitchen that we only use for one purpose.  These are taking up space and we can do without these.  Think apple slicer, we can cut the apple with a knife.  Think popsicle molds, how many times have I used them.  I can only think of one time.  We are working our way through the cabinets and drawers in our home.  How many of these items do you have in your home?

Items are piling up and will be ready to donate soon.

Simplification – Duplicates Be Gone

By

Simplifying the kitchen is good thing and makes what we need easier to locate when needed. spring cleaning

During this stay at home time, we have begun getting rid of duplicates.  Really, how many potato peelers can one kitchen need?  Not to mention the hamburger flippers, ladles and more.

We have begun going through the process of cleaning out the kitchen cabinets and drawers.  I can’t believe how much we have accumulated over the years.  Maybe, its time to pretend we are moving and do a deep cleaning? Think about all the money we have wasted with buying these items!  It’s time to think save money instead of buying another item.

Simplifying By Doing It Ourselves

By

We have made choices in our lives to do things ourselves and not pay for the service.  It’s a personal choice that we are happy with.

With that in mind, I want to share with you what we personally don’t spend money or reduce our spending on in our household.

Our Home:

  • Yard work
  • Spring and fall yard clean up
  • Snow shoveling
  • Gutter cleaning
  • Power washing
  • Trash / recycle – would have to ay a trash hauler as our town doesn’t provide this service
  • Rain barrel – we collect rain water and use this to water the garden and plants
  • Compost Bin – our town has a goal to go waste free, so we are able to take our food waste to the town for compositing

By doing these things ourselves, we save money each and every month that we can use in a variety of ways (reduce debt, increase savings).

Simplifying By Reducing

By

With more time on my hands, I got to thinking about what I could reduce or eliminate to save money.  Honestly, I always think about this.  For me, it comes down to spend that money now on something or save it for later.

What items do I purchase that I could use another option?  Here are some of the things I have changed in our house:

  • Swapped out a magnetic white board monthly calendar for buying a yearly calendar.
  • Used my cell phone sharable calendar instead of the paper planner.
  • Changed from plastic containers to glass jars and from plastic bags to silicone reusable bags.
  • Using essential oils to make my own cleaners versus buying individual cleaners for parts of my home.

How much can you save by making small changes?

Simplifying Our Entertainment

By

Being home meant more time on my hands.  For me, this could lead to more spending and I (or my budget) wasn’t going to allow that.

For us, we have reduced our cable TV to basic and have one streaming service.  That’s all we have and I wasn’t going to pay for any more.

We have kept ourselves entertained with free stuff.  We have watched movies on the channels that we have.  I was able to watch the movie Hidden Figures that I had wanted to.  I highly recommend it if you haven’t watched it.  We explored a variety of free services. We have always used Hoopla from the library for free movies. We’ve toured places what we haven’t been to, such as virtual tours of museums and national parks.  I’ve read many books that I was planning on reading that I never got to.  We broke out our board games and played for entertainment.  We have explorer new locations for our daily walks.  All this without spending a penny.

If we can do this, you can too.

Simplifying By Not Shopping

By

Being home with the Covid 19 requirements, caused me to spend more.  Business was slower, minimal interaction and more time on my hands, cause me to spend more.  Not a good thing.

Once I made this realization, I needed to take action.  First, I had to understand that because something is a good buy, doesn’t mean I need it.  This was a big step.  Next, I eliminated apps on my phone and unsubscribed from emails from companies, reducing the temptation to spend.

Now before I buy something, I ask myself do I really need this?  Is this something I would have bought without a sale?  If the answer is “yes”, then I make the purchase.

 

Simplifying By Reducing

By

Yesterday, I told you what we did about the paper clutter.  Today, let’s talk about the other clutter that was in our home.

To be honest, we have simplified and reduce a lot, but we still have more to go.  We inherited many items from our families and I found that the sentimental items were the hardest to get rid of.  For me this was the hardest. But I have come up with a solution that works for me and maybe you too.

We purchased our families home.  And along with that came these items.  What was I do with them?  At first it was easily to toss many items. But then, I was left with the hard stuff.  Those sentimental items that I didn’t want to keep but didn’t want to toss either.  That was my dilemma.

This is what I have done to simplify the items in our house

  • My dad was a great athlete and had so much memorabilia.  First, I decided that I wanted to remember all of this, so I took photos of all the items I wanted to remember.  I have the memory and the photo now, so I was ready to get rid of the items.  But what could I do with these items, it didn’t seem right to toss them.  For his school memorabilia, I contact the schools and donated the items – yearbooks, sports uniforms, programs, pins, equipment, etc.
  • Nostalgic items was another category.  I purchased a book called Trash or Treasure and contacted collectors.  Here’s a couple of examples – I sold a metal toy to a collector for $500, I sold my mother’s cameras to a company in the mid-west, family china to a company that buys it for people seeking replacement items for their collections.
  • Boxes of newspaper clipping, from my fathers sports career.  Just finished scanning all of these while at home during the pandemic.

I am down to the last few items and then I will be done.   We have eliminated boxes and boxes from our basement and I am happy with where the items are now..