Document Keeping

[Michael G.]

There is so many documents that build up in my home files and wondering
how long should I keep documents from a sale of my house up north?
How about the purchase documents of buying our house in Florida?

Cheers!

[retiredguy123]

I use my scanner to make electronic copies of important documents, and store them on my Google drive. Anyone who has a Google account has 15gb of free cloud storage. Just go to "drive.google.com" and click on "my drive".

Personally, I would keep real estate deeds and title insurance policies forever. If you purchased a title insurance policy, it never expires, even after you sell the property.

[BrianL99]

There is so many documents that build up in my home files and wondering
how long should I keep documents from a sale of my house up north?
How about the purchase documents of buying our house in Florida?

Cheers!

I keep my stuff for 10 years.

We sold a business last month. I had to rent a box truck to transport the paperwork we're required to keep, by State & Federal Law. We'll eventually digitize most of it, but some stuff we're required to keep in original form.

I haven't used cash to pay for much of anything, for 10 year, so I always have digital receipts. When I'm asked if I'd like a receipt at a business, my answer is always the same ... "No thanks. I have enough paperwork in my life".

[villagetinker]

True story, we sold some property back up north, NO ONE noticed we were selling property #2 but the documentation stated property #1 adjacent, 4 additional sales later and several years, we get a call from a lawyer about which property we sold. I just happen to have kept the old emails and associated documents, and actually found the original error that no one noticed. We were not on the hook, so no idea how it was "fixed", all of this occurred 8 years after the sale.
So I tend to agree, keep this type of paperwork, just in case.....

[spinner1001]

There is so many documents that build up in my home files and wondering
how long should I keep documents from a sale of my house up north?
How about the purchase documents of buying our house in Florida?

Cheers!

Sold house up north: I would keep the closing/settlement statement for at least 10 years and other sales documents at least five years.

Current Florida home: I would keep the closing/settlement statement, deed, title insurance policy, and other purchase legal documents for as long as your own the home plus at least 10 years. If you designed your home as a new build, the design documents for as long as your own the home plus at least two years. You might keep these documents together with your current property insurance documents and tidy in case of a catastrophic event such as a tornado or fire, and for your survivors.

[JGibson]

Safe deposit box for originals.

Trusting Google servers can be risky in these tumultuous cyber security times.

[bsloan1960]

There is so many documents that build up in my home files and wondering
how long should I keep documents from a sale of my house up north?
How about the purchase documents of buying our house in Florida?

Cheers! Don't care that folks will tell me I'm overreacting: Unless you lived in a tent you sold your house for a LOT of money. Unless you bought a tent you payed a LOT of money. Any transaction that involves a LOT of money is worth saving the paperwork forever.

[CoachKandSportsguy]

Safe deposit box for originals.
Trusting Google servers can be risky in these tumultuous cyber security times.

buy a 1Gig solid state stand alone hard drive, USB connection,
save all digital copies to that drive, keeping it off the daily use computer for any successful hacking attempts, and disconnect from hard drive when not copying nor retrieving statements.

download and copy all digital financial statements to the hard drive, and the bury it in the back yard for safe keeping. . or put it in a fire proof box and save it a corner of a closet. . . and you are good for as long as you live. . . and its a one time expense. If you have a shared drive, put copies on the shared drive and have a relative save the same files to their stand alone hard drive for backup purposes, and remove the hacking threat. . .

same with important emails. . .

good luck. .

[ElDiabloJoe]

Don't care that folks will tell me I'm overreacting: Unless you lived in a tent you sold your house for a LOT of money. Unless you bought a tent you payed a LOT of money. Any transaction that involves a LOT of money is worth saving the paperwork forever.

^ Concur. A few file folders and a yellow/black tote from Costco or Home Depot costs less than $20 and does not take up a lot of space for something that could be so very important!

As an aside, my friend and I both relocated from CA to TN about a year apart. We bought homes in the same neighborhood / community. He opted to save a couple hundred bucks and not buy title insurance. Turns out, there was a significant title issue on the conveyance of the lot he bought and subsequently built upon. The notarizing occurred 20 years prior and stamps and/or documents were missing. Turns out, the notary had actually moved FROM TN to CA, the exact opposite of my fiend's relocation pattern.

Fortunately, after many hours of researching and attempt to contact the notary, he finally located her about 50 miles from where he was in CA at the time. 2 or 3 trips to the location before he made contact.

Double fortunately, the notary kept her boxes of records from her notarizing career that ended some 15 years prior.

Triple fortunately, she was willing to (and did) go through those records for hours to locate the needed documentation to resolve the title issue.

A lot of hassle and possibly a lost deal or lost tens of thousands of dollars for the lot and hundreds of thousands of dollars for the house when a $200 insurance policy would have been cheap piece of mind.

Especially because the lot in question and the community in question have historically been subject to multiple contentious claims of ownership (Formerly Cherokee lands taken by the U.S. via Trail-Of-Tears, then the TVA took by eminent-domain a lot of the area from generations of Appalachian farmers, and then shortly afterward the community developers came in from out of state).

[Boomer]

Even if you think you are down for the count in the primary residence you now own in TV, start a file with records of anything you spend on improving the property, even if it seems minor at the time — like maybe a new faucet here and there.

Why?…….

The Taxpayer Relief Act of 1997 put a lot of money in the pockets of home sellers. Before that any profit was taxed as a capital gain, unless you spent more on the next house.

(Personal opinion of mine is that before—1997 was the time of the McMansions springing up from developers in suburbs. It was also the time of more job transfers for the early boomers who were working toward the height of their careers in the 80s and 90s……

Back then, if someone taking a transfer was selling a house in. . .for example, Chicago and transferring to — let’s say, Cincinnati, the incoming buyer had to spend their Chicago profit or be taxed on it. Said pre-1997 buyer was thrilled to see what could be bought in Cincy in comparison to what they sold in a higher priced market. Might as well live large instead of turning that profit over to the government. But that’s just my thought on architecture and boomers of those times.)

Anyway, since 1997 a single person can exclude $250,000 and a couple can exclude a half million without paying a capital gains tax on primary residence profit.

You might think you will never move again, but just in case, save records of everything that applies to money spent on improving your residence. Close that gap between buying price and a potential for selling price.


WARNING: Never take advice on taxes from a stranger on the internet who could be your old English teacher for all you know. Check it all out with an accountant.

If you want to know more about capital gains and real estate, Investopedia has concise, clear articles online. Give it a Google with the topic.

Boomer

PS: Dinosaur though I may be, I agree with the previous poster in this thread who is not comfortable with storing important documents in cyberspace. Not only is there some concern I have for vulnerability of those records, I have more concern for access down the road. If you happen to know an archivist or a reference or research librarian, they can tell you tales of information trapped in time because it has been stored in a very old school way and it is time consuming if not impossible to get to.

I am a back-it-up in hardcopy type — not everything -- just the big deal documents. I want to be able to hold those in my hand if ever I need to.

Boomerosaurus :)

[La lamy]

I keep records of homes sold and bought forever as well as mortgages. I had to have a bridge loan for one of my home purchases and my lawyer was supposed to have paid it off as soon as my next home's sale was done. Once it came time to sell that place 9 years later, I found out there was a $285,000 lien on my home!!!!!!! Past lawyer never repaid the bridge loan. Thank goodness I kept all my documentations so my new lawyer could track down the lawyer who messed me up (he had moved by the way). Could have been catastrophic for me if I didn't have all those documents saved.

[JGibson]

buy a 1Gig solid state stand alone hard drive, USB connection,
save all digital copies to that drive, keeping it off the daily use computer for any successful hacking attempts, and disconnect from hard drive when not copying nor retrieving statements.

download and copy all digital financial statements to the hard drive, and the bury it in the back yard for safe keeping. . or put it in a fire proof box and save it a corner of a closet. . . and you are good for as long as you live. . . and its a one time expense. If you have a shared drive, put copies on the shared drive and have a relative save the same files to their stand alone hard drive for backup purposes, and remove the hacking threat. . .

same with important emails. . .

good luck. .

If you plug that USB hard drive into the computer you will leave a digital trail in the computer.

A bank safe deposit box has better fire protection than my house and you can add a joint account holder in case you die.

[nancyre]

Capital improvements on a house can be included in the cost of the house for the calculation of capital gains. So yes keep your receipts for major items, till you sell the house.

[Haggar]

There is so many documents that build up in my home files and wondering
how long should I keep documents from a sale of my house up north?
How about the purchase documents of buying our house in Florida?

Cheers!

Attached is the Record Retention Guide from the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants.

[dewilson58]

There is so many documents that build up in my home files and wondering
how long should I keep documents from a sale of my house up north?
How about the purchase documents of buying our house in Florida?

Cheers!

Some posts are saying 10 years..............which is a good number.
Except fraud, IRS "won't" go back that far.

Boom is right about rolling your residential cap gain into your next house.
But there are also other public & bank records available to CYOA if audited.
(this is not a usual IRS audit target)

:gc:

[CoachKandSportsguy]

If you plug that USB hard drive into the computer you will leave a digital trail in the computer.

A bank safe deposit box has better fire protection than my house and you can add a joint account holder in case you die.

yes, but not the documents if you do a CCleaner to reclaim space and wipe all unused space.
both fire risks are very, very low probability events.

you are paying extra for fear related reasons for also very , very low probability events.

I have a safe deposit box and the biggest risk to me is losing the key, and having to pay stupid fees to replace the lock

[FredJacobs]

You are going to need the closing statement on your current house for income tax purposes when you sell. As was said before - for as long as you own your present home plus 5-10 years.

[CoachKandSportsguy]

You are going to need the closing statement on your current house for income tax purposes when you sell. As was said before - for as long as you own your present home plus 5-10 years.

One additional point: you the owner may never sell the house, BUT your heirs may have to, and its wise to make sure that your heirs have a copy of the documents for any estate issues,
or know where they are and have access to them independent from you

[Dexterconfetti]

Or if your physical bank branch closes and doesn’t tell you…fortunately I had canceled the SD box the summer before.

[thelegges]

Our tax attorney keeps copies of anything we need to keep, and copies of our wills, we have originals in the bank. Once original is no longer needed it’s digitized in our file, with copies for their files, one for us, and one for our executor. I have very little paperwork at home.

[C. C. Rider]

I keep records of homes sold and bought forever as well as mortgages. I had to have a bridge loan for one of my home purchases and my lawyer was supposed to have paid it off as soon as my next home's sale was done. Once it came time to sell that place 9 years later, I found out there was a $285,000 lien on my home!!!!!!! Past lawyer never repaid the bridge loan. Thank goodness I kept all my documentations so my new lawyer could track down the lawyer who messed me up (he had moved by the way). Could have been catastrophic for me if I didn't have all those documents saved.

I doubt that the loan wasn't paid, or you would have heard about it much sooner than 9 years. More than likely, IMO, what happened was that the "release of lien" document wasn't recorded in the courthouse when the loan was paid and this wasn't discovered until the new owners decided to sell the property or take out a new loan on it.

Lenders don't generally wait 9 years to notify someone that their payments aren't being paid.