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I am in the process of cleaning out my home office. It is a project to say the least. I found a Performa 6400, an old 9500/120 (w/ zip drive!) an old B&W G3 and and a G4 all collecting dust in the corner.
I digress......
I also found about 10 years of old bank statements. I assume I don't need to keep them that far back, but what is your time frame?
Thanks!
JPK
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I keep em for 7 years.
You can ditch regular bills and receipts earlier than that if they have no tax implications.
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A professional organizer I know of says not to even bother keeping them at all. If you need them, you can always get to them online. If you REALLY need one and can't get to it online, you can always request one from the bank. Paying a few bucks to request one is a lot cheaper than storing them in your house for 10 yrs (taking up space unnecessarily).
If it matters to you that much, it would probably be easier to download yours monthly online and save them to your hd (and back up).
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My accountant makes me keep them for 7 years. Anything older gets shredded. I now get them electronically as PDFs so they are easy to archive. My pile of paper "stuff" is shrinking slowly but surely!
DM
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Here in the UK we are told to keep them for 6 full years plus the part of the year you are in. Banks don't keep them that long so there is no getting them again if you chuck them away. The six years is to do with how far back the Inland Revenue people can ask for if they want. I have no problem with storage, one envelope can keep all my bank statements from several accounts for a year and then once a year I take the oldest envelope and stick it on the fire. Easy.
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In my home office I have four 2 drawer file cabinets as the base units for 2 desks. One of the file cabinets has canceled checks et al way back to the 80's. I know I don't have to keep them but I'm not going to use the space for anything else and I really don't want to have to deal w/ them right now. Besides, it's kind of fun to look back and see what I spent money on back then -- like I gave a whopping $35 to be a member of WNYC in 1985! Such a cheapskate...
