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Some Things You Could Throw Away

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Some things you could throw away

AUGUST 4, 2014 VOLUME 21 NUMBER 28

Our clients often look over the piles of paper (old financial records, mostly) accumulating in their homes, and ask us whether they really need to keep all that stuff. Is it important to hold on to all those documents for legal, tax or other reasons?

Sometimes, by the way, the question comes from clients who are cleaning out their parents’ homes. True story: when my own mother moved from her home of almost fifty years a few years ago, I helped clean out closets of old files and records. I found my parents’ check register from the month I was born (and, of course, months and months before and after). Excited, I figured I could find out how much they paid the doctor. Not having found an entry, I am now mostly worried about being repossessed.

But back to our question. What do you need to keep? Here are a couple things to keep:

  • Tax records for the past seven years. Why seven years? Because the federal statute of limitations for taxes is generally six years (that’s not quite right, incidentally, but assuming you are not committing tax fraud you can rely on that figure), and keeping one extra year makes sure you have documentation if something does come up. But before we move on, let’s make a couple points here: your old bank statements, cancelled checks for non-deductible items like utilities for your home, and an awful lot of the paper people tend to throw into the “tax” file are simply not important for tax purposes. And keeping what you do keep in an electronic format is perfectly fine. So you can probably clean out quite a bit of that “tax” file, too.
  • Original documents with independent significance. What do we mean by that? Wills, trusts, powers of attorney, deeds, auto titles, birth certificates, marriage licenses, death certificates — all of these can be needed to prove the date and circumstances of the underlying events, or to effect your wishes. Keep them. Copies can mostly be discarded (with a couple exceptions — see the next point).
  • Copies of important documents if you don’t have the original. Don’t have an original death certificate for a parent or spouse who died years ago? OK — then keep that photocopy. It won’t be useable as a copy, but it will be helpful in the effort to get a new certified copy. Also keep copies of wills, trusts and powers of attorney if you don’t have the originals — copies of your trust and powers of attorney might be just fine, and even a copy of your will can be used if your heirs can convince the court you lost the original, rather than tearing it up. By the way, if you can’t find the original of your will, that might mean it’s time to make an appointment to update your estate plan. But that’s a different issue.
  • Receipts showing payments for improvements to your home. Not a big deal for most people, but this one can make a difference. If the gain on your home is going to be substantial, or you will sell it more than five years after you move out, then you will want to be able to show how much you spent on improving the house. This won’t make a difference for most people, but it will for a few.
  • Electronic copies of at least some of the things you plan on throwing away. Don’t bother to scan everything, but you might make a pile of documents you think you might regret destroying later, and scan that pile.

That’s not a complete list, but it does include most of the things you actually have to keep. For more detail and some other suggestions, consider the federal government’s suggested list of things to hold on to. We like their description of a process (collect all your papers from around the house and make three piles — “Active File,” “Dead Storage” and “Items to Discard”) but we think following their advice will still leave you awash in unnecessary paper.

So what can you actually throw away? Maybe it will help if you start with the stuff you just don’t need to keep any more. We have some suggestions for the discard pile, but first we want you to think about creating two separate piles of documents you’re not going to keep: one for the trash (or recycling), and the other to be shredded. Anything with an account number (even a closed account) or any personal information should go into the “shred” pile.

Things you could throw away or shred, as appropriate:

  • Old bank records. By “old” we mean not likely to be needed for tax returns, so anything seven years old is safe to shred. Even more recent records can be shredded if you’re a little selective. Bank statements more than three years old are safe to shred, as are most cancelled checks. Does your bank make statements available online? Then shred them all.
  • Unnecessary copies of important documents. Do you have your original will, trust, house deeds at hand? Put them in a safe place and shred all the copies you have lying around. They are more likely to confuse your family and heirs than to be helpful. But keep track of those originals, please — and keep the copies (of current documents ONLY) if you have already misplaced the originals.
  • Appliance manuals. We know — the federal government is very clear about keeping these documents so long as you have the appliance. That is probably because the federal government has not heard about the internet. And when you finally replace your refrigerator, will you remember to pull out the ten-year-old manual and send it with the appliance? Of course not. OK — keep the current ones if you want, but throw out the ones for appliances you have discarded over the years. At the same time you might hunt for that pile of now-useless remote controls and plug adapters, and throw them out, too.

This is a good topic, and we will probably revisit it on another occasion. In the meantime, maybe you have your own suggestions for things you think people hold on to too long. But let us just make one more point about that federal government list of things to hold on to: we think the idea of writing down all your passwords and keeping them in a safe place is a mistake. And that’s another topic for a future entry.

Oh, and remember: we periodically schedule a shredding day for our clients. We invite clients to bring in their personal documents for shredding, and we add them to our commercial shredding bin. Interested? Check with our office for the next date, and start building your “shred” pile.

5 Responses

  1. FYI – Statute of Limitations for income tax returns in Arizona is usually 10 years (ARS 42-2066), and usually 3 years for federal (unless one commits fraud, or significantly understates income, or has extended the statute of limitations voluntarily or by stay)

  2. EOBs – Explanation of Benefits. I find piles and piles of them when I go through clients’ and wards’ paperwork. Once the insurance company has paid and the doctor has zeroed out your account, you just don’t need them anymore. Bring them to Robert’s office on shredding day.

    Also, I can’t think of any reason you still need the 4″ thick packet of closing and title documents from the purchase of a house you sold 40 years ago.

    1. Oh, man, Dawn — tell me about it. If EOBs were simply eliminated, think of all the forests that would still be standing. They just seem so official, it’s hard to throw them away. But I agree with you. Also on the closing documents for your real estate purchase from 1967 — the only things that are really important are the original transfer documents and the notice that you’ve paid off the mortgage (once you have), and both of those should have been recorded. You can shred them now (note: that answer may be different if your property is in a state other than Arizona; ask a local lawyer for information before throwing out old title documents in other states).

  3. When old living trust documents are restated in their entirety, should these old documents be properly disposed of? Original living trust documents were prepared in 1993, then restated in their entirety in 2003 and then again in 2010. Should all the old originals from 1993, and 2003 be retained or discarded? I keep it all in our safety deposit vault.

    1. Bob:

      It’s a good question you ask. We usually recommend that people keep a copy of the original trust document — but only to prove that it was amendable. The intervening documents can usually be discarded / shredded. It wouldn’t hurt to keep at least a scanned copy of all documents somewhere, just in case there is a dispute. One common reason for restating a trust, though, is to simplify the documents — keeping three (or four, or more) generations of documents does not aid that goal.

      Robert B. Fleming
      Fleming & Curti, PLC
      Tucson, Arizona
      http://www.FlemingAndCurti.com

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Robert B. Fleming

Attorney

Robert Fleming is a Fellow of both the American College of Trust and Estate Counsel and the National Academy of Elder Law Attorneys. He has been certified as a Specialist in Estate and Trust Law by the State Bar of Arizona‘s Board of Legal Specialization, and he is also a Certified Elder Law Attorney by the National Elder Law Foundation. Robert has a long history of involvement in local, state and national organizations. He is most proud of his instrumental involvement in the Special Needs Alliance, the premier national organization for lawyers dealing with special needs trusts and planning.

Robert has two adult children, two young grandchildren and a wife of over fifty years. He is devoted to all of them. He is also very fond of Rosalind Franklin (his office companion corgi), and his homebound cat Muninn. He just likes people, their pets and their stories.

Elizabeth N.R. Friman

Attorney

Elizabeth Noble Rollings Friman is a principal and licensed fiduciary at Fleming & Curti, PLC. Elizabeth enjoys estate planning and helping families navigate trust and probate administrations. She is passionate about the fiduciary work that she performs as a trustee, personal representative, guardian, and conservator. Elizabeth works with CPAs, financial professionals, case managers, and medical providers to tailor solutions to complex family challenges. Elizabeth is often called upon to serve as a neutral party so that families can avoid protracted legal conflict. Elizabeth relies on the expertise of her team at Fleming & Curti, and as the Firm approaches its third decade, she is proud of the culture of care and consideration that the Firm embodies. Finding workable solutions to sensitive and complex family challenges is something that Elizabeth and the Fleming & Curti team do well.

Amy F. Matheson

Attorney

Amy Farrell Matheson has worked as an attorney at Fleming & Curti since 2006. A member of the Southern Arizona Estate Planning Council, she is primarily responsible for estate planning and probate matters.

Amy graduated from Wellesley College with a double major in political science and English. She is an honors graduate of Suffolk University Law School and has been admitted to practice in Arizona, Massachusetts, New York, and the District of Columbia.

Prior to joining Fleming & Curti, Amy worked for American Public Television in Boston, and with the international trade group at White & Case, LLP, in Washington, D.C.

Amy’s husband, Tom, is an astronomer at NOIRLab and the Head of Time Domain Services, whose main project is ANTARES. Sadly, this does not involve actual time travel. Amy’s twin daughters are high school students; Finn, her Irish Red and White Setter, remains a puppy at heart.

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Matthew M. Mansour

Attorney

Matthew is a law clerk who recently earned his law degree from the University of Arizona James E. Rogers College of Law. His undergraduate degree is in psychology from the University of California, Santa Barbara. Matthew has had a passion for advocacy in the Tucson community since his time as a law student representative in the Workers’ Rights Clinic. He also has worked in both the Pima County Attorney’s Office and the Pima County Public Defender’s Office. He enjoys playing basketball, caring for his cat, and listening to audiobooks narrated by the authors.