HOW TO ORGANIZE YOUR FILES AT HOME

We spent New Year’s Eve at our friends Jane and Scottie’s ranch two hours outside of Dallas and then headed home the next afternoon to catch up on work and tackle a few projects around the house. Between spending more time at the office packing orders for Design Darling and wrapping a million presents the night before we left for Maine, our house had definitely seen better days and I didn’t want to ring in 2016 with wrapping paper all over the living room floor.

This also prompted Will and I to make a long list of house projects we want to tackle this year, one of which had been plaguing me since the day we moved in together: organizing all our files at home. I had an extra file box at the office and decided to sit down and sort the stack of papers accumulating in Will’s office before it got even more out of hand. The file box itself is simple and pretty, I used bright pink file folders to make it a little more fun, and now all of our important documents finally have an organized home. Here’s a system that worked well for me!

how to organize your files at home

1. Make a list of categories that you want file folders for. Here are the ones I wrote down:

– Will insurance

– Mackenzie insurance

– Rory (vet forms)

– Will taxes

– Mackenzie taxes

– House

– Cars

– Design Darling (paperwork for my business and employee)

– Travel (so I can stop misplacing my passport)

– Will keepsakes (for birthday cards and the like)

– Mackenzie keepsakes

– Will investments

It’s just the two of us in our household (plus our pup of course!) but you could have individual file folders for each of your children with birth certificates, report cards, etc. I also bought more file folders and hanging folders than I knew I needed right now so I can continue to add new categories as necessary.

how to organize important documents

2. Buy a file box or file cabinet, file folders, and hanging folders. I used this acrylic file box, these bright pink file folders, and these white hanging folders. A file cabinet might make more sense for you if you have a ton of paperwork to file (we have two of these in our office). And again, buy more file folders and hanging folders than you think you’ll need — I added a few more categories that weren’t on my initial list after realizing just how many documents were waiting to be filed away.

how to organize files at home

3. Stack your documents by category (car, house, insurance, taxes, etc.) and then sort by date within each stack. This is the most time-consuming step but also the one your future self will thank you for.

how to organize important documents at home

4. Label your file folders and match each stack of paperwork to its appropriate folder.

5. Drop your file folders into your hanging folders et voilà! You’ve got all your important documents organized at home.

how to organize paperwork at home

How do you organize your files at home? What’s one organizing project you want to tackle this year?

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