When I decided to revamp our home office, organizing our paper clutter was a project I wanted to get done ASAP. Whenever I needed to locate an important health care document or paperwork for my car, it took a while to find. That’s because we had three places that it could be. I had a binder of miscellaneous paperwork, while Bryan had not one but two lock boxes full. Even though our office isn’t close to being finished, getting our paper organized was a top priority.
Here’s what I used:
- Brother PT-1290 label maker
- Smead Hanging File Folders – These come 25 per box. I bought two.
- Sterilite File Box – I can’t seem to find this online, but I purchased it at Target. You can find it in the aisle with the file folders as well as in the aisle with the other plastic bins.
I absolutely love this file box, because it can easily be picked up and moved if needed unlike a stationary file cabinet. Plus, it was much more affordable ($11!).
The first thing I did after buying my supplies was take our paperwork and dump it all over the floor. In all honesty, I did just that. I dumped out all the papers in our living room and took a deep breath. After realizing that I could be in over my head, I started labeled each document with a sticky note. After I went through each piece of paper and decided whether to keep or trash, I grouped them into categories. Once I had all the categories, I assigned each a color. I find that when paper is color-coded, it’s much easier to find and it’s just overall prettier to look at.
- Red: Medical
- Yellow: Credit Cards & Student Loans
- Orange: Apartment & Auto
- Green: Income & Taxes
- Blue: Misc. (We have two random folders in here: receipts for any large purchases and recipes that I haven’t organized yet)
Red:
- Medical Benefits
- Medical Visits for Bryan
- Medical Visits for Nicole
Yellow:
- Credit Card
- Jewelry Loan
- Student Loans (3)
Orange:
- Apartment Lease
- CRV Contract
- CRV Maintenance
- Pilot Contract
- Pilot Maintenance
- Civic Contract (old car)
- Civic Accident Reports (yeah…)
- Turnpike EZPass Details
- AT&T Bills (the most recent month’s bill)
- Comcast Bills (the most recent month’s bill)
Green:
- Tax Documents (2010 and up)
- Full-time Employment Contract for Bryan
- Full-time Employment Contract for Nicole
- Unemployment Files (all details from when I was unemployed last fall)
- Retirement
Blue:
- Receipts from Large Purchases
- Recipes (that haven’t been organized yet)
To see where I’m linking up today, check out my Link Party page!
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Great system, Nicole! Thanks so much for sharing at Think and Make Thursday!
So smart! I really need to do this!
Love this! I love to be organized and this post calls out to the OCD side of me. lol
Great system! I love the color coded files. We have about 6 boxes worth of files (that’s what happens when you get older and have two kids LOL), but I need to get them more organized.