In 10 years everything will be digital. Lots can happen in 10 years, this wouldn't be on my radar now.

A simple strongbox won't protect you from the most likely hazards - fire and/or water damage. We carry a small fire safe for passports and the like. No fire safe is truly that for long, so we just hope that the fire department gets there quickly or its weight causes it to fall through the floor before the interior temp gets too high. Things that we don't need with us are in a larger safe in a climate controlled storage unit.

Rob

We do the same as Rob and Laura.

Bank safety deposit box. Scan everything. Take copies. Less and less “papers” are important...pink slips, deeds, Court filings, savings bonds etc.

Thanks everyone. I’ll try to start getting use to going digital. I think i need a scanner first.

One thought on deeds - most are recorded at the county so unless there is some overriding reason you need it with you simply scan it and keep it in a safe deposit box. If you ever need a copy you can get on from the county. You can also record other documents but there are some drawbacks. The first one is everyone can see what you have recorded but many things are not that sensitive, the other is that whatever you record must be in recordable form. Kind of a pain but if you need to make sure you have originals well stored county registrars make a pretty good place to keep things, and you can get a certified copy for just s few buck. Just my thoughts.

Concerning things recorded at the county registrar office - you can have all sorts of things recorded there. When I divorced, I had to record that at the county I lived in. My attorney said people record their military separation papers and all sorts of things they want to preserve. So when someone moves a lot and things get lost, they'll know where they can retrieve copies.

Arca, what deed doesn’t need recording? In California an unrecorded deed only binds the grantor, plus original recorded deeds are historical only. It’s what the county recorder has that counts.

I have no idea about California in particular, but no deed, to the best of my knowledge needs to be recorded, it is simply public notice of your interest in the property. Now having said that, it is generally fool hardy not to record a deed as someone may take an interest in the property adverse to your s and then the only folks that make money are the lawyers. However, I have seen a memorandum of mortgage recorded instead of the actual mortgage so the amount of the mortgage was not disclosed and other such things. I also didn't record a land contract (deed of trust) I once had with the VA as I was pretty sure that the VA was collectible if they did something stupid and gave someone else an interest in the property. (please let's not get into a discussion of whether or not the government does stupid things). Actually, my point was more about recording things that aren't deeds such as divorce decrees, Powers of Attorney, etc., if you want them to be available at a later date. Just for the record I am not a lawyer and this is not legal advise merely the rambling of an old man who's been around the block once or twice.

I scan with an HP Deskjet 3755, and occasionally back up to an external hard drive I keep in the truck. Critical originals are in a small fire safe in the trailer or in my storage facility.