To Liz, please:We are putting together our critical document to-go box, which includes the standard items that are recommended in the event that we must evacuate, such passports, insurance paperwork, mortgage bills, birth and marriage certificates, and so on.
Since a lot of the documentation are available online, I was curious about pay-off statements from previous mortgages and loans. Do copies of those need to be taken? Grant deeds from past homes that we no longer own are another issue.
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Answer: You’ll need information to prove your identification and record your possessions in the event of a tragedy. Prioritize protecting the most crucial documents and assume you can replicate the others if needed.
Start with documents like passports, birth and marriage certificates, immigration records, military records, car titles, home inventories, appraisals, home plans or blueprints, recent tax returns, wills, or other estate planning documents that would be difficult or time-consuming to replace. The originals should be kept in a safe area, such a home safe, that is both fire and water resistant.
Think about keeping copies of these documents in a secure cloud-based storage service (Everplans is one choice) or on an encrypted thumb drive in your travel bag, along with pictures of your driver’s license and vehicle registration. You may include hard copies in your evacuation bag, but you’ll need to balance convenience and security because a lot of the information could be useful to an identity thief if it were taken.
Although insurance policies are typically available online, you might want to add the policy numbers and contact details of your insurance provider.
Additionally, think about digitizing any family images that aren’t already on online storage. Disaster victims frequently regret not having copies of priceless photographs, and you might not have time to pick up albums.
Liz Weston, a Certified Financial Planner, writes a column for NerdWallet about personal finance.She can be contacted by phone at 3940 Laurel Canyon, No. 238, Studio City, CA 91604, or via the atasklizweston.com contact form.
