How to Organize Paper Clutter

Hello!  Our Winter Home Organization Challenge continues, and this week and I’m going to show you how to organize paper clutter once and for all! We’ll discuss how to purge the paper that’s in your home now, how to reduce the amount of paper that comes into your home, and how to organize the paper that needs to stay.   

Use the 6/P Strategy

The 6/P strategy makes purging the paper from your home very simple. 

Since we’re dealing with paper and not an actual room or space, we will tweak the strategy just a bit. 

We will use the following words that start with “P”.  Prepare, Purge, Pile (instead of Polish), Personalize, Place, and Put Back.

Let me explain each step.

Prepare

Prepare to conquer paper clutter by collecting the following items:

• a trash/recycle bag
• a shredder
• a laundry hamper for the paper you want to keep

Purge

Go through all the paper clutter in your house and throw away anything that you do not need to save. 

Keep reading for a list of important papers you should save.

Shred any items that have identifying information.

For example, your address, birthday, social security number, or account number.   

Put all the papers that are necessary to keep in the laundry basket.

Pile

This is the most important step for learning how to organize paper clutter.

Make sure that you are only keeping the necessary papers.

Alright, sort the paper that you decided to keep.

Grab the laundry basket and put every piece of paper in one of the following piles:

To keep permanent or long term

• Birth/death certificates
• Social security cards
• Marriage certificate
• Will/living will
• Vehicle titles
• House deeds/mortgage documents
• Life Insurance policy
• Tax returns (seven years)
• Home Inventory List (written & photos)
• Passports

To keep temporarily (one year)

• Medical bills
• Current prescriptions
• Pay stubs
• Insurance policy statements
• Tax-related paperwork

Currently using

• Bills that need to be paid
• Papers that need to be filed
• Papers you need to act on/sign
• Coupons

Sentimental value

• Children’s school/artwork
• Cards

Personalize

It’s time to think about how you want to personalize your filing system and storage for the paper you’re keeping!

There are tons of ways to do this but I think using zones is the best method.

Here are some of my suggestions:

• Set up a mail zone to keep incoming mail under control.  Consider using the following items: folders, stacking trays, baskets, or wall-mounted organizer
• Set up a filing zone so you know exactly where to find a paper when you need it. Here are several types of files to consider: a file cabinet, expandable file folders, plastic or decorative boxes with hanging files
• Set up a school zone to contain kids’ school papers and artwork. Consider using: plastic shelves, plastic bins, or file folders.
• For important permanent documents that must be protected consider: a weather-tight container, a fireproof box, or a safety deposit box

PLACE

• Place the trash bag you filled up in your garbage can.
• Recycle or throw away the paper you shredded.
• Place all of your paper piles into the type of storage container you decided to use.

Put Back

Paper clutter can sneak up on you if you don’t make a habit to deal with it regularly.

Make a rule to purge paper weekly and you will stay organized and free of paper clutter from now on!

You can use our handy printables to help you work through each step.

All printables are free for our weekly email subscribers.

To gain access to the free printable library click here! 

How to cut down on the amount of paper that enters your home

Remove junk mail

The easiest way to cut down on the amount of paper that enters your home is to not allow junk mail anymore. Go to the Federal Trade Commission Consumer Information website and read about how to have your name removed from unsolicited mail and phone calls.

DMAChoice.org – Service that helps filter offers mailed to your mailbox to reduce junk mail

Catalogchoice.org – Free service to cancel specific catalogs and other types of paper mail you no longer wish to receive

Tired of receiving numerous credit card and insurance offers? Go to: OptOutPrescreen.com to get off the credit card and insurance lists

Electronic billing

If you’re getting bills in the mail, switch to paperless billing. 

If you’re concerned you won’t remember to pay them, enroll in automatic billing.

STORE ELECTRONIC DOCUMENTS IN THE CLOUD

Another option we use is to store electronic documents, bills, and receipts on the internet in free “cloud” storage.

Lots of free secure space is available through Microsoft(OneDrive), DropBox, and Google (Google Drive) among others. Each offers free signup and can walk you through how to upload your documents for safekeeping.

We use Microsoft OneDrive which allows you to keep a copy on your laptop or pc and automatically uploads a copy for save keeping to the cloud. We pay about $3 a month extra for OneDrive to buy more cloud space and use it to store photos too.

Each cloud storage choice above has similar options if you need more space above the free amount provided.

To get most documents to the cloud, we usually use our all-in-one printer’s flatbed scanner to scan documents to PDF format and upload those to the cloud.

Others may use a wand-type scanner to scan normal and oversized documents.

For other documents online or in email, we choose to print them but instead of printing to paper, choose the PRINT TO PDF option, and Windows/mac on your laptop/pc will create a PDF document instead of printing to paper.

In cloud storage, you can create electronic folders to organize your document files just like a filing cabinet. So create a file folder for bills, important legal documents, manuals, etc. Name the folder for what you want to organize and upload your electronic documents to it.

Choose the email Receipt Option

When you purchase at a store have the receipt sent to your email.

No more little pieces of paper laying around or having to be removed from pockets before doing the laundry lol!!

If you chose the cloud storage option mentioned above, you can then print your email to PDF and store it in the cloud storage.

Recycle manuals

Unless you don’t have a computer or smartphone, there is no reason to keep manuals in your home taking up space.

You can find manuals and instructions for almost everything online with Google search.

Recycle kids artwork

If you have kids that love to produce pieces of artwork and you can’t stand to throw them away, recycle them instead!

Give their art as a gift to relatives or make cards out of them.

You can also use their masterpieces to wrap gifts for relatives.

Grandparents will be thrilled!

HOW I ORGANIZE PAPER IN MY HOME

I believe the easiest way to organize paper clutter is to use zones.

I use zones to keep paper from piling up. 

The main problem I had when we moved into this house was the mail. 

We don’t have a mailbox at the end of our driveway. 

We have to walk two blocks to pick it up and we have to use a key. 

This caused two problems. 

First, we needed a place to keep the key so it wouldn’t get lost. 

Second, whoever got the mail would leave it on my kitchen counter, which was driving me crazy.

So, to solve the problem, I set up a mail station!

Mail zone

To solve the first problem, I hung this cute mailbox on the wall inside my office.

We keep the mailbox key and any outgoing mail inside the box. 

When someone is heading to the mailbox, they step inside the office beside the front door, open the box, grab the key and anything that needs to be mailed, and then head to the mailbox. 

When they return, they deposit the mail in the storage container and return the key to the mailbox. 

At least once a week mail is sorted. 

Junk mail goes into the trash, bills go to Rich’s desk, and all other paper is sorted into my stackable trays. 

I have four trays for the following categories: papers to be filed, papers that require action shortly, coupons, and sentimental items like cards that I want to save.  

Filing zone

We use a file cabinet to store all of the paperwork we need to keep temporarily (one year). 

It’s helpful to use different color files for different categories.

• Monthly bills-burgundy files
• Home-teal files
• Medical-gray files
• Auto & Insurance-navy files
• Banking & Taxes-purple files

school zone

Because our kids are older now, I no longer have a school zone in my office. 

If you have school-age children feel free to look at the post below.

It covers how I organized their schoolwork daily and how I dealt with sentimental artwork and papers I wanted to keep.                                                  

How to Organize paper and documents

Important Permanent Documents

We keep important documents to be stored permanently in this fire safe. 

We know exactly where they are, and they’re protected should the house catch fire.

I hope this post has been beneficial and you gained some great tips to organize the paper clutter in your home!

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Until next time, follow us on Pinterest, Facebook, and Instagram!

Blessings, Donna and Rich

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