How Long To Keep Your Records After Selling the House?
How long should you keep records associated with a loan and your property once you sell? Three years? Ten years? Forever?
As society becomes more paperless, it’s hard to think about holding on to all the documentation that goes along with your home—especially once you sell your house. Imagine: some real estate transactions call for roughly 180 sheets of paper, generating a sizable pile, plus hand cramps from all that signing.
But how long should you keep records associated with a loan and your property once you sell? Three years? Ten years? Forever? Before you start your “keep” and “toss” piles, here’s an overview of which documents are essential and how to be smart about your home sale record storage.
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Are electronic records an option? The answer is yes, but…
“When I have buyers or sellers, I do keep electronic records, and I send all documents to my clients electronically, but I also encourage people to keep paper copies,” said Randi Beard, a top-selling real estate agent with 16 years of experience in the Asheville, North Carolina, area.
“Even though a lot of our storage is cloud-based, I just find it’s really helpful for them because a lot of times, people don’t even remember where they catalog it in their cloud storage,” she added. “Even Millennials, they still like having that paper copy as well.”
