Best place to store Important papers?

Frank99

Pondering the best place to store Important papers at home like Deeds, Certificates and personal stuff.
Although those fireproof safes are always recommended i wonder if that would be to obvious for someone trying to pinpoint your things.

We had a neighbour feed our cat whilst on holiday and my other half thinks her documents were moved so we no longer ask that person just in case.

greensalad

In a locked filing cabinet with the key placed in a different room.

If people want to get hold of your physical copies of documents, they will. You can only limit the chances. They're far more likely to try and target online information anyway. 

tacpot12

Inside a waterproof document wallet stored inside a fire safe is how I keep my important documents. In the event of a fire, it is likely that the house will be flooded as the fire brigade attempt to put the fire out, so having the documents in a completely waterproof wallet it probably a good idea. This would also protect against other sources of water damage, such as leaks and flooding. 

victor2

We have a firesafe in the back of a cupboard where a casual visitor would not see it. It's heavy and screwed to the concrete floor, so an opportunist burglar probably wouldn't be able to take it.
Do like the suggestion of a waterproof wallet to put the documents in though. Might look for a few.
Of course there's also the possibility of your house burning down and being so structurally weakened that it could be a long time before you can get at the safe, so no documents that you could need in a hurry should be kept there...

ChilliBob

Interesting thread. My ring binder is seeming a bit pants now lol. Coincidentally the other have has the passports in some zipped document wallet thingy which I reckon would be pretty water proof.

We also joked sbout a niche in our downstairs bathroom, and how if it didn't work we could put a picture in front of it, then turn it into a safe.

My Dad used an old metal screws box under the bed for important stuff. Sadly burglars found it and ripped stuff up for no reason

twopenny

Originals are kept by a solicitors. They are happy to do this. copies in a filing cupboard in the house
While I was surprised to find my lovely reliable neighbours poked around when I asked if they would turn the heating on I very much doubt they would attempt identity theft. But they are welcome to bore themselves if they are that desperate.

I do keep certain things in a sunken part of an antique bookcase but most burglars want cash. I was burgled 2 days in a row and he bypassed the little oils worth £1000 for the holiday money box of £7 in 5p, a torch and half a bottle of tescos whisky.

Unless you are expecting sophisticated burgulars don't over think this. Hidden from a neighbour if you go away is more relaxing. They are unlikely to delve too deep.

If you live in a high crime area where they want documents get more through..

fenwick458

Frank99 said:

Although those fireproof safes are always recommended i wonder if that would be to obvious for someone trying to pinpoint your things.

I have a number of safes, some are obvious(decoys), some take a few minutes to access, some take 15 minutes to even get to the code/key entering stage and there's maybe 0.1% chance someone could gain entry and put everything back like it was before without me knowing, assuming I'm still alive.
creating a digital version of something and storing across multiple locations sometimes works, it'll almost certainly mean theres less chance of you losing it but depending on where you choose to put it,  it could be less secure and hackers could access it.
eg, there's no such thing as secure online storage. anything online is essentially stored on "somebody else's computer"

GrahamLM52

Here's my thoughts on safe storage of important stuff. I'm not a security expert, but I was once involved in the "disaster recovery/business continuity" business.

I've seen a fire-ravaged safe get opened and the inside was a mess. Papers were wet and plastic had melted. The computer back-ups inside were all ruined (this was in the days of floppy disks and tapes. I'm not sure how modern back-up media would fare).

Bolt the safe to a secure surface, preferably in a place that makes it difficult for a thief to get a pry bar or hammer to it (a tight corner or under stairs works well).

The electronics in an electronic safe may be badly damaged during a fire or flood. This inevitably requires an "expert" involved to open it.

If you have an electronic safe, ensure it has a battery back-up connection so you can open it when the internal batteries go flat. If it does not have a back-up connection, make a note in your diary to change the batteries annually.

Make sure someone else (a trusted relative, perhaps?) knows the combination.

If it is a key-operated safe, give a spare key to someone else (that trusted relative, perhaps?).

I gave a relative my important documents and computer back-ups to store in his safe, and he gave me his. That way, if my house is destroyed or inaccessible my important stuff is safe with him (and vice-versa). I figure that as he lives half an hour away, if BOTH our houses are destroyed on the same day, we will have bigger things to worry about than our paperwork!

Someone mentioned giving documents to a solicitor to store. This is common practice, but when I phoned the solicitor who had some of my documents, I found he'd gone out of business! It took a couple of months for another solicitor to track my documents down and it was a real pain in the neck as we had to jump through all sorts of hoops to prove we were the legal owners of the documents.

FreeBear

GrahamLM52 said: If you have an electronic safe, ensure it has a battery back-up connection so you can open it when the internal batteries go flat. If it does not have a back-up connection, make a note in your diary to change the batteries annually.

Have a watch of youtube videos of certain brands of safes being opened with a potato or just a well timed thump. That should put you off buying a cheap electronic safe from somewhere like B&Q.

For my sins, I have a heavy Chubb safe fitted with a high security key operated lock and a secondary combination lock. Nothing of any great value in it, but it should keep a criminal busy enough until someone feels his collar.

outtatune

I wonder if @Frank99 has somehow managed to find out all our adresses and is trying to make sure he can turn each of us around in the most efficient way possible?

Ebe_Scrooge

Are you wanting to keep them safe from theft, or do you want to make sure you can always access them?  If the latter, then you can always scan them and keep the PDF copies somewhere safe online.  Just email them to yourself, store them on OneDrive if you have that, or something similar.  Then in the worst case scenario where everything in your house is physically destroyed, you'll be able to access them from any computer anywhere.

Yes, I realise there are always security concerns about what happens if someone hacks Google or whatever ... but it's an idea to consider.