Keeping important information in one place is an invaluable tool and having it backed up is just as important. While reading the business section a couple of Sundays ago, I came across an article by syndicated columnist Humberto Cruz called "An organized list of Finances is best legacy".
Among his suggestions were a word document titled "Read this if I am dead" which lists all acounts and assets, individuals to be contacted, like the SSA, where the important documents are and how to access them etc...even how to operate the sprinkler system.

He pointed out a tool that he was impressed with- The Family Records Organizer CD Rom by T Rowe Price. I just got it (5 working day turn around- pretty impressive).
I agree with him: It is easy to use, interactive, educational and it beats the competitor price. Its free and you don't have to be a customer to request it at www.troweprice.com/getorganized.
Basically it is the same info I have been asked to compile by most financial planners over the years, but finally in a format that is computer friendly. It also has encription and password protection, even though the data is only stored on my PC.
Do I expect that I will be contacted one day by T Rowe Price? I didn't leave my phone number...if I do get contacted, I can handle it! I was very pleased that they built this without internal advertising for their products... I am pretty pleased with the tool, and no I don't have a vested interest in T Rowe!

When attempting to click on the link to get the CD & other information, you will need to remove the period at the end of capsu78's sentence. Regards, Comanche7

Sorry about that. I didn't realize I was setting up a like when I typed it. I was simply ending my sentence like Sister Dorothy Joseph would have wanted!

No problem, been there and done that myself all too often. It is an interesting site once you get to it.

You want to be careful though, even though its free it might not be in the future or it might not work when your children are running MSWindows 2025.
Keep your files in as open format as you can. Microsoft Word 2007 for example won't open a MS Word 2000 document unless you download the importer so if you used Word 2000 in the future your stuck. Stick with plain text or rich text or html, or something else that can be imported into most anything.

I ordered it. If I can't print it or export it, I might use the wizards and then convert it manually in another application. I want hard copy and I want portability, so I agree with Eugene.

If I am reviewing this correctly, I think it provides "save/print" options in multiple formats. I believe it offers a PDF format which might mean I can't update it as easily if technology changes. I know it is being stored in a DB file on my documents folder so I think the bigger "threat" to this process is losing the CD they provided.

Anyway, the gathering and compilation of the data into one master document is the real benefit of this type of macro. It installs easily, asks the right questions and pulls it together into a comprehensive report. Even a "snap shot in time" printed copy in your critical documents organizes me beyond where I thought I was prior to using this tool.

PDF's look nice,however its much easier to get data into a pdf than out of one. I avoid anything that used a back end database like that because what happenes when in a couple years you want to update your document, you can't esaily edit a pdf, if you copy the text out you loose all the formatting, etc.
With any software the cost is not what you pay for it up front, the total cost of ownership is what it costs to support during its life. Years later you may be forced to hand type data from a printed pdf if you use software like that. if you stick with something more open from the start then you can simply open the file and edit it in afew years.
I'm worked with computers and in IT a lot and have seena lot of poeple get stuck with data in some format and waste a lot of time re-entering data because of using programs like that.
There are a couple somewhat recent threads on this form where there are links to templates you can use which do not require special software or a propritary database format.

Eugene,
I can't disagree with your thoughtful comments. I can easily open useless documents from 1997, but if I need one badly, Mr Murphy often steps in.

You mention some recent earlier threads that may have covered this ground. I ran a search but came up empty.
Any keyword you could recommend?

Thanks

See here, page 3 particularly .

Blasts Emergency Binder has a lot of good information and there are links to web sites and templates in it.

Thanks,
That is what I was looking for. The reason I didn't see that thread is I am still recovering from the "Great Hardrive Crash of 2007". In early June, my barely 3 year old HP's hard drive crashed... Had I backed up my files? STRIKE ONE!
Bad enough,as I am trying to figure out what files I have lost, 3 weeks later some knucklehead breaks into my car car in my driveway (and 3 other neighbors) and makes off with my Treo phone. Did I have my car locked? Strike Two! We pride ourselves on the safety and security of our 'hood, and have the property tax bill to back it up it!
So began the serious identification of what was lost and reconstruction. To add to Eugenes point, the cost of recovery is much higher than the cost of data imput in the first place. My Itunes library gone, photos from a college bowl game-gone, the poem I wrote to read to my daughter on her wedding day... you get the point! With the Phone gone, I now realized I had lost the only remaining copy of my schedule and contacts.
So I just got my new PC (and my new external HD for simple back up and security). I am now recreating my "keystone" financial spreadsheet from my last saved version almost a year earlier.
I intend to get all of my "Keystone documents" onto flash drives and paper backed in a couple of locations.
I figure I had at least 40 hours work into the main file I lost, and have spent 10 more recompiling data SO FAR.
I like the Binder concept and the templates contained in that thread. Now that I have most of my stuff recompiled, I may even re key into those formats as well. The rekeying is quick, it is recompilation that takes the time. In the future it is the "Retrieval" process I want to make plenty redundant and bullet proof.
Had I had a house fire or tornado and lost all of my source documents, I am convinced it would take a hundred hours to get my arms around all of my account numbers, passwords, assets,insurance policies and contacts.

PS... Included in my "lost favorites" files were the links to this forum. I "once was lost, but now got found" as I searched through old emails and came across my Login email from this site. I would have been lost for good in the "world wide web" without that lucky stroke of unintended back up!

Nothing like a good disaster to make you realize what your disaster plan should have contained.
I've recently reorganized my papers and electronic documents. I have a folder in the safe and on my laptop for each family member. Then there is an 'important information' document with the scans of things like the birth certificate, ss card, etc. in the fireproof safe is are the same documents in the same order. I bought simple report covers and sheet protectors* and slid the documents in them. Then a business card page holds things like the social security card, and then cd holder pages with a cd copy of their folder in the computer. Then I made an additional set for the things that are joint between my wife and I, it has things like the marriage license, joint bank account info, etc. It may seem odd to have things separated like that but I found that things like retirement and life insurance info is easier to maintain under individual folders and the kids will someday grow up and leave so they can then take their files with them.
Each person has their important spreadsheet, a bank account register doc, health record spreadsheet and inventory spreadsheet. I'm working on combining those down some and in the fireproof safe receipts for everything slides into the sheet protector for each inventory sheet. In the computer I have all the different downloaded back account, health insurance, etc statements.

Now a few years ago I learned to keep files in as open format as possible. I always had isseus with Microsoft office programs deciding at random my documents were corrupt requiring copying from backups, compatibility when I would upgrade to a newer version of office requiring a lot of time and effort into conversion and cleanup. Then apps like microsoft money or taxact that couldn't even properly work with their own backups. Then finding out that apps like Microsoft works on my parents computer couldn't even open files from microsoft word or excel, there was no interoperability even within the same company. And don't get me started on all the smaller companies that would disappear two years after you bought their application and then you had no way to get your data back out of it.

So I converted to the open document format www.openoffice.org
This gives me several advantages. First the document is documented, its a simple zipped xml file, at worst case you can unzip it and still make out the contents. Second it is an offical worldwide standard so its not going to change every couple years making my old backups still readable year down the road. Third I can install the apps on as many systems as I want without worrying about $. Fourth it can run from flash or cd ( www.portableapps.com ). So when I burn a backup cd I can burn the windows install, the linux install and the portable version on that cd o I can read the files anywhere. Fifth it supports native pdf writing so I recorded a quick macro that makes a pdf copy every time I save so I have another copy of the doc in another readable format. I'm working on my macro to make it save text and csv formats each time as well so each time I edit one document I'm actually editing three at once for extra future proofing. Its much less complicated than it sounds, just make a standard set of folders now and keep each one the same.


*concern, will the sheet protectors melt inside the safe if there is a fire outside, must test somehow.

Eugene,
Thank you for the detailed response. I currently sit alone in a home office with no access to tattoed,ponytailed, eyebrow pierced IT types who call me "Dude in the end cube" that I can hand my laptop off to and say "perform your voodoo on this and get my presentation back".

So, if I was reading your detailed reply correctly, my understanding is I can create my documents in word, excel etc (where my skill sets lie), and then save them off and convert them to the more universal format by downloading the program on the link? Then when I retrieve them, I simply convert them back to word, excel, make revisions and resave to the open format?

I am not asking for a tutorial, just a basic "flowchart" type understanding of the process.

Thank you for any help you are kind enough to give.

And on another topic, from 1998 through 2000, I was "on deck" during a series of acquistions, consolidations and office moves. Over the course of that time, I observed 10s of thousands of new and used sheet protectors tossed in various dumpsters. So I began gathering them and built up quite a stockpile which I am still burning down today. I was mocked endlessly by business associates as my signature work product was almost always in sheet protectors.
My daughters would have a laugh at dad as well when I would pull stuff out in sheet protectors. You should see the howling my "travel folder" gets when we would go on family vacations.
Now my youngest is a senior in college and she recently showed me one of her upper level class projects...completely enclosed in sheet protectors. I don't know if I was more proud of her A, or her presentation binder...

Will they melt in a fire safe? Thanks...something new to worry about.

Remember most fire safes are fire RESISTANT, not Fire PROOF.

The internal temperature will rise fairly high, but usually below the flashpoint of paper.

Sheet protectors and CD's do not make it through fires well in fire safes.

If you plan on keeping CD's/DVD's in a fire safe, make sure it's rated as a computer media fire safe.

And yes, I know these things by learning the hard way.

The OpenOffice program I listed is a replacement for Microsoft Office, it will open and save word, excel, etc files to some extent but since Microsoft keeps the format hidden and keeps changing it the reverse engineering isn't perfect.
I keep with OpenOffice because I can legally install it on someone else's computer since there are not licenses to be purchased.
The difference between a free app like openoffice and one like the planner you mentioned is the large open source projects like openoffice are not owned by one person or company. Those small person owned or company owned apps might not be available tomorrow but open source apps are worked on by many so if one programmer stops helping there are many others that still help and new people joining all the time so its a safer bet that it will be around for a long time.

SLO,
Thanks. I am familiar with the different levels of protection as I have accumulated 2 small fireboxes, a larger Sentry fire 2 drawer file cabinet and most recently a Senrty Fire safe with the UL rating as well as the ETL rating saying it provides "resistance" for media.
I will now reprioritize my most signifigant files and bump them up to the new safe. I still keep my bank box as well to hedge things if the house suffers a full blown catastrope.

During the recent SoCal fires, i had a discussion with my retired parents who live up in the hills above LA. I suggested that they keep a bug out kit near the door with essentials like water, snacks and warm clothes, their meds and their 'important documents'.

For this i suggested that they print out copies of things like their advance directives, names of their doctors, lawyer and a current list of the meds their taking, dosage and for what conditions.
In addition, i suggested that they have a digital backup on either a thumbdrive or cdrom that has the same info as well as other info in an encrypted file, such as scans of bank account statements, credit card statements, social security, drivers licenses, birth certificates, deeds, etc.
This stuff could just be scanned in and saved as a gif or pdf, something that you can read with the most basic computer (don't assume everyone has Microsoft, or even the right version) and be printed if necessary at a Kinko's for example.

The plan is that anything that is medical emergency related, is in plain view both in paper and digital, so that either they take it with them if something happens, or the paramedics can find it easily.

Stuff that is needed after a disaster is also available but encrypted to keep it out of the hands of identity thieves if the media should get lost or stolen. The unlock code should be given to trusted people like other family members just in case.

I suppose that it might be a good idea to keep a thumbdrive with this info on your person at all times, they fit on a keychain and with the plain and encrypted sections losing it isn't a huge deal.

be careful with the gif format, for important papers you probably want a loseless format such as tif.
Instead of scanning bank and credit card statemets go sign up online and download them, much nicer and easier than scanning.
I've actually switched from USB flash drives to microsd cards. Those have become popular in cell phones so storing my important data on a 2G microsd and sticking it in my cell phone keeps it with me at all times. My phone is also a smart phone so I have the abaility to view most of whats on that card.

Just an update... I do like the Family Records Organizer (FRO) that T Rowe sent me quite a bit. I have merged a couple of different lists between me and my wife onto it and am happy with the results. I agree with what Eugene and others have said about future retrival etc... In the very least this tool is giving me a good format to print out for my bank box and home safe, but will try to figure out a way of moving it to a more open format for future update.
One thing I did not plan on doing , but has the makings of a fruitful organization project, is to open every statement I have gotten in my and my wifes name and look for current contact info, correct acct # etc. I have been merging my wifes and my passwords and ID's into the FRO.
I intend to do this through the end of the year/ next billing cycle and end up with a 2007 year end document. By looking at the each billing statement carefully I discovered a monthly overbilling on one of my service agreements that I was able to correct with a simple phone call.

Another thing to keep in mine is consider consolidating accounts. We decided that it was much simpler to keep a bank credit card from one or two banks than a dozen store credit cards. It cut down on the number of statements we receive and made it easier for me to keep track of the ones we do have. We closed over a dozen accounts in the last couple years.