I am trying to streamline my file cabinets and wonder if there will ever be any need for undergrad financial aid records, tuition statements, etc. Can I just shred it all?
We shredded ours.
Keep the promissary notes and documentation of any loans!!! Keep off any statements indicating loans are paid in full. DH actually had to produce these documents for a federal job, and we had to prove student loans were paid in full when we bought our house…
We kept a few copies of college applications, as mementos of (good) times past. Haven’t looked at them since, and I’m not sure the kids are interested. Otherwise, we only kept information relevant for taxes.
My D received a letter from the IRS 2 years after she graduated from college questioning her last 529 withdrawal. It was easily cleared up with a phone call (they had overlooked that she attended college in the spring of 2012) but we had the documentation if it had been needed. I would keep anything you used for tax filing or claiming the tax credit for however many years they say to keep tax stuff (7 years?)
Another option is if in doubt scan it and save it on the computer.
Months after graduation S’s college sent him a bill. It was very odd, since of course we had paid all the billed fees and tuition payments on time. But it was a correction of an error in the school’s accounts (after all, failure on the student’s part to pay an outstanding charge would have caused them to withhold his diploma and they hadn’t.) Since S could see that he did indeed owe the charge, he paid up. However, that scenario could have gone the other way and S could have been in a position to prove he didn’t owe them anything. Definitely keep billing info. for a while.
You burn it all immediately. Just kidding.
After our son was accepted to college, we kidded that we’d have a camping bonfire with all the college junk mail… never did. Kept it around a few years in a big box in hopes, but it never happened. I still have some of the various acceptance packages. And the FAFSA etc stuff. He graduated in 2015- it’s really time to purge it.
Our first graduated in 2007. We have only one thing here from undergrad…a personal letter he received from a faculty member at one school to which he applied. It was just so nice.
The kids have all of their info now…in terms of loans, etc. we do not have any of the old fafsa or Proifile forms…or any of that stuff.