6 Things to Do When Moving to a New City Alone

6 Things to Do When Moving to a New City Alone
Photo credit: Image by congerdesign from Pixabay 

Moving to a new city alone presents a lot of unique challenges. Whether you are moving to get a fresh start, restart your career, or develop new relationships, it is essential that you fully prepare yourself to make the entire process easier and less terrifying. Here are six things you need to do if you plan on moving to a new city by yourself: 

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Ep 005 – Are You Tracking Your Home Documents?

SHOW NOTES:

In today’s episode, John and Beth talk about how to manage the ever growing accumulation of homeowning documents. From mortgage contracts, appraisals, and home warranties to important receipts and owners manuals – the stack usually grows faster than we can manage. While the bulk of home documents may still be in paper format, there is an appealing draw to convert to a more digital strategy. In this episode John and Beth share tips on how best to organize your documents, the pros and cons of digital vs paper storage and how to take the leap into using digital storage, one small step at a time.

IN THIS EPISODE:

  • [01:57] The types of documents for homeowners
  • [8:38] How to store homeowner documents
  • [11:00] Paper vs digital document storage
  • [16:15] How to scan documents
  • [20:28] Using a mobile phone to take photos of documents
  • [22:04] Digitizing multi-page documents
  • [23:18] Where to store digital documents
  • [26:00] Protecting your digital storage
  • [28:40] The value of going digital
  • [30:38] Value of sharing documents easily
  • [32:43] Action items: developing a digital strategy

KEY TAKEAWAYS:

  • There’s no right or wrong way to store home documents. Do what you most feel comfortable with and what makes the most sense to you.
  • There is value in storing items digitally, like the ability to search your documents and sharing capabilities.
  • There are multiple ways to convert items to digital – by photo, documentation apps, or by scanner.
  • There are multiple ways to convert items to digital – by photo, documentation apps, or by scanner.You don’t have to convert to digital storage all at once. It’s an incremental process. Get a strategy and take as much time as you need to convert documents and fine the best way to store them whether in cloud storage, hard-drive, etc.

LINKS MENTIONED:

www.beasmarterhomeowner.com

www.homezada.com


How to Make Your Cheap Office Chair More Comfortable

Although high-end chairs are built with high-quality materials, sturdier frames, and a much greater range of ergonomic adjustments than the average chair from Staples or Wayfair, a cheap chair could still fit perfectly if you make some smart modifications. 

A few inexpensive cushions can make any office chair more supportive and comfortable-and some tweaks to your keyboard and monitor can make everything fit ergonomically with the “new” chair.

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Ep 003 – What is a Home Inventory and Why You Need One?

SHOW NOTES:

Welcome to the Be A Smarter Homeowner Podcast, today your hosts John Bodrozic and Beth Dodson are focusing on what a home inventory is and the reasons why they are recommended. As a homeowner, you may have not even thought about doing an inventory on your home, but if you need to make a claim it can be very helpful. Not just for insurance claims, home inventories become handy in managing money and estate planning as well. Tune in to this episode to get organized on maintaining and protecting your largest asset and expense, your home.

IN THIS EPISODE:

  • [01:00] What does it mean to take a home inventory and what should you record?
  • [04:29] Beth gives advice on ways of doing inventory on the items in your home depending on what has value and is important to you, i.e., photos, video, and spreadsheets
  • [06:35] Different tools and ways to take your home inventory
  • [13:00] The importance of a home inventory to ease insurance processes and claims
  • [21:35] Using tools to create a better relationship between consumer and insurance company and evaluating your insurance policy
  • [27:00] Home inventory for estate planning, trusts & wills

KEY TAKEAWAYS:

  • There are many different ways to take your home inventory and different things to record- make sure to record what has value to you personally
  • Updating your home inventory is important, especially after remodels and updates- this includes updating the value of your homeowner’s insurance policy to value these changes
  • Technology can be a big help in the home inventory process in taking video or photos and then being able to record these items digitally- making it easy to submit to insurance companies as needed

Home inventories can also come in great use if you ever move to a new house- you can manage the move with a moving company more easily

Links Mentioned:

www.beasmarterhomeowner.com

www.homezada.com


8 Make-or-Break Home Office Essentials You Didn’t Know You Needed

8 Make-or-Break Home Office Essentials You Didn't Know You Needed

Whether you’re a work-from-home veteran or a new initiate, building an inviting office space is vital to maintaining your productivity. For all those bringing the 9-to-5 into their humble abodes, here are eight home office essentials to make your workday run smoothly. 

An online P.O. box

Working from home can be hectic, meaning that little errands like checking your P.O. box, slip through the cracks. You might tell yourself that you’ll check the mail tomorrow, and before you know it, you’ve missed out on vital documents and packages. 

With a virtual P.O. box service from providers like iPostal1, entrepreneurs or solo professionals can check their P.O. box virtually without leaving the home office. It uses an actual street address to intercept and upload your mail to the client portal. From there, you can decide whether the employees forward, scan, shred, or store your mail, all from the comfort of your home. 

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