The first day of Spring is March 20th, and it can’t come soon enough. You might be thinking of all the spring cleaning in your future: prepping the yard for summer, cleaning out the garage, and scrubbing down every corner of the house…but have you thought of your finances?

Spring is the perfect time of year to take a detailed look at your financial situation, when your mind is centered on getting a fresh start, renewing energy, and making life easier.

(1) Look at your TRUE credit reports. 
The law requires that you have access to view your credit report for free once a year through annualcreditreport.com. Although look-alike third party sites are free and can be helpful, they do not reflect your true score. The Annual Credit Report site will help you get access to your report from 3 bureaus: Equifax, Experian and TransUnion.

(2) Cancel unused subscriptions.
Subscriptions with auto-renewals might not seem like they add much expense to your budget, but when combined, they could do some damage. Look at all your subscriptions to things like streaming sites, magazines, gym memberships, online clothing, food, or beauty “boxes,” and more. Which subscriptions are serving you and which could you live without to save a few bucks?

(3) Sort through your files.
Paperwork can be daunting and distressing. If you’ve been letting bills, mail, insurance, tax, payroll, and other paperwork pile up, clean it out. Dedicate 1-2 hours to sort through it, determining what can be shredded and what should be kept. Organize folders by category and re-sort paperwork into corresponding spots. Once you’ve got a system, you can stick to it throughout the year. To simply even more, see if you can switch anything over to e-notices.

(4) Start that emergency fund you’ve been thinking about.
You might have received your tax return back around this time. Use some of these funds to finally start an emergency fund. Determine how much you want to add per paycheck/week/month. Getting started is the hardest part – but once you see the fund grow, you’ll be glad its there.

(5) Consolidate accounts and set up automatic payments.
If you’ve got multiple bank accounts at multiple institutions for no reason other than you’ve always had them, take a look at consolidation. Having all your funds in fewer accounts may simplify creating your budget and taking a quick “snapshot” of your current financial situation. To make your life even easier, see which of your bills you can set up as an auto-draft each month. As long as you know the day they settle, this will save you time and ensure things get paid on time.

Right now, we’re offering you the chance to spring clean your finances by bringing your loan to us from another institution for 1% cash back. What would you do with some extra spring cleaning money?