A record-keeping system like the one you describe sounds fine. Many people like to keep their utility expense records for a year in case there are any problems with a utility company crediting their payment and to use to make comparisons between the current year's utility costs and the previous year's. If you want even more of an historical record of your utility expenses, say the last two to 10 years, you could set up a spreadsheet in a computer software program and record the monthly cost and usage of each type of utility. In this case, you could shred the actual billing statements at the end of each year because the payment and utility usage data will be summarized in the spreadsheet. Information like this can be very useful to provide to potential buyers when selling your home.

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