OK to store working files at top level?

[Mary]

I've been storing my working photo files on my Mac at the top level of the disk; however, Apple geniuses seem to want you to keep all your files in the user/documents or picture folder "because applications are trained to look there" -- or something like that. It's easy for me to set up chronosync at the top level -- any reason not to? thought I'd ask after all these years.
--Mary