When you come to that point in your life that it’s time to downsize, you can be faced with a lot of choices. Aside from choosing a new home, and potentially a completely new location to call home, you’ll also have to decide on all the things in your current home that you should keep or toss. This article from U.S. News collects some helpful advice from people who have already been through the process.
Many people, at some point in their lives, look around and decide they need to downsize. Maybe that means buying a smaller home or getting rid of one car. Maybe it’s a desire for less clutter. Or maybe it’s a far-flung goal to leave your kids less to sort through someday.
That was Kathy McCoy’s motivation after two “nightmarish house cleanings.”
“My parents were hoarders, and it took two years to clean out their 1,000 square-foot house,” says McCoy, a psychotherapist in Florence, Arizona, and an author of books that cover topics like teenage depression. “My aunt was not a hoarder but had many treasured mementos squeezed into her closets and attic. I made a firm decision after these experiences, to downsize my life so that no one I love will have to go through a prolonged cleanup after I’m gone.”
But downsizing is harder than it looks. McCoy says she and her husband managed to part with many of their belongings when they sold their home of 29 years and moved to an active-adult community. But even so, they’re still downsizing, she says.
No wonder it’s hard. After all, you spent a lot of money to get to where you are, and you don’t want to throw out everything you own, do you? (Well, maybe you do.) But before getting a bulldozer to scoop everything out of your home, try these tactics from people who have been there.
Take photos. It’s become pretty common among professional organizers to suggest taking pictures of items you don’t need but hate to throw out because of sentimentality. Still, it’s good advice, says Pauline Rick, a public relations coordinator for Mercy Ships, a nonprofit organization that sends hospital ships to the poorest parts of Africa for medical care.
Her best downsizing tip is to occasionally take stock of your stuff and find the things you aren’t using but are keeping for sentimental value. Then photograph those items before trashing, donating or re-gifting them. Generally, Rick says, it’s the memory you want to hang onto, and not the item itself.
Do not pay to store items. Just don’t. You’re paying to put off what you’ll eventually have to do anyway.
Sissy Lappin, a real estate broker in Houston and founder of ListingDoor.com, a site about selling one’s home, says 90 percent of her clients are downsizing because they’re empty nesters. The biggest mistake these homeowners make, she says, is getting a mobile storage unit, filling it, then paying for it month after month after month.
“I joke that once that stuff goes in there, it will never come out. I have clients who have had stuff in a POD for over five years,” Lappin says, referring to the popular moving and storage company.
Do a test run. So you want to get rid of a bunch of clothes in your closet or maybe a bunch of books you never read. Go through the motions of getting rid of them, but don’t actually touch them – yet.
Todd Kuhns, who co-owns a video production company in Kirksville, Missouri, says he and his wife have been downsizing for a few years and have embraced the test-run concept.
“For example, we went through all the cups, glasses and dishes in our kitchen cabinet and, instead of immediately getting rid of things, packed a bunch of them up and put them in a box in the garage,” Kuhns says.
That way, if they realize they made a mistake, they still have the item around.
“It’s a safe way to prove to ourselves what we can live without and what we really need. Sometimes you’re really surprised,” Kuhns says.
Of course, it’s also a good way to fill up your garage with boxes, so use this strategy carefully.
