When it comes time to move, whether you are downsizing your home or just need to scale things back a little, the hardest thing to do is trying to determine what you need to keep and what should be thrown away. Some people don’t have any problem downsizing, but for most, moving is already a stressful time full of many changes. But then you add in the fact that you have to “get rid of” so many of the things you hold dear, this could easily lead to an emotional disaster. So let’s take a few minutes to go over some tips and tricks for downsizing your home that will help you get through the entire process quickly and easily without losing your mind.
How Do You Begin The Downsizing Process?
If you are like most people, getting started is the hardest part of downsizing your home, but it doesn’t have to be. Here are some guidelines that will help get you started with just a few simple preliminary steps.
Sorting Through Everything
You don’t want to accomplish the sorting process by trying to go through your entire house all at one time. Take small baby steps by only trying to sort through one room at a time. As you begin, you need to have a few clear-cut guidelines in place such as, only allowing yourself to handle each piece once by giving it a yes (to keep) or no (to throw away) answer. The maybe’s will only encourage further emotional ties and turn your sorting into a long, hard, drawn-out process. Every item you pick up, determine how often it’s used. If it has been used within the last six months, you should probably keep it. Everything needs to go.
Dealing With Emotional Attachments
It’s extremely hard to part with memorabilia and all the other items you have so carefully collected over the years. Therefore, in order to make it easier, choose three of those things that are the most dear to you, then take pictures of the rest and put them into a scrapbook or onto a piece of digital media for future enjoyment. Anything of high value should be gifted or donated. If it’s too hard for you to go through the sorting process yourself, hire someone to do it for you, after you have carefully chosen the three keepsakes you will be taking with you.
How Do You Determine What To Throw Away When Downsizing Your Home?
Once you know the size of the space you will be moving to, you can then decide exactly what you can and can’t take with you. You would be surprised at how many things you really don’t need. For example, do you really need a hundred pairs of shoes, boxes of books and cd’s, drawers full of old concert t-shirts? What about all that sporting equipment you don’t use anymore? Now let’s talk about your kitchen. Do you use all those kitchen gadgets you’ve collected over the years and how about the many gifts you’ve acquired from friends and family that you’ve never used? Do you really need multiple sets of dishes and cabinets full of Tupperware? Really, how many bowls of Tupperware can you use at one time anyway? Get rid of it, all of it! Only keep the items you use on a daily basis or at least once every six months or so and only keep them in the quantities you actually need.
Now to take the downsizing process a bit further. Go around and look at everything you have in your home and decide whether or not you need it and how it makes you feel. This is especially helpful when it comes to deciding about your home decor.  If you don’t need it, get rid of it. If any given piece doesn’t give you a warm fuzzy feeling, get rid of it. You can replace these items later with something that does make you feel good, if you have the room.
Are There Items You Should Never Throw Out When Downsizing Your Home?
Knowing what to keep can be as equally as confusing as what to get rid of when downsizing your home. What if you accidentally throw away something you will need later? Taking a few minutes to learn some of the items you should never throw away will help keep you from getting rid of something you might need going forward. Here is a list of some of the items you should never throw away.
- Family recipe cards
- One of a kind or limited collectibles
- Family heirlooms (evaluate them and keep only a few then gift the rest to other members of your family so they can carry on the memory for you)
- Irreplaceable items (not including memorabilia)
- Pictures (convert them to digital media if space is limited)
- Your family’s home movies (convert them to digital media if space is limited and even if it’s not as digital media takes up far less space and is much easier to deal with, not to mention that you won’t have to store and handle all that old, outdated equipment)
- Old wedding rings and other personal family jewelry items (this doesn’t include everyday jewelry you don’t wear anymore)
- Family generational bible
- Important documents, such as:Â marriage certificates, passports, shot records, death records, wills, property deeds and any other legal paperwork you might need)
- Emergency supplies, such as:Â a weather radio, landline phone, batteries, flashlights, first aid kits, medications, candles, etc.
The Bottom Line
Downsizing your home doesn’t have to be hard, but you do need to be in the right frame of mind before you begin. Sit back and ponder your new living situation and realize that you are not your things and your things don’t define who you are. Once you’ve downsized, you will probably realize that you didn’t really need all that “stuff” after all. And, believe it or not, most of what you threw away will soon be forgotten to the point you don’t even remember owning it in the first place.
2 Point Highlight
1. Â When it comes time to move, whether you are downsizing your home or just need to scale things back a little, the hardest thing to do is trying to determine what you need to keep and what should be thrown away.
2.  How to determine what to throw away when downsizing your home?
