5 Things To Do Before You Downsize Your Home
One of the most practical ways to save money on housing and maintenance is through downsizing. It means moving out of your large home for a smaller, more compact house that suits your needs.
Empty nesters and young adults moving to city apartments typically choose this affordable housing option. Nevertheless, no matter your reasons for downsizing, there are several tips you can apply to your planning to make this lifestyle adjustment seamless and organized.
Here are five things to do before you downsize your home:
Start Preparing Early
Once you’ve found the perfect smaller home that suits your taste and spatial needs, you should prepare as soon as possible. Doing this will give you enough time to sort your belongings and figure out the logistics of transporting them to the downsized home.
Ideally, you should give yourself and your family a minimum of two months before moving day for the preparations. You can make a list of the possessions in your home so you know beforehand what needs to be sorted and packed. You can also use this list to adjust your buying habits and avoid purchasing more household items than you need.
Start getting rid of unwanted items like broken appliances and old furniture. You may find disposal options at this site, such as rubbish removal and donation.
Tackle One Room At A Time
The best way to approach your pre-downsizing tasks is to break them down by room and start small so you don’t get overwhelmed. Many home organizers suggest starting with rooms with the least sentimental items, such as the laundry room or bathroom. This helps set the pace, encouraging you to keep going.
You can divide your belongings into categories if you have many items in a room and don’t know where to start. The categories can be item types like clothing, books, and miscellaneous items.
At this point, you don’t have to sort your stuff into what to keep or throw away yet because you’re still in the process of being aware of what you have.
Measure Your New Living Space
Since you’ll be adjusting to a smaller space, measuring the new home you’ll be living in is essential. This is important not only for fitting your belongings in comfortably but also for storage. Thus, if you come from a large home, you might need to rethink lifestyle choices, such as bulk-buying food for a walk-in pantry or purchasing a lot of clothing.
Measure the dimensions of each room in height, width, and length. This allows you to determine how many food items can be stored in smaller kitchen cabinets or how many outfits can fit in limited closet space.
Remember that bulky objects such as furniture, television, fridge, and cooking appliances are the most challenging items to fit into your home.
Declutter Your Inventory
Finally, you can begin the decluttering process when you have a good idea of what you’ll need and what fits into your smaller home. To make it easier on you and your family, set strict goals about what you want to do with each item, then sort them into piles of ‘keeping’ and ‘throwing away’ and go through one object at a time.
Possessions you won’t be retaining can be categorized as throwing away, donating to charity, selling, or giving away to someone. Make sure to list items to be sold as soon as possible to allow time for buyers to purchase them before your move.
Furthermore, broken, damaged, or nonfunctioning objects should be disposed of appropriately and tackled one pile at a time. These can be a box of e-waste or old power tools that need to be taken to a recycling facility.
Consider Sentimental Items
It’s no secret that downsizing can be a significant life adjustment that includes getting rid of specific belongings that you could still be attached to. Many of the items you may have to part with could be children’s toys, family heirlooms, and lifelong collections with deep personal meaning.
In this case, you can evaluate each sentimental object’s role in your new home. Will it be on display, often used, or stored in a box? Nevertheless, if you can part with your loved possessions, consider giving them to other family members, but take pictures so you can look back on them later.
Conclusion
Before downsizing your home, you can start preparing for the move by sorting out the inventory in each room. Categorize your items and arrange them accordingly.
Then you should measure the smaller living space you’re about to move into and discern which items can be kept, discarded, sold, or given away. The next step is decluttering and organizing the belongings that you want to take with you. Doing this will give you enough time to pack your items and ensure they fit comfortably in your new home.
With over 20+ years of experience in a variety of corporate and entrepreneurial environments, Diana has developed a great understanding of Marketing Strategy, Brand Development, Customer Success, Public Relations and Management. Her internal drive for developing others and external brands, has allowed her to work in some of the largest cities in the world including Milan, Paris, NY, Mexico, and the Middle East. This experience has been fundamental to Diana’s success and ability to communicate cross-culturally.
