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18 months ago I moved from a seven bedroom home in Odenton MD to a one bedroom apartment in Aurora, CO. 1650 miles (major downsizing, a lot went to WY with my four kids)
10 months ago I moved to a two bedroom apartment in Boulder, CO. 50 miles (not much downsizing)
In 30 days I close on a two bedroom condo in Boulder CO (seven miles). ANOTHER MOVE !
Tomorrow (Saturday) it is supposed to snow, I am hauling my old Dell Server boxes (used them for my MD move and kept them - they are 2.5 ft x 2.5 ft, 18" tall) out of my rented garage and taping them back together, and starting to pack once again.
Decluttering - not much to get rid of. I kept all my yard stuff knowing I'd be a home owner again. All the shovels, rakes, hoes, axes, mattocks, garden hoses etc will go under my new porch, behind latticework.
Giving away my bedroom set (two bureaus, mirror, flip-lip storage box, queen frame), two hutches, and my L-shaped sectional to a coworker with a near-empty rental. This stuff is just too big for my condo, which has very narrow switch-back stairs. I'll take my IKEA shelves to store towels and sweaters and extra blankets.
I already downsized when I moved halfway across the country, and have avoided buying more "stuff". My bicycle and Thule rack are my sole purchases I would call "cumbersome to move".
Out in the garage are some items I will toss - broken tools, a cracked snow shovel (I ended up with three somehow), who knows what else. Maybe five or six armfuls. A water dispenser that makes water taste oily.
I am overlapping my apartment lease until late April, so will enjoy a nice leisurely pace (load up my SUV every two days and haul it to the condo). Maybe my queen mattress and box spring are the only items I'll have to "truck" over. My parent's grandmother clock fits in my Grand Cherokee.
Probably toss all the canned goods I moved twice and didn't use (most expired by now I bet). A lot of oils, vinegar, and sauces (in tall skinny bottles like A-1 sauce or olive oil).
I have way too much Dungeons and Dragons stuff (books, dice, miniatures, magazines, old modules) but aside from some hardback books I don't want or need, I'm keeping all of it. Though these days I mostly play on line with people in other states. This is my one "clutter vice". It all fits in, say, a bifold-door'd closet.
I love my small two-wheeled dolly and the wooden, carpeted frame with four caster wheels I've had forever. Makes life so much easier.
Edited to add: all I'll need in the new place is one futon sofa, I saw a couple on NextDoor.
Whew, this is not fun at all honestly. I work from home, and my company more or less runs itself, so I've been just devoting my time to the declutter pretty much and the last few days were sorting through old comic book cards from 25 years ago so I can list them on eBay. Of all the things I collected, they are one of the few that didn't retain much value compared to the time they were popular. That being said, still worth selling, I'm hoping there's about $500 in value there but the highlight was finding a Mr. Marvel Stan Lee signed card that my parents at the time had told me, "Nah, that can't be a real signature, it's just his signature printed on the card." We didn't have the Internet in 1993 like we do now, so there was no way for me to check really except maybe if I had taken it into a comic book shop, which evidently I didn't do. I still believed it was Stan Lee signed for a while, then I trusted my parents. Sure enough, I was right, and it's about a $200 card in mint condition. I won't be selling that as Stan Lee is one of the last century's biggest visionaries so I want to hold onto this one piece.
Next up is the comic book collection, then Star Wars collectible cards (I sold the low hanging fruit there 5 years ago, unopened boxes I had bought for $10-15 were worth anywhere from $80 to $250, massive ROI and I had 20 unopened boxes! I couldn't believe how much cash I made), eventually working my way to Star Wars LEGO sets. Somewhere in here I need to list a bunch of older electronics, too, another win -- my Virtual Boy games (of which I have every game, 14, that saw a North American release) are worth anywhere from $15 or $20 (half what I paid) to upwards of $100 for a few rare games. As a whole amazingly enough I enjoyed these games when they came out and I'll sell them for break even at least 20 years later.
It always makes me laugh with my various collectibles because my parents both always rolled their eyes, "Sure hun, collectibles, don't expect this stuff to ever be worth any money, they make too many of these things, just enjoy them" but I got the last laugh. I probably spent $1,000 on Magic: The Gathering cards back in the day (6th grade) and I sold my collection for more than $3,000. Almost everything I collected appreciated from 200% to 400%.
I don't know when we're going to move. It is not up to me. DH announced recently he has a bunch of things he wants to accomplish at work, so he's not even thinking about retirement.
Would have been nice to know that before we bought the retirement house in another state. I'm always the last to know.
I am trying to downsize but it is difficult. Not because I have trouble getting rid of things. I find that quite easy. It's difficult because he notices and pitches a fit if he sees me toss or donate something, even if it's something he didn't even know we had. I can't get rid of anything large as it would be noticed. Small things I hide in bags before throwing them out. Or wrap them in brown paper.
I am probably the only woman in America who has to sneak garbage out of the house.
But I persevere and try to dispose of a few worthless items every day. I kid myself that I'm making progress.
Sounds like everyone has lots of projects underway.
Fluffy- I had to laugh because I can relate. I think DH assumes I can read his mind.
We are in a blizzard so I made a list of all the little projects that need to be done to the house. We need to do or hire out a lot of painting!
I'd rather pack than paint. Two more boxes have been packed and once our weather gets a little warmer, we will move the all the boxes to a storage unit.
Just some quick thoughts:
#1 It is expensive to pack and move stuff (in general more than $1 or 2 a pound or more)
#2 It is likely your children or grandchildren do not want your "heirlooms"
#3 It is likely your heirlooms and antiques are worth very little to others as well. Attend a couple of retirement / downsizing auctions in your area and you may be shocked, some stuff will not even get bid on.
#4 Most of what we have is "just stuff"
#5 You will be relieved and amazed at how good it feels to get rid of STUFF.
#6 Don't leave decluttering and getting rid of stuff to your kids. Do it while you can.
We downsized from a 5 bedroom house to a bedroom condo. Moved everything we owned in a mid size U Haul truck, had space to spare. We did use the money from selling stuff to buy some new furniture.
Just some quick thoughts:
#1 It is expensive to pack and move stuff (in general more than $1 or 2 a pound or more)
#2 It is likely your children or grandchildren do not want your "heirlooms"
#3 It is likely your heirlooms and antiques are worth very little to others as well. Attend a couple of retirement / downsizing auctions in your area and you may be shocked, some stuff will not even get bid on.
#4 Most of what we have is "just stuff"
#5 You will be relieved and amazed at how good it feels to get rid of STUFF.
#6 Don't leave decluttering and getting rid of stuff to your kids. Do it while you can.
We downsized from a 5 bedroom house to a bedroom condo. Moved everything we owned in a mid size U Haul truck, had space to spare. We did use the money from selling stuff to buy some new furniture.
This is so true. My grandmother was an antiques dealer, so she knew what she was doing. My parents ended up with a lot of antiques from her, but when my father was downsizing to move a couple of years ago, he was not able to get nearly as much for most of the furniture as he expected.
I possibly could have been interested in some pieces, but I live in a small place and frankly don't have the room, and no way am I just going to store stuff and especially as I am not likely to ever upsize. My sister lives across the country and didn't have interest in shipping anything and my brother lives in a tiny studio basement apartment. So none of us were in a place to take any of the even more valuable and attractive stuff. We've all furnished and established our own households over the years and don't need more stuff.
Bizcuit, your words are so true also. I think mine is the first generation to find that their kids don't need or want our stuff, and most of us are astonished to find no one else does, either.
I am in the same boat as others, not knowing how to get rid of all the "heirlooms" that have come my way from ancestors during my lifetime, and which I am not steely-minded enough to get rid of. Not sure what my solution is going to be, but my husband and I spend a fair amount of time each day trying to figure it out.
Just some quick thoughts:
#1 It is expensive to pack and move stuff (in general more than $1 or 2 a pound or more)
#2 It is likely your children or grandchildren do not want your "heirlooms"
#3 It is likely your heirlooms and antiques are worth very little to others as well. Attend a couple of retirement / downsizing auctions in your area and you may be shocked, some stuff will not even get bid on.
#4 Most of what we have is "just stuff"
#5 You will be relieved and amazed at how good it feels to get rid of STUFF.
#6 Don't leave decluttering and getting rid of stuff to your kids. Do it while you can.
We downsized from a 5 bedroom house to a bedroom condo. Moved everything we owned in a mid size U Haul truck, had space to spare. We did use the money from selling stuff to buy some new furniture.
Yep, children or grandchildren don't want it. My mother died suddenly on Christmas Eve. I drove 1000 miles to her funeral and to get a few family heirlooms. I came back with pictures, an antique clock (that needs to be fixed) from the 1800's and a family bible from 1890, which I'm currently getting repaired. FYI, family bibles can cost a fortune to get repaired, so it better be worth it to you. No real value otherwise. But I will leave the bible to my niece since I have no kids. Hopefully, she'll have a deep appreciation for it, but who knows. My mother had nothing of value other than those things and had written her sons out of her will.
I still got what I wanted, which was sentimental to me.
Anyway, now I have way more stuff than I want, and I haven't decluttered thoroughly in 6 years. Its overwhelming to think about, but I have to do it soon.
Bizcuit, your words are so true also. I think mine is the first generation to find that their kids don't need or want our stuff, and most of us are astonished to find no one else does, either.
I am in the same boat as others, not knowing how to get rid of all the "heirlooms" that have come my way from ancestors during my lifetime, and which I am not steely-minded enough to get rid of. Not sure what my solution is going to be, but my husband and I spend a fair amount of time each day trying to figure it out.
LOL you guys weren't saving the right stuff, then! Everything I had stashed away from when I was a kid has been worth a fortune compared to what I expected, except one or two collections, which are worth enough to mess around with (barely) but not enough to get excited about. I spent the last 4-5 days sorting cards while watching movies, these cards are probably only worth about $1,000, but considering I could watch movies while doing it, still somewhat worth my time to deal with rather than just give them away.
This video game I have -- I bought every game ever made for Virtual Boy, Nintendo's short-lived console from the mid-90s -- just went for $600 on Saturday. A few others are worth a chunk too, probably $1,000 for 14 games then, which is pretty incredible because I bought them just to enjoy and I already got my use out of them as a kid, but here they are now, worth way more than what I paid.
I'm not sentimental about my stuff though, if I'm not actively enjoying it, it's getting sold or given away. I love how worthless books are, though, took like 100 of them to Powell's to sell and I got $75 store credit. Eh, whatever, I just wanted them gone, but it's still kind of laughable. You could sell them on Amazon marketplace but it would take you months to move even half of them I'm sure, and I'm not going to the post office to ship $5-10 items. If I can't get $100 for something I'm probably not selling it. I'm selling lower priced items in bulk auctions of the same kind of stuff, even if it's less money, it's also less hassle and shipping charges.
The only thing I hate about decluttering is it always creates a way larger mess at first. Everything now is stashed away in boxes in the garage, or in a closet, or otherwise out of sight, so bringing it all out and organizing it before I sell it or give it away creates a mess of the house, but at least once it's gone then it's nice.
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I'm always the last to know.
