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I'm sifting through and donating, selling, tossing, packing and organizing years worth of accumulated stuff. We'll be selling the house this year and moving into a condo we are currently renting out. We'll be living there while traveling to decide where we will relocate eventually.
I've read Ken Walsh's book, "It's All Too Much" for great ideas on remaining focused on what goes and what stays. We'll put a small amount of items in the garage for storage, but we believe that if we can't use it or are madly in love with it, we'd rather pass it on.
I searched for this topic here with no luck. I would love to hear from those who have actually moved from a house to a condo:
~ What did you keep that you actually didn't need / want / use?
~ What did you toss that you wished you had kept?
~ What items are worth their weight in gold for condo living, regarding organizing, comfort, enjoyment?
We moved from a house to a motorhome 3 years ago. Not exactly the same but we now live in about 500 sq. ft. We left all furniture with the house when we sold. We even sold the boat with it. We let the kids have pictures and cut back our pictures to 1 album. We sold almost everything else in garage sales. We have no storage because we can replace everything else if and when we need to.
We cut back on clothes. If you don't work you really don't need many clothes. Just a few pairs of pants, a few summer tops, a few winter tops, a couple of jackets, 1 nice outfit(which I don't have), a pair of sneakers, everyday shoes, and 1 pair of dress shoes.
I really cleaned out my kitchen to true essentials. I only kept a set of 4 place dishes b/c we don't entertain in the motorhome. I don't have any extra gadgets b/c I really didn't use them.
We don't have dvd's, cd's(I got an I-Pod and transfered all my music), videos or any extra clutter stuff.
Life is very claen and easy without the clutter. You can go to www.rv.net/forums and do a search about downsizing or decluttering. All of these fulltimers have had to "purge their stuff" in order to fulltime.
Good Luck. You will feel so free without all the junk. It is so nice to be able to go into a store and not want or need anything. It also saves a lot of money.
We moved from a house to a motorhome 3 years ago. Not exactly the same but we now live in about 500 sq. ft. We left all furniture with the house when we sold. We even sold the boat with it. We let the kids have pictures and cut back our pictures to 1 album. We sold almost everything else in garage sales. We have no storage because we can replace everything else if and when we need to.
We cut back on clothes. If you don't work you really don't need many clothes. Just a few pairs of pants, a few summer tops, a few winter tops, a couple of jackets, 1 nice outfit(which I don't have), a pair of sneakers, everyday shoes, and 1 pair of dress shoes.
I really cleaned out my kitchen to true essentials. I only kept a set of 4 place dishes b/c we don't entertain in the motorhome. I don't have any extra gadgets b/c I really didn't use them.
We don't have dvd's, cd's(I got an I-Pod and transfered all my music), videos or any extra clutter stuff.
Life is very claen and easy without the clutter. You can go to www.rv.net/forums and do a search about downsizing or decluttering. All of these fulltimers have had to "purge their stuff" in order to fulltime.
Good Luck. You will feel so free without all the junk. It is so nice to be able to go into a store and not want or need anything. It also saves a lot of money. Lisa
THANK YOU Lisa! Great ideas here. Especially helpful regarding the clothing. I just went through my closet, but still would like to pare down. Really, I tend to wear the same things over and over again, so I need to get realistic.
When we were moving to Ca we went from a 4 bed house to a 2 bed apt. Needless to say we had to really downsize. We followed one simple rule. If you haven't used an item in a year it goes. We got rid of a ton of small appliances, all those silly kitchen gadgets you just have to have and then never use. Books, I kept my favorites, ones that I will read over and over again. The rest I donated to the library. Same with music. Its hard but downsizing can be done.
Here's what i've learned about moving; anything you find under the bed, get rid of. In hard to reach cabinets and closet areas: don't need those. Discover something you didn't know you had while packing? Add to garage sale. Also, make sure your current furniture fits into where you are moving into!
If you're not ready to host a garage sale and would rather have a larger buying audience, try selling your things online. It's fun, easy and a great way to get rid of all that stuff in your attic. Besides, you might make enough money to pay for the moving van or the small house repairs or a nice dinner out in your new home city. you can also find some good moving tips in Discount Moving Boxes, Packing Supplies, Movers, Free Shipping DE, NJ, PA, NY, CT, VA site
Me and my fiancee recently dowsized into a house that could have fit in the garage space of my old house
We got rid of basically everything before the move. We sold things on eBay, craigslist, garage sales etc etc because we wanted to start with a clean slate in our new place. We moved with a dresser, clothing and pots/pans/dishes and our dog.
It was really nice to sit in the house for a few weeks and really get a 'feel' for the new space. We're really lucky we didn't bring our furniture and whanots because they didn't go with the feel of the new place at all. With the money we made off of selling our old stuff, we were able to purchase new (well... most of it was from craigslist/garage sales) things that fit our new house well.
I recommend getting rid of whatever you can and just taking the time to see what looks and feels right for you in your new place
I downsized last year when moving into a condo. After living there awhile with only the bare essentials, when I did get my stuff moved out of storage.... I realized I had WAY more stuff that I actually needed or wanted. I got rid of a whole lot of stuff. It was so wonderful to feel free of hauling around so many belongings for decades. Now, life is much simpler and I have less to clean/dust/vacuum.
Here's what i've learned about moving; anything you find under the bed, get rid of. In hard to reach cabinets and closet areas: don't need those. Discover something you didn't know you had while packing? Add to garage sale. Also, make sure your current furniture fits into where you are moving into!
Aargh. Good advice, but, that sentence. What if theres some good stuff you've put there but havnt used for years. Tell me its a judgement call and not a point blank statement please?
Aargh. Good advice, but, that sentence. What if theres some good stuff you've put there but havnt used for years. Tell me its a judgement call and not a point blank statement please?
If you are downsizing from a 2000 sf home to a 800 sf condo stuff has to go. While a little judgement needs to be used, for some people it needs to taken as a point blank statement.
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