Moving to a new space presents you with an opportunity to energize and cleanse your life.
Every person accumulates stuff as time goes on. Clothes you once love become last season’s fashion, hobbies fade, and items that once seemed like something you’d have forever have no longer become valuable in your life.
As you age and develop new interests, styles, and buy new things, the old things can hold less sentimental value. This only develops into a problem when you hold onto things you’ll no longer use.
In this post, we’ll outline how to approach the sorting process in a way that will leave you with the things you love while cutting out the junk and unnecessary items from your life.
The sorting process
The best way to develop a sense of what you do and do not need is to sort your items into 4 different uses:
- Everyday items
- Items you irregularly use but are essential
- Items you don’t use but need to keep
- Items that do not hold value in your life
This process will be helpful in determining what you’ll need to bring with you when you move, but will also help you develop a sense of essential items in your life.
While there are nuances in this sorting process, at its core this is a practice to determine what you need and don’t need.
Things you absolutely need for day-to-day life
This first group of items will likely be pretty obvious. This includes things like your mattress and other furniture that will fit with your new space, as well as your television and other appliances you use every day.
This list will be different for every person, but in addition to home furnishings and home decorations, some items include:
- Kitchen essentials: Kitchenware or appliances used daily or very regularly such as your toaster, coffee machine, necessary pots and pans, and plates and utensils.
- Everyday clothing: While you may not need your whole wardrobe (more on this later), you likely have clothes that you use regularly and need to bring with you.
- Electronics: Televisions, computers, tablets, and any other electronic you use every day are obvious items you’ll be bringing along.
Everybody has items they use daily and regularly. We recommend taking stock of this if you know you’ll be moving ahead of time. Keep a journal and keep track of the items you are using regularly.
This will help guide you in the creation of this group and may even surprise you. Something you think you use everyday may only be occasionally used or vice-versa!
Essential seasonal and infrequently used items
This list will be similar to the first, but will likely include more seasonal and niche items in your home. While these items are not used every day, they fill a necessary place if your life and the operation of your home.
Some good examples of these items are…
- Yard maintenance equipment
- Sporting equipment
- Barbecues and outdoor furniture
- Entertainment such as DVDS, games, and books
- Tools and home improvement items
- Holiday decorations
While the first group can somewhat be determined by asking yourself whether you’ve used something in the last couple weeks, this group needs to be looked at longer term. A better question is whether you’ve used them in the last couple years.
Things you don’t use regularly, but you still want to keep
The next group are items that you haven’t used in years (or maybe have never used), but you feel deeply that you need them around. This could be for any reason — from saving a valuable piece of furniture that doesn’t fit into your current space, to an item that holds sentimental (if not functional) value, or something you’ve purchased but haven’t gotten around to using yet.
This group is the hardest to determine. Often, homeowners feel they need to keep an item for future use, just to hold onto it for years and years, moving it from one place to the next without actually ever using it.
This is completely understandable, and it can be hard to part with items you feel hold exceptional real or sentimental value. You do not want to throw something away just to wish you had it down the line.
We recommend taking a real stock and thinking clearly about the item BEFORE the moving process starts. Do not put the decision off for the day of the move, as it will make you think less rationally about whether to hold onto something or not. When you are given a relaxed environment where you can think clearly, you’ll make a better decision.
Things you haven’t used in years and will likely never use again
This group is almost always bigger than you think and contains items you simply no longer need. While it can be hard to say goodbye to items and feel like you are letting go of perfectly good stuff, the end result is a freeing experience that will allow you to start fresh in your new home.
Some types of items that commonly fall into this group include:
- Clothes: The “Have I used this in the last year” question is particularly relevant here. If you haven’t, it’s probably something that can be let go.
- Furniture: Chances are the old rug in your basement that hasn’t been used in almost a decade doesn’t need to be brought to your new space.
- Electronics: Your computer from 2007 is outdated and will no longer be functional.
- Decorations: If you haven’t used a decoration in multiple seasons, chances are it won’t be used again.
- Sporting goods: Particularly if you’ve upgraded, your outdated equipment is probably best left forgotten.
- Unread books: Do you really need that biography you got as a gift in 2003?
Chances are you will feel a lot better once these items are out of your life.
What to do now that I have separated everything into three groups
The first three groups are coming with you! These are items you will use and will help enrich your life.
Contact ANC Movers and we’ll move these safely and securely for you to your new home.
Unfortunately for the fourth group, they simply did not make the cut. Once this group has been determined, there are a couple things you can do to get rid of the items:
- Hold a garage sale: This is a great way to get rid of things you no longer need. You’ll also make a little bit of spare cash to spend on things you will actually use!
- Donate: Anything that either cannot or was not sold at the garage sale can be donated to an organization such as Goodwill, who will sell them at a fair price to people in need.
- Recycle: Anything you can’t sell or donate can be recycled.
For the things you love, move with care with ANC Movers
If you’re taking the time to decide what’s valuable in your life, invest in taking care of the things in life you do care about.
At ANC Movers, we’ve packed, moved, unloaded, and unpacked thousands of boxes for those moving in Portland and Vancouver. Every one of our workers is fully licensed and carefully trained. We take care to make moving as simple as possible for all of our clients.
Contact us today and let us know how we can help. We’re happy to provide a free moving quote and answer all your questions.
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