How to Get Rid of Your Stuff That You Don’t Need
You don’t use everything you own. I’m willing to wager you don’t use even half of the belongings filling your home regularly. So here’s how to get rid of your stuff and declutter your home.
A percentage of most people’s stuff is season-specific, like heavy coats or swimsuits, but my point is that you could lose a significant portion of your possessions without even noticing they’re gone. It’s time to get rid!
According to several surveys, most UK citizens are hoarders. People hold on to things for a long time.
The average home in the UK contains at least enough unused physical items to cover 4.8 square meters of floor space (about the size of a king-sized bed or 6 percent of an average three-bedroom home). That’s a massive amount of stuff!
But a surprising 1 in 3 homes devotes more than eight square meters (about the size of a bedroom) to storing junk. That’s not even mentioning the people who have to hire additional storage units for their stuff.
In total, the UK spends about £250 billion on storage alone, and together, everyone’s unnecessary belongings could form a mountain covering 78.4 square kilometres.
Worse, according to the Daily Mail, a woman will spend more than eight years of her life shopping for more things to cram into her home.
Simply put, you aren’t alone in your cluttered lifestyle, but you do have the power to change how you live and live clutter free instead.
At first, spending time getting rid of your possessions is daunting and uncomfortable. You might feel guilt for getting rid of things.
However, don’t feel guilty! Once you develop a strategy for understanding precisely what you do and don’t need, purging your belongings will feel liberating. It’s time to get spring cleaning, no matter what time of year it is!
Here’s how to do it as painlessly as possible.
Go Room-by-Room
The first step in the decluttering process is to start small. Cleaning and organising can be unpleasant, so it makes sense to endure it in small doses. Otherwise, it feels overwhelming.
By dividing your home organisation by rooms, you will be less likely to quit and more likely to search for stuff you don’t need.
It might help to make a checklist of places to look, organised by room.
For example, your kitchen purge list might look like this:
- Drawers
- Cabinets
- Counter-tops
- Pantry shelves
- Refrigerator
- Freezer
Check your fridge and freezer for any items that have passed their expiration dates, and throw these away.
Ask Some Questions
When you start decluttering, you should touch everything you see, and when you do so, you should take a moment to ask yourself a few simple questions to help you learn why you own it.
Here are some examples to help you get started:
- Why did you acquire it?
- What does it do?
- When did you last use it?
- When will you use it again?
- Why do you still have it?
More likely than not, you’ll find an abundance of possessions that serve you no purpose.
Often, you keep stuff only out of obligation to someone else, usually a family member or friend you feel uncomfortable declining. Sometimes you will hold onto things because they were expensive or sentimental items, but you don’t use them. This can lead to lots of sentimental clutter.
If you don’t know how to use something, if you haven’t used it in more than a year, or if it has no real sentimental value, or if you don’t love it, you can get rid of it.
Hide It Away
Before you start overloading your rubbish bins in a fury of clutter elimination, you might want to give yourself a breathing period.
It is wise to bag up all your decidedly unwanted possessions in trash bags or pop them into cardboard boxes and stash them somewhere out of sight, like the garage, the coat closet, or the spare bedroom. This will help prevent any regret you may have once you get rid of these things for good, as you’ll know that you can live without them. Just make sure you hide the boxes of stuff somewhere easy to find!
After about a month of living in a less-cluttered home, you will welcome the opportunity to give away your excess stuff, and you will know for sure that you don’t need any of it to survive.
Know What to Do Next
Finding the items you no longer need is one step, and getting rid of them is another.
Now that you have a healthy pile of belongings to part with, you need to decide upon your disposal methods. In general, you have three options:
- Throw it away,
- Give it away, or
- Sell your stuff.
Usually, what you do depends on what your stuff is and how it looks.
Suppose your stuff is in poor condition ― compromised by time, grime, or misuse ― or any type of single-use, disposable item (think paper clutter like birthday cards and takeout menus!). In that case, you should feel comfortable tossing it right in the bin.
Conversely, if it seems usable and in good condition, you can give your unwanted possessions to friends or charities. Board games, old clothes, DVDs and CDs are always welcome at charity shops or thrift stores. Donating items like old blankets and sheets to animal shelters is also a good idea.
Sometimes, organisations will even take items that seem broken down if they are particularly valuable, which means you can donate large items like boats, cars, and kitchen appliances.
Then again, if your stuff is in excellent condition and you have the time and energy to devote to a campaign, you can attempt to sell it yourself. Perhaps have a garage sale or flog it on eBay.
If you have the opportunity to do some good with your unwanted, unneeded stuff, you should. But, ultimately, all that matters is that you get rid of it and avoid accumulating more.
[bctt tweet=”You don’t need that stuff! Let me, help you clear the clutter with this post: ” username=”life_breakdown”]
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great tips! I am a hoarder!
If I haven’t usec/worn anything in 6 months, I’m unlikely to again, so it goes to the charity shop or in the bin
I used to throw things. Now though, when they are still useable, i just put them in front of our house and let those who find them useful get them. Its a way to help them as well.
Great advice! I am working on clearing things out of our house and decluttering now.
what about furniture?
Awesome tips for hoarders like me! I’e just started sorting my closet to get rid of the clothes that I haven’t worn in a long time..
This post is motivating me to start purging. I really need to get rid of the unnecessary clutter.
My wife should know about this idea! she needs to declutter
I love these tips! I’m in the process of cleaning out my closet and I’m SO happy with how much I’ve gotten rid of so far. SO so so much stuff haha!
These are great tips! It’s always a good time to do a deep clean! Especially in the summer when there’s things everywhere!
I need to get rid of a ton of stuff in my house…ugh!! I feel a major cleanup coming this week!!!
Such a great post! I really need this in my house
Being a sentimental person, I had difficult time letting go of things before. It’s something I had to learn specially now that I’m a mom.
I have lots of stuff that I don’t use anymore but I don’t throw them away. I give them to my friends.
This post comes at a perfect time. We are moving and you really realize how much STUFF you have when forced to box it up. Great time to use these tips; thank you!
I like these tips and hopefully to follow them. This post is very helpful especially fora mom like me!
we have moved 7 times in 10 years. With each move, we are forced to evaluate what we need when packing a family of 5. Now that we are in our forever home, I am hoping to use some of these tips paired with what we have learned over the years to keep clutter away.
I agree with this. If I haven’t used it in six months, or its not a seasonal thing I’m waiting to bring out later, I have to sell it. Then I use that money to buy things I really do want or need. Sometimes we do have just way too much stuff, but in the UK’s defense. Your homes are tiny often with not much storage options. Just sayin.
I really need to do this! I have so much stuff that I have no idea where it came from.
Great post, I’m sure lots of people need to read this! I hate clutter and don’t actually have much stuff that I don’t need. The only thing that we “hoard” is the kids’ artwork, etc, but even those are streamlined from time to time.
I think I need to de clutter our kitchen. I have more stuff in our kitchen and to my room
We are dropping two boxes full of stuff at Goodwill today. Sineone could use this and they don’t have t pay the full price, it also help the community.
I need to declutter my closet. I hope that I will find time to do it.
Decluttering can require a lot of effort but it’s worth it in the end especially if you’re able to free a lot of space in your home! Aside from that you can also help out by donating the old stuff that you’re getting rid of. Thanks for all the tips!
Great post! I will try this in my house really soon.
I have a strict rule which is necessary when living in a tiny apartment. If something comes in, I get rid of something. I love all of your tips, they are really helpful.
As often as I go through my “stuff” I still have so much of it. I have some hoarding tendencies so I have to be pushed into getting rid of things.
I need you to come to my house. We have so much stuff we could get rid of.
Cool tips for getting rid of unnecessary stuff that might be taking up space in your house somewhere!I’m gonna try these
I know I have too much stuff. I get overwhelm with de cluttering
I totally understand this! I get so overwhelmed with all the trinkets I have, but I can never find that heart to get rid of it.
Ugh! i really do need to clear some stuff out. I like your advice. I need to get these things out of the house while it’s nice outside.
Love these tips!! We are considering moving and have started doing this through out our house as a pre-move preparation.
Great tips! I’ve been purging for the last week or so, major nesting happening here and getting rid of so much stuff. It’s crazy we’ve lived in our house for a year at the end of August and the stuff we’ve accumulated, is nuts!
Great tips for anyone looking to reduce the amount of stuff they own. I definitely have some clutter that I could eliminate.
Great advice. I recently purged things from my kitchen. Not only did I feel good about gaining more space and feeling more organized, but I was able to donate the things I no longer wanted or needed so that someone else could use them.
Every now and then I get going on this and clear things out. I can be brutal (even though I may later regret it, so a waiting period is a really good idea), but it does feel so good when you’re done.
Superb pic of someone buried under a pile, that happens to me whenever I open my wardrobe door….timely advice for me heed I think
best
ashley
My mother is a hoarder. She has SO much stuff that she just WILL NOT part with. It’s awful.
this is my job for this afternoon. as a family we have a ridiculous amount of stuff. I’m starting with the kids stuff, which will be passed on to friends or go to charity.
Great advice Sarah, I’m a terrible horder. The thing is I do the de-cluttering and hide them away in the shed or ‘the darkest cupboard in the house where no-one goes but the spiders’ but then I still have difficulty in getting rid of them even if they’ve been there for months. Maybe it’s time for a trip to skip, I’d like to recycle but would probably end up putting half the stuff back if I sort through it. I’m terrible, i know.
All fabulous advice and while I’m not a hoarder, every other member of the family has way too much stuff!
Good tips. I am a hoarder. I hold onto everything due to some sort of sentimental value. For example I still have my revision file for my final exam. I won’t need it again but I’m holding on to it because of the amount of work that went into it!! ?