How much stuff to keep really?

[sberry]

I really try to use my junk and don't "save it". Its not going to find a better use later. People give me stuff they cant stand to toss, some good, some great, some not.
Its really hard for some people to toss old carpet for some reason. They seem to think cause they don't need it you might. Everytime I hear,,, Its such a shame to toss,,,, I know its garbage.
I know people buy junk, got no use for it. Its just too good to let it go, so worried someone else is going to toss it they pay to "save" it. Haul pails of used spark plugs home and put them in boxes. People save grocery bags until they pile gets to be too much then they try to give them to someone might have a use for them,,,, after all,,, they are too good to throw away.

 

[sberry]

About the same for old furniture.

 

[reader2580]

I finally got around to more cleaning in my garage. I only did around four hours this weekend, but it looks a lot better. There is a good sized hole now that is empty. Another couple of hours and there might be enough room to park my car. My riding mower broke yesterday and is disabled right now so that is kinda blocking things. I am trying to sell the big white Pack Rat storage drawer right now.

I will probably be going through my stuff and getting rid of quite bit of it later this fall before the snow starts.

 

[taumac]

I finally got around to more cleaning in my garage. I only did around four hours this weekend, but it looks a lot better. There is a good sized hole now that is empty. Another couple of hours and there might be enough room to park my car. My riding mower broke yesterday and is disabled right now so that is kinda blocking things. I am trying to sell the big white Pack Rat storage drawer right now.



I will probably be going through my stuff and getting rid of quite bit of it later this fall before the snow starts.

Looking a lot better. Nice progress.

 

[transplant_wi]

... if you have been holding things untouched for 10 years, let it go and let someone that could actually put it to use or use parts that would help them out. I actually like pairing down stuff now, it's a sense of relief and it frees up space...

This!

My goal is to have a minimalist setup to cover most needs and farm-out the jobs I cannot handle. I recently sold my machinist's lathe because I had hardly used it. I had this delusion of teaching myself machining, in addition to by day job and other hobbies. I also have to restrain my urge to buy stuff too far in advance of working on an anticipated project. (anybody need an Allis WD-45 wide front project?)

Some people think that there is no cost to hanging onto stuff 'just in case', but to me the cost is high - the clutter stresses me and I am less able to concentrate.

Keep up the good work OP!

 

[TractorJeff]

Its all replaceable! Then get rid of it! No need to have **** that hasn't been used in a year or 3! I Know! Ask me how I know? Cause I'm still cleaning out 30 years with of "might need it someday"!

 

[600SL]

Set up an E-bay store. Put everything you have up on the store. You wont feel bad if it sells even if it sells cheep.

Occasionally you will find needed something you sold but you will be ahead because you will have sold $100.00 worth for every $10.00 of stuff you later found you needed.

A lot of time you will have something an buy new anyway because you didn't realize you had it.

So start the ebay store and keep pushing stuff out the door.

 

[reader2580]

I've managed to empty out four bins of stuff in my garage this week. I have a number of items on Craigslist with people coming to pick up tomorrow. I will also list some more free stuff on CL tomorrow. Most free stuff seems to be gone within a day.

My big purge will over the winter. I am going to haul all the bins in my garage into my basement and then sort everything and get rid of a lot of it. I can see a lot of stuff get donated to Goodwill.

 

[Platonic Solid]

A few shop lights would really open this space up.

 

[LS6 Tommy]

You've got a shitload of room. You're just a slob...

Straighten that all up and I bet you'll find you have room to keep a lot of the stuff you thought you would need to dump...

Tommy

 

[welder4956]

I finally got around to more cleaning in my garage. I only did around four hours this weekend, but it looks a lot better. There is a good sized hole now that is empty. Another couple of hours and there might be enough room to park my car. My riding mower broke yesterday and is disabled right now so that is kinda blocking things. I am trying to sell the big white Pack Rat storage drawer right now.

I will probably be going through my stuff and getting rid of quite bit of it later this fall before the snow starts.

Looking better. Mine could use a good cleaning also.

The ladder can be hung on the right side wall using a couple of ladder hooks like these:
http://www.lowes.com/pd_251422-2191-26204___?productId=1071865&pl=1&Ntt=ladder+hooks

The wheelbarrow could also be hung on the back wall or somewhere that won't interfere with parking using some wheelbarrow hooks:
http://www.amazon.com/TidyGarage-WB1-Wheelbarrow-Storage-Bracket/dp/B0002SCWY2

 

[reader2580]

You've got a shitload of room. You're just a slob...

Straighten that all up and I bet you'll find you have room to keep a lot of the stuff you thought you would need to dump...

No need to keep stuff I will never use in a million years.

I did find an air hammer I knew I had, but I could not find. I had to buy another to demolish the chimney in my house. A second one was only like $15. The air hammer may have been in my storage container when I needed it, but just as likely it was in the garage.

 

[78C-10]

I too have recently have taken the minimalist approach. As transplant wi said it is less stress when the stuff is gone. Over the last few years I have sold, donated, and thrown all kinds of stuff away I was keeping and have bought over the years. Most of my stuff has been in plastic storage tubs for the past 15 years. If I haven't looked at it for over a year or more it is gone. Anymore I don't want a lot of stuff, just enough to tinker with, I used to keep auto parts for vehicles I didn't even own anymore. If I don't own the vehicle the parts go away. Over the past couple of years I have dealt with anxiety issues and getting rid of stuff has helped get rid of it and I have not regretted getting rid of one thing including selling my 69 Impala and 78 Chevy pick up. I think of it this way, just because there is an empty space does not mean it needs to have stuff in it. When I walk into my garage and there is open space I feel so much more comfortable in it instead of looking at things and saying someday I'll get to it. Less is definitely more

 

[nine4gmc]

Man, I had a few 69-70 Impalas and would love a 78 Chevy... Congrats on the stress free life though!

 

[rodsnratfinks]

I too have recently have taken the minimalist approach. As transplant wi said it is less stress when the stuff is gone. Over the last few years I have sold, donated, and thrown all kinds of stuff away I was keeping and have bought over the years. Most of my stuff has been in plastic storage tubs for the past 15 years. If I haven't looked at it for over a year or more it is gone. Anymore I don't want a lot of stuff, just enough to tinker with, I used to keep auto parts for vehicles I didn't even own anymore. If I don't own the vehicle the parts go away. Over the past couple of years I have dealt with anxiety issues and getting rid of stuff has helped get rid of it and I have not regretted getting rid of one thing including selling my 69 Impala and 78 Chevy pick up. I think of it this way, just because there is an empty space does not mean it needs to have stuff in it. When I walk into my garage and there is open space I feel so much more comfortable in it instead of looking at things and saying someday I'll get to it. Less is definitely more

A while back I spent about sixth months processing my belongings. Three years earlier, I began selling off things that I always thought I would need someday/restore/get a lot of use out of. It didn't take long for it to become a trend. Anyway, in the last sixth months of the process, I fire sold everything I owned that wouldn't fit into a 10x10 storage, and when I moved everything I owned in one uhaul. I have halved my possessions twice since then. Now that I'm a homeowner, I plan on keeping things relatively simple. I do plan on rebuilding my toolset, but only with things I really use. This has allowed me focus on the things that really matter to me. I like working on projects still but I don't generally allow new projects until the current one is finished. This has allowed me to do complex projects without getting overwhelmed, and when a project is taking a while, I reset my workspace periodically so that I can work around what I have. One of the biggest helps in this process has been the fact that I've pared back my tools to the point where about 98% of them fit in my rollaway.

It's still a work in progress. One ever shrinking corner of my garage is items my wife and I are planning to sell, and another corner is potential furniture restoration projects for the house, but but I won't be able to get to those until my wife goes through her mountain of boxes in the living room, as we still have yet to decide which furnishings to restore and keep, and which furnishings to sell on. Were it not for those things, you could fit two cars in the garage. It feels good!

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[Ponchoguy]

The only demo debris in the garage is the Bildrite. The rest of the demo debris is outside. I didn't want the Bildrite getting wet. The Bildrite will hopefully be out of the garage tomorrow as I am going to load it in my trailer for the dump. I still have a few things in the garage that need to go the Restore.

Moving the shelves against the walls is a good suggestion. The two back shelves are pretty much 100% full. The front set of shelves is not full as I was planning to put oil and chemicals on that shelf. I have a metal cabinet and that might be better for the oil and chemicals.

Just about any long stuff has already been put up near the ceiling. The long white stuff on the floor is new soffit and fascia for the garage.

The "stuff" I need to go through and throw half of it out.

Start small and make progress. It looks daunting when you start...my garage needs a major cleanout as well. I have a car and all my tools in it now, but it's just crowded.

From what I see, if you got some stuff off the floor and just organized better, it wouldn't look as messy. Half the battle is your perception.

 

[jimgood]

Looks to me like you're making good progress. Just keep picking at it. You'll get there. I am finding that I have to make multiple passes through things in order to determine their value going forward. I still have totes that I have to itemize and label. It's frustrating when there are things that get buried and forgotten about.

I inherited a lot of stuff when my father died in 98. He had a saddlery business and I have hung onto boxes and boxes of saddle hardware and a sewing machine thinking I might use it some day. Yeah. Right.

 

[kaymccampbell]

Get rid of as much **** as you can. Use the most critical eye. I just sent 200 gallons of trash to the street and about another 100 gallons of scrap metal to the recycle bin. And I have some tools and equipment heading for adoption. It was just stuff that I was saving for someday. Well someday came.

 

[reader2580]

Even though I sold off some stuff that was taking up space I seem to have gone backwards in the past couple of weeks.

I finally got my riding mower fixed late last night so that will help. There is siding all over in my garage right now due to re-siding the garage. That will be done tomorrow so that will be gone by this weekend.

 

[reader2580]

I finally got the garage cleaned up enough to get the car in the garage. I definitely have a ways to go to get it really clean. I have been working slowly on it for a while, but I got really motivated today by 10 inches of snow starting tomorrow.

 

[egnorant]

Looks good! The hard part is that now that you have room to do stuff, it gets messy again!

I'm in the slow slogging part where I have cleaned out the useless, finished a big project (transmission), stalled on a small project (winch), organized wrenches and organize number 2 of 6 tubs of vintage Mustang parts all without trashing the garage again!

I try to do something every day so it becomes habit. Even if it just a moment to jot down a note to buy a 25 cent part.

Bruce

 

[reader2580]

I just got through cleaning my garage again so I can park in the garage. The incredibly warm weather has really helped. I got rid of a few things, but I need to get rid of more.

I would say I am about 80% done with cleaning up the garage. The problem is the last 20% will take quite a while. I could use another full weekend out in the garage.

 

[sberry]

I could fix half that in a couple hours. It would have been done the first time I set something down and couldn't find it.

 

[ssdave]

Sure there's a lot of stuff that hasn't been used for a few years but every now and again when you need something and you find out that you kept one, it makes it all worthwhile.

.

I had to get out of the above mindset to start getting a handle on my clutter.

Stuff that you are saving for "someday" is clutter that just gets in the way and encumbers your life. The space is infinitely more valuable to you than the stuff, unless you are absolutely destitute and the cost of the stuff when you need it will bankrupt you.

Look at it this way: For every item that is going to be used in the future, you will be storing probably 20 that won't, or that you'll find a better one, or that will rot before you can use it. If you sell those 20 items for 5% of what they are new, you'll have the 100% you need to buy the 1 in 20 items that you will actually need.

If the items aren't valuable enough to sell for 5% of what they are worth new, why are you storing them?

 

[ez-duzit]

I had to get out of the above mindset to start getting a handle on my clutter.

Stuff that you are saving for "someday" is clutter that just gets in the way and encumbers your life. The space is infinitely more valuable to you than the stuff, unless you are absolutely destitute and the cost of the stuff when you need it will bankrupt you.

Look at it this way: For every item that is going to be used in the future, you will be storing probably 20 that won't, or that you'll find a better one, or that will rot before you can use it. If you sell those 20 items for 5% of what they are new, you'll have the 100% you need to buy the 1 in 20 items that you will actually need.

If the items aren't valuable enough to sell for 5% of what they are worth new, why are you storing them?

Good post.

You could add that, by the time you actually do find a use for that 1-in-20 stored item, chances are very high you won't remember where it is is.

 

[reader2580]

I have been saved from a 16 mile trip to the store by having stuff that seemed like junk. Having said that, I have way too much stuff I will never use.

I have 20+ tubs of stuff in my garage. I plan to bring them in the house over the winter and purge a lot of the stuff.

 

[TractorJeff]

I find it easier to let the Wife stand in the Garage and throw Stuff in the Dumpster while you stand in the Dumpster tossing the "Good Stuff" out the other side!
Just kidding!
I have been "Sorting/Reducing" a little every week. Small Gains/Small Footprints of Shelf and Floor Space appear over time.
Biggest thing is coming to the realization that Woodworking is not my Specialty and Craigslisting the Powered Table Tools!

 

[crewchief888]

You can't put 10 pounds of **** in a five pound sack.

You must strive to reach equilibrium, where the stuff fits the space in a way that you can use it.

Most people on this forum increase the space to meet the needs of the stuff, sometimes over and over.

Bigger sack or less ****, or both.

Bill

^^^ this

i'll tell you a little story, a friend of mine never got rid of anything, was big into mopars, and messing around with tube type radios and TV's. he lived by himself in an old farmhouse on about 10 acres.

he was killed in a car crash one night on his way home from work. his elderly parents werent up to the task of getting rid of all his stuff. they asked if his friends would help with getting rid of all the stuff...

2 barns full, equipment shed full, 2 story farmhouse packed from the cellar to the attic, and a 66 passenger school bus packed from floor to roof, and front to back....

it took several months to finally get everything cleaned up.
i told myself i'd NEVER put anyone through that ordeal.
i gave away and eventually scrapped a LOT of parts. i dont keep much of anything (parts wise) laying around anymore, i dont stock up on hardware, supplies or anything else.

 

[PelicanPines]

Keep everything...

1. You may end up on a tv show...
2. Eventually it will be your surviving families issue...

One thing tho... label everything...

 

[bczygan]

I just got through cleaning my garage again so I can park in the garage. The incredibly warm weather has really helped. I got rid of a few things, but I need to get rid of more.

I would say I am about 80% done with cleaning up the garage. The problem is the last 20% will take quite a while. I could use another full weekend out in the garage.

You've done great, and in pretty quick time too.

The last 20% or 10% isn't an emergency, but something you can work on over time. You have gotten back the main functions of the space. That's great.

And the last part is the hardest, because these are the things that you REALLY want to keep. At this point, you have already run into needing something you threw away. So there is a tendency to want to keep all that's left. This is a time when you can better judge how much space you have left for things. Every item needs to have a space to be. Once everything is in it's place, you will find life is easier. Keep prioritizing and finding places for things. Keep some empty spaces. Everything left after this either must go away or more space needs building.

Now it's necessary to do maintenance. By that, I mean you need to keep things from getting that way again. This is really the secret. You have to learn new habits. Put each and every thing away after use. Right after use. Don't buy anything without visualizing exactly where it will live in your house, shop or yard. You will have to become a little OCD and ****, which is a change.

I've got to go now.......and put some things away!

Bill

 

[Dinky26]

Looks wonderful!

Gives me great motivation to get mine where I can work in there now that I'm in a wheelchair most of the time stability is not good to be able to stand. (I had a stroke 7/26/15). Does put things into a different perspective. Still not easy to get rid of stuff.


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[Charlie51]

Thanks for this post, Reader2580. You inspired me to load up the old garage door tracks and springs, old bed frame iron and other miscellaneous junk from the garage attic and haul it to the recycler yesterday.

 

[jgregt]

I sure we all sometimes go through the "But I'll probably need that sometime," rationale. And sure, sometimes when you toss something, years later you do need it, but it goes with the process. And for me it doesn't happen that often.

2016 has been the year of getting rid of unused stuff in the house. Sold a bunch on ebay, sold stuff at the neighborhood garage sale and tossed out a bunch of stuff.

I've found that my sentimentality for things and thoughts of future use go WAY down after I have had a few beers while de-cluttering. If I haven't used it in 10 years, I probably won't use it in the next 10.

Try to take it a little at a time, so you don't feel overwhelmed.

 

[reader2580]

I am starting a basement finishing project I hope to have done by Christmas.

After that my plan is to bring in a tub or two of stuff from the garage at a time. My goal is to get rid of at least 50% of the stuff and more if I can.

I tend to have great ideas for projects and I end up buying all the stuff I need for project, but never do the project. I bought a piece of wood I need to install some closet shelves at least six months ago. It is still sitting because it needs painting and I despise painting so it sits.

 

[sberry]

I built space for junk too good to toss. We use a lot of it and what we don't isn't in the way. I continuously and compulsively strip my shop of stuff not going to be used, finished or not being worked on. I have 8K sq ft to house anything I dont want in the shop and another 1k ft in a house basement shelved out for stuff too good to toss out but don't want in the way.

 

[Hilltopmasonry]

Good post.



You could add that, by the time you actually do find a use for that 1-in-20 stored item, chances are very high you won't remember where it is is.

This

Actually I usually find it after i go out and buy another cause I forgot that i had one tucked away somewhere


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