Below are 10 of my tips to organize storage spaces like a basement or garage. Large storage spaces are intimidating due to the sheer volume of items and if they are inaccessible, it makes it even more intimidating. These are the fundamental principles I use when helping people tackle overwhelming longer-term storage spaces.
1. Prepare to make final decisions with everything you touch
When you run out of keep space, you will handle some things again as you realize that something you thought was important, is not as important as something else. Aim to only make the decision once, though. In order to do this, accept the proportion of items that you have above your defined storage space and prepare yourself to part with things the first time around and keep few items.
It can help to make a list of what you think is in the space that you find important before you even look through the items. This helps you realize you were fine without the items you didn’t even know were in the space. It also helps you know you are keeping the most important things.
2. Create hard limits within the basement for stuff
Most people have plans for their basements and if they don’t no one imagines they want to have their basement floor-to-ceiling full of stuff they can’t access anymore. It’s important then, to set limits to how much furniture or small items you can manage or want in your basement. The same goes for the garage. The garage is supposed to store the car. Clarify how much of the space you are willing to use for just storage and create boundaries using shelves.
3. Zone what types of items you are allowing yourself to keep in the basement
Now that there are limits. What types of items are you wanting to store and why? Defining your goals with storage is helpful in maintaining limits. If you know you want to make space for overflow pantry items, great! Dedicate the shelves for that and which types of things you will store there. Do you wish to store memories that you wish to go through with your kids when they are older? If so, how many shelves or containers worth of items would you really want to go through with them? Would you spend more than one afternoon looking through old photos of vacations?
Give yourself clear parameters to define what wouldn’t meet the criteria to be stored in these locations.
4. Accept the limits you’ve set (make sure your spouse is onboard completely)
Don’t allow the overall size of your containers to change. You can adjust how much you dedicate to each shelf but do not allow yourself another shelf. You picked this amount knowing that was how much you’d be able to manage and know what is there.
5. Create a memory bin
Create a memory bin that would not hold more than what you could go through with someone in a single afternoon. Break out more bins and categories if you must, but they still MUST fit in the space defined above.
6. Don’t treat all items within a group as equal in value
One of the best ways of reducing the volume of items in a space is to break up groups. Stop seeing all your childhood toys as one group and look through them for the best of your childhood toys. They were not all great. You had favorites, keep those if you must. Just never assume everything is of equal value within categories.
7. Assign décor permanent homes (hang now)
Many times the unused décor and linens get dumped into the basement “in case” we’d need them later or change our minds. If you have already hung your décor, decide now to part with any items you would not swap out seasonally. Then make sure that seasonal décor has a home in your dedicated spaces, but remember step 6 and look at each item.
If there is any décor that you still want to use, put it up now. Assign it a home and hang it. If a space is unfinished, there’s probably still a way to hang things as you want it to be. If you can’t hang it quickly, then make sure you still assign it a home and part with the rest. Do not keep it if it could be repurchased and you won’t be able to use it in the next 5 years.
8. Move keep items to designated storage: 1-in-1 out
Make sure you are not using piles on the side. As you decide to keep something, move that one item onto your keep shelves and pull off things that you want to get rid of or sort through still. You can leave everything that was on the shelves originally, and one-in/one-out with each item/box/bin.
9. Adjust category “names” by the container size
We thought through specific categories of items that you wanted to keep in Step 2. However, you may need to make your containers more general terms based on what you need to keep in an area. So use temporary labels until you’re done and adjust if you want to keep two totes of Christmas decorations, you do you! If all your holiday decorations can fit in one tote, then label that bin Holiday Decorations.
10. Adjust zones by priority if necessary
It’s possible that a particular zoned area wasn’t an accurate guess of the volume of things that you have in that category. Just like your labels, you can adjust your zones if something is very important and overflowing its space. Decide what you are willing to have less of so you can keep more in this category.
It’s nearly impossible to look at a large full space and accurately estimate how much of something you need to keep, so we start where we feel is reasonable. Then the reality of our items may force us to recognize that you aren’t “reasonable” in this category….and that’s fine, as long as we can sacrifice something else to make the space for the oversized category.