How to Downsize Your Home Effectively

Every now and then we get to reach genuinely defining moments in our lives, and it’s always in those specific instances that we tend to ask ourselves the big questions – the really important ones that could help us reassess who we truly are, what we actually have and what we really want. And finding ourselves at the notoriously tricky crossroads after a life-changing event is only a prelude to some important decisions with potentially major repercussions for the rest of our lives.

Have you been thinking about downsizing your home and all the clear benefits it will introduce to your new life? How often do you get tempted to move into a smaller home and thus take advantage of the indisputable advantages of having less living space? If you:

• have just retired from years of hard work and are looking for a good way to stretch out your life savings by moving into a smaller home and thus lowering effectively your property taxes, rents, mortgage payments and even insurance,
• have had your adult children move away from the family house and have been wondering what to do with all the unused rooms in your home,
• have been feeling overwhelmed by the countless useless stuff in your home and are looking for a fresh uncluttered start in a new smaller but completely clutter-free home,
• have been feeling exhausted by the tough work of maintaining you property and will welcome any proven method to reduce the household chores and free up more time to enjoy the things you love but didn’t have time for until now, or
• have been looking for ways to increase your disposable income as the financial situation you’re in right now is definitely not looking very promising,

then yes, you must have considered moving into a smaller home at least once.

There are numerous reasons to downsize your house, either on your own volition or by force of unfavorable circumstance, and thus give up a sizeable chunk of your living space in the downsizing process. Giving something up doesn’t mean that you won’t win something else in return, right? And when it comes to downsizing a home, that principle of “Give and you shall receive” is stronger than ever.

Is Downsizing Your Home A Good Idea?

Depending on a number of factors, downsizing your living space can prove to be not only the right move for you but also the stroke of genius that will bring the refreshing and much needed change in your life.

Downsize your home to save money

In most cases, the decision to downsize your home when moving will let you save money and even get more cash in several different ways.

First of all, you can pocket some additional money from selling all the no-longer-needed household items and personal possessions that won’t fit in your new home due to its reduced space. Every downsizing instance is preceded by a serious home decluttering process which will help you redefine your views on household practicality and living space management. Read on to find out more about the tough decisions that await you while desperately attempting to reduce the staggering number of items you have managed to accumulate throughout the years.

Secondly, if you’re selling your present big house or apartment and purchasing a smaller and less expensive home for you and your family, the price difference will go straight into your savings account. Well, not the entire sum as the real estate commissions, the upfront tax, the insurance costs and the removal costs will, sadly enough, eat up a considerable amount of money out of your profit.

And finally, the maintenance costs of your new smaller house or apartment should be much lower than what you’re paying right now. Downsizing your house is a great way to revitalise your disposable income and give it more breathing room – your monthly mortgage or rent payments will be more affordable, as will be property tax and home insurance; also, your energy bills (heating during the winter, cooling during the summer and overall home illumination costs) will be considerably lower. Also, fewer things around your new house will incur additional expenses for regular cleaning, occasional repairs, and a score of other unexpected maintenance expenses.

Downsize your home to save time

And having less living space to maintain will magically free up more time to do all the things you’ve never found enough time to do until now – dedicate more time to yourself, get to spend more time with friends or family, take up a new hobby or resume an old one, travel more often to exotic destinations, meet exciting people, fall in love. You will be the master of each and every extra minute and hour that the act of downsizing your home created for you.

It’s possible that you get the occasional pangs of nostalgia for your old big house where there was always something to do and where the term “free time” was only a sweet dream. If that happens, remember all the times you wished you had lived in a smaller, cozier and less cluttered home with much fewer daily chores to tend to.

Downsize your home to free your mind

Downsizing from a big house to an apartment or a smaller house can be a mentally freeing experience as well. The mental freedom usually comes from not having so much useless possessions and unused space around you. The idea here is that the more material things one owns, the more energy one will require to keep their mental equilibrium. The welcoming sense of liberation is usually a direct result from the sudden realization that, with fewer possessions to weigh you down and a perfectly decluttered, eco-friendly and manageable home, life can be so much easier, simpler and more “natural” than ever before.

Is Downsizing Your Home A Bad Idea?

All in all, the decision to start living smaller is an important choice that will influence how your life unfolds in the foreseeable future. And while it’s an indisputable fact that downsizing your home comes with clear advantages, as just discussed, the idea to drastically decrease your living space and its consequent implementation may prove to be a bad decision for various highly personal reasons. This is why, the downsizing dilemma should be resolved only after extensive and productive discussions among all family members – everyone should be aware of exactly what they’re losing and what they’re winning after the home downsizing process is complete.

Of course, the most obvious obstacle that could make you reconsider your decision to downsize your house or apartment is the fact that you will have to say goodbye to a lot of your current household items simply because they cannot fit them all in your new smaller home. As liberating as that purging experience can be, you may be one of the many people who have serious trouble parting with personal possessions no matter how unpractical they may have become. Not necessarily a hoarder, if you tend to have stronger emotional attachments to the things that surround you, then the process of downsizing your house will prove to be a hard pill to swallow.

Or you just may end up missing your old lifestyle with all the available space, organized clutter and an endless list of chores to do around your spacious home. Some things can temptingly look much rosier in theory and then, unfortunately, turn out to be much grayer and darker in reality. You may even resort to searching for proven ways to cope with home downsizing once you move into your new smaller home. For some downsizers, the emotional pain of scaling back can be too much to handle, so do your best to weigh carefully your downsizing options and their potential consequences before you take the decision to downsize your life.

How To Downsize Your Home Effectively: Downsizing Tips

Now it’s time for some practical downsizing home tips to help you handle this emotion-filled transitional period the best possible way. First and foremost, you’re going to need to know how to downsize and declutter your home at the same time.

Do a complete household inventory

The very first step to downsizing your home is to re-discover exactly how much stuff you own, and the only way to do it is to compile a full household inventory. Use the spreadsheet application of your preferred electronic device or take a notepad and a pen (the old school approach), and go to each room of your residence noting down each and every item in it. Try to be as specific as possible and register the current condition of the possessions as that valuable information will enable you to decide their fate later on.

It’s good to know that this inventory sheet you’re about to create can also serve you well when the time comes to pack your belongings for moving as you will know exactly what you’re taking with you and what you’re leaving behind. Furthermore, your inventory sheet can prove to be an invaluable tool when the professional removal company you have chosen to hire requests that same inventory information in order to quote you an estimated price for your relocation.

Be a precise decision-making machine

When you have the inventory sheet ready, it’s time for some important decisions to be taken. Luckily, for the majority of the items you will be given a break as you will have no trouble sorting out the so called no-brainers – things that you will definitely take to your new home (the priceless horse-shaped rocking chair your granddad gave to you when you were just a little kid) and others you will certainly leave behind (the huge and largely worn out wardrobe that you’ve been planning to get rid of for years now). And just when you start thinking that sorting out your household items for a move is kind of fun, you suddenly find out that the tough decisions that you dreaded from the very beginning are staring at you with puzzled looks.

Here’s a quick downsizing tip that may or may not help you ease your decision-making pain. Moving experts agree that if you haven’t used a specific item in over a year, then you don’t really need it and you’d be wise to just get rid of it in a proper and environmentally-friendly way. Basically, you have a few good options when it comes to downsizing the household items you’ve decided to not take to your new house or apartment:

• you can do the right thing and give away to friends, family or charity anything that is still usable. Why not let somebody else make good use of the things that just don’t work out for you anymore?
• alternatively, you may as well decide to profit from all that is forgotten, useless or unwanted by attempting to sell them either online or at a car boot sale.
• And needless to say, any items that won’t do anybody any good should be thrown away for recycling or disposed of in an eco-friendly manner.

Pack your downsized possessions

Pay attention to the following top 5 packing tips when downsizing your home for a trouble-free move.

• Get hold of suitable packing supplies (cardboard boxes, packing paper, bubble wrap, various padding materials, packing tape and so on) either from your local removal firm or from an office supply shop located nearby.
• Start the packing process as early as possible to avoid the accumulation of the perfectly avoidable moving stress the closer you get to your moving date.
• In order to keep your packing areas from being overly cluttered, start packing from the rooms you use least frequently and work your way towards the ones you occupy on a daily basis. Also, take care of the larger items first (kitchen appliances, furniture, etc.) and only then should you get down to packing the smaller stuff.
• Don’t skimp on your packing supplies as that “cost-saving” method could prove to be rather costly in the end.
• It’s imperative that you label your packed boxes properly (detailed content and destination room) for much faster error-proof identification when you reach your new home.

Find the best removals when downsizing your home

Our tips for downsizing your living space will end with a few words about the importance of finding a professional removing company to help you move into a smaller home. To downsize effectively, you need a reputable and reliable relocation partner by your side – experienced moving professionals who can give you a helping hand and invaluable moving advice throughout each relocation stage.

And finding such trustworthy removals is not that hard either. Simply spare 60 seconds of your time to fill in our fast moving quote and you will be shortly contacted by a licensed and insured professional removal company that will support your moving route, meet your individual moving preferences and satisfy your relocation needs.

Good luck!