Lots of people like to get everything moved into their new home, get settled in and then start sorting through everything to decide what they need. If you think about it, this doesn’t make any sense! You’d be paying to have a lot of stuff moved, perhaps across the country, only to get rid of it anyway. You should also have much better things to do, like enjoying your brand new home!


When you’re still in your old house and getting ready to leave, this is the ideal time for you to think about what you simply don’t need any more. You’ll probably save yourself a lot of stress if you have a more streamlined collection of possessions to move and store.

Here are some tips for getting through this process efficiently…

1) Get started in time so you’re ready for your moving date. If it helps, set yourself a deadline to be completely organised by. Make an initial plan and start taking stock of what you actually own as soon as possible, depending on how much stuff you plan on sorting through.

2) Start in one room and don’t get distracted by flitting between parts of your home. This will most likely waste a lot of time. Complete one part of the task and move on.

3) Papers should go first as these are an annoyance in most homes. It’s easy to accumulate letters, leaflets and documents just lying around in disorganised piles. Tackle these first to throw out anything useless and file the rest properly.

4) Separate other items into different categories based on whether they’re broken, redundant, or simply not that useful except in rare situations. If you’re planning ahead of time, hide them all away for a few months to check if you miss any of them.

5) Decide what needs to go and throw it out, sell it or give it away. If you need to replace one or two of those items at some point later in life, it shouldn’t be a problem, so don’t get too worried.

Once this process is done, you can decide how happy you are with what remains. If you’re still feeling like you have a lot of clutter you’d rather not have around, just keep repeating the process until you’re satisfied.

Share this post…