Dealing with clutter can be nerve-wracking. When you are wondering How to Declutter Your Home but are not sure how to go about it, you need to read these easy tips to help get your home organized and back on track in no time.
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How to Declutter Your Home and Simplify Your Life
We all look around our homes and want to declutter but sometimes it is hard to know where to start. Sometimes the clutter and mess can be overwhelming and make it hard to start. Or worse, you get started and then everything is torn apart and you don’t want to keep going. Then the house is worse than it was before you started. You aren’t alone. Most of us have been there. Use these easy tips for How to Declutter your home to get organized and clutter-free.
Tips to Declutter Your House / Steps to Declutter
When you are ready to get started, use these tips to declutter your home. By using these ideas, you will know how to declutter your home fast and without feeling like it is a difficult job. These are the best ways to declutter a house, in my opinion.
Start Small
Most people want to tackle all the clutter at once. If it was that easy, you wouldn’t have put it off for so long. When you look at a giant mess, trying to tackle it all at once is what makes the job seem overwhelming. Start small in one area. Maybe it is an end table or another catch-all spot in the house. Plan on only working in that area. You can have 3 bags, boxes or bins. When you start, put anything that is trash in one bag. Things to be donated goes in another. In the last bag, anything that you want to keep but does not go in that space. After clearing out the space, wipe it down, vacuum or sweep the area. Then put anything that belongs there back. Only the things that belong there. If you are keeping it but need to find a home for it, leave it in the container labeled keep. If you found things in the space that you are keeping but it has a place it should be kept, move it to where it belongs. It doesn’t matter if that place is still a mess. You will get to it and when you do, you will be able to get the items you put there into place.
Once you have finished one space, you can move on to another or you can wait until another time. This helps you to see progress right away and doesn’t take much time. Using this method, you can declutter fast, in as little as 10 minutes at a time. One of the ways I love to declutter and organize is to set a timer and give myself just 10 or 15 minutes to work on an area. This makes it seem less overwhelming and in my opinion, is the best way to declutter a house!
Don’t Try it All At Once
One of the biggest mistakes people make when they want ways to declutter is to try to do it all right now. While that sounds good in theory, most people will be on a roll, tearing everything out and then get started on moving things around. Have you ever been in the middle of a big project and half way through, you don’t want to do it anymore, or it took longer than you thought and you do not have time to finish it. Then instead of feeling like you have gotten anywhere, the house looks worse than it did before.
Do You Really Need It?
One of the best steps to declutter your house is to ask yourself do you really need it. If it is something that you do not use often, do not need, but want, decide where it should go. Is it something you want to hold onto for sentimental reasons but do not need out all the time. Is it something that you want to be able to see all the time and need to find a place to display it. This can go with knick-knacks, trinkets, family heirlooms, and even clothes. Once you can decide that you want it but don’t need it, you can start to decide what to do with it. Maybe it is best to put it into storage. Maybe you want to find the perfect shelf to set it on. If you know you are keeping it but need somewhere to put it, you can put it in the keep bin until you can find the best place for it. If you are keeping it but putting it in storage, get it moved to storage and out of the way.
Room By Room
Are you one of those people that bounce from place to place when you want to declutter your home and simplify your life? The best plan of attack is to complete one room at a time. And that means the whole room. Start small and do one place at a time, as mentioned above, but after that space is finished, move to the next space in the same room. Do not take something to put it in its new home and start working there because, well, it needs to be decluttered too. Stay focused and work section by section in each room, and then move on to the next room. By using a methodical method, you will see the progress you are making and it will motivate you to keep going.
Donations
After making your donation bags or boxes, be sure to take them to donation right away. You do not want to leave them in a corner of the room, collecting dust and taking up space. If possible take them to the donation center right away. If you can not do it that day, schedule time specifically to take them. This gets them out of the house and keeps them from being more clutter, just in a different form.
Once you get started with steps to declutter, you will see how nice it looks. This will help you stay motivated. Don’t get overwhelmed with the mess. If you need help, you can always create a declutter your home checklist. List the places that you need to work on and stick to the plan.
Declutter Your Home Checklists
Join our clean and organize challenge where I send you a free declutter checklist every month!
Clearissa Coward says
Hi Melissa,
Great tips. I tell my friends and clients the same things. Starting small is very important so we do not feel overwhelmed and quit the project. Good article. Thank you for sharing at #omhgww. See you next week. Pinned and Tweeted if buttons are available.
Becca says
For me, it’s the things I “should” keep that add so much clutter. All the drawings by my kids, “free” gifts with purchase cosmetics that I don’t normally use, clothes that I don’t fit but want to, the “what if I need this one day?”… it goes on and on. I’d love to be free of the obligation of these things.