10 Tips On How To Downsize Your Home

Downsizing to a smaller home is a big – and often – emotional decision. Maybe you’re moving to a smaller home because of a life transition. Or maybe you looked around and realized you have more space than you need.

Downsizing has plenty of benefits, but it can be a lot of work. Use our 10 tips to downsize your home and make the process smoother.

What Is Downsizing?

Downsizing is the process of moving to a smaller home. You may be moving to a smaller house, from a house to an apartment or condo or moving from your home into a tiny home or RV.

Common Reasons For Downsizing

People decide to downsize their homes for several reasons. Sometimes it’s a matter of needing less space or wanting to save money. In other cases, you may need to downsize out of necessity. Here are a few common reasons people downsize:

• Divorce: Usually, one of the spouses stays in the home after a divorce, or they both move out and sell the home. Either way, one or both spouses may decide they need to move to a smaller home for budgetary reasons or because they don’t need as much space.
• Money savings: Money is one of the most common reasons people downsize. When you move to a smaller home, there’s a good chance you’ll have a smaller mortgage. You’ll pay less for the home and have smaller monthly mortgage payments.
• Less home maintenance: Maintaining a home – especially a large one – can be a lot of work. If you no longer can or want to spend your time on home maintenance, it may make sense to downsize. You may even downsize to an apartment where a landlord handles all the upkeep.
• Minimalism: In the past few decades, minimalism has become a major trend. Many people are beginning to realize they have more space and belongings than they need, so they commit to downsizing.
• Life transition: Divorce is one life transition that can cause someone to downsize, but it’s not the only one. Maybe your kids are away at college, and now you’re an empty nester with more space than you need. Or perhaps you have to move to a different city and end up buying a smaller home.

How To Downsize Your Home

If you’re planning to downsize your home, you’ve got some work ahead of you. Here are some tips to make the process easier:

1. Start As Early As You Can

You don’t accumulate a house full of stuff overnight, so you can’t expect to figure out how to downsize in a day either. You’ll need plenty of time to sort through your belongings, decide what to do with them and follow through with your plans.

To avoid feeling overwhelmed, spread this task out over several weeks. That way, you can make methodical choices, take plenty of breaks and give yourself time to confirm what you’re keeping – and accept what you’re letting go.

Consider sorting items by prioritizing what you’ll need to pack once you decide to move – even if the big day is months away. Waiting until the last minute to finish downsizing can be very stressful. Make good use of any spare time by dedicating it to this project.

2. Take A Full Inventory

As you’re decluttering your home, take a complete inventory of your belongings. It’s helpful to have a list or spreadsheet you can look at to help you decide what’s important. A checklist can also help avoid a situation where you accidentally keep three of an item you only need one of.

Hanging on to the inventory of your items can also be helpful when you get to your new home. You’ll have a complete and accurate list of all your belongings. And you can use it to find a new home that fits all your newly pared-down stuff.

Finally, an inventory can also be helpful when you’re ready to get rid of items you no longer want. Are you planning to hold a garage sale to sell your unwanted belongings? Thanks to your inventory list, you already know which items to sell.

3. Determine Your Essentials

Even though you’ll be shedding a lot of items, you can’t let go of everything. You’ll need a core set of belongings that helps you live a comfortable life. So before you get rid of everything, make a checklist of essential items that must go to your new home.

This list should include items you’ll use every day, like furniture, appliances, dishes, clothing, linen, electronic gadgets and more. Post this list somewhere you can see and easily add to it, like your fridge.

Downsizing your home also presents an excellent opportunity to assess the state of your essential items. Have your towels seen better days? Is it finally time to toss out those ancient, warped frying pans?

Whatever the case, get rid of the items that are past their prime and replace them with newer models that will last for years.

4. Consider Your Sentimental Items

Many of the items you bring to your new home will serve an important function, such as your couch or dishes. But you’ll probably want to keep some sentimental items, such as family photo albums or an heirloom you received from your late grandparent. While these keepsakes may not serve a functional role in your day-to-day life, they’re still important and valuable.

That doesn’t mean you’ll keep every sentimental item. You may decide you can’t part with gifts from loved ones, but maybe not every art project your child made in elementary school has earned a second life in your new home. Only you know what’s important enough to keep.

5. Take It One Room At A Time

Just the thought of decluttering and downsizing your entire house will likely cause your stress levels to rise, but here’s an approach to reducing it: Don’t think of it as downsizing your entire house. Look at it one room at a time. The thought of downsizing your home office should feel a lot more manageable than downsizing your entire house.

Going room by room – including basements and crawl spaces – will help when you unpack at your new home. Because you packed by room, you can unpack boxes in their appropriate rooms.

6. Get Rid Of Duplicates

One of the easiest ways to declutter your space is to get rid of duplicates. Many of us probably have a few items in our homes that are duplicates or even triplicates.

For example, do you have three slow cookers in your pantry? Have you ever used all three at the same time? You likely use one regularly, so it’s probably safe to get rid of the extras.

7. Digitize When Possible

If you’re like most people, you have stacks of photos and important documents stored in different places in your home. These items take up a surprising amount of space and only add to the clutter.

As you prepare to downsize, consider ditching the hard copies by digitizing them. By saving everything to a hard drive or in the cloud, you can keep your memories and vital information close while ensuring your new place stays tidy.

Use a smartphone or a scanner to convert your photos and important documents into space-saving digital files. You can even digitize your VHS home videos, but that might take a bit more work.

You can also offload the digitizing project to someone else. Consider enlisting the help of a digitization service that can handle it for you.

8. Measure Your Furniture

Before hauling all your belongings to your new home, make sure they fit. It’s important to measure any furniture you plan to bring to see where and whether it would fit in your new home.

Trust me – you’ll be so glad you measured ahead of time, especially if it turns out some of your furniture is too big. Rather than haul a too-big item to your new house and have to make arrangements to get rid of it, you can plan to buy a replacement that will fit its new surroundings.

9. Donate, Sell Or Give Away Items

Once you’ve decided which items won’t make the trip to your smaller home, it’s time to say goodbye. You likely haven’t thrown everything in the dumpster. Chances are you have many high-quality items someone else may enjoy. Rather than banish your belongings to a trash can, consider:

• Gifting to friends or family members
• Donating to charity
• Selling on an online marketplace
• Hosting a garage sale

10. Consider Storage Options

Once your furniture and appliances have a place in your new home, think about storage for the rest of your belongings. Do you have adequate cabinetry and closet space? If you need more storage in your new home, don’t worry. There are lots of creative ways to stow away your stuff, such as:

• Adding a storage bench to your entryway
• Buying living room furniture that doubles as storage – think ottoman
• Putting up shelving in your garage or bathroom
• Hanging hooks for pots and pans in the kitchen
• Buying bins and drawer organizers for your bedroom closet

If you still have too many possessions for your smaller space, consider renting a storage unit to keep the important items you don’t use every day.

But before you sign the rental agreement on the storage unit, make sure you really need the items. It won’t make sense to spend money storing items that will sit in a storage unit for years with no plans to use them.

Additional Downsizing Tips For Homeowners

As you plan to downsize your home, here are a few additional tips that can help you along the way:

Plan Your New Lifestyle

When you downsize, be sure your new space and lifestyle will work for you. Before you load that moving truck, take measurements at your new home and then measure your furniture and appliances.

Will everything fit as you’ve envisioned it in your mind? If so, great! If not, you may need to let some stuff go or purchase smaller versions of items. It’s better to manage this before you move because the last thing you want to deal with on moving day is your king-sized bed not fitting into your smaller bedroom.

Don’t Do It All Alone

Downsizing your home is a massive undertaking and can be stressful if you’re doing it alone. If you can, enlist family members and friends to help ease your burden. Chances are they’ll be happy to step up and pitch in.

Depending on their skills and your needs, you may be able to recruit them to:

• Organize items by category for your review
• Help you make decisions about what to keep
• Digitize your photos, videos and documents
• Transport donated goods to charities
• Run a yard sale
• Help with hiring a moving company
• Take measurements in your new home and measure your larger belongings
• Implement storage solutions in your new home
• Find a storage facility close to your new home
• Pack items
• Coordinate and participate in your move
• Provide moral support
• Hire a professional organizer

Avoid Cluttering Your New Home

When you’re about to downsize your living space, avoid the temptation to buy anything that isn’t necessary – even if you really, really want it. Adding more stuff to the pile will make your upcoming move more challenging – which is the last thing you want.

In addition to avoiding buying new items before your move, try to limit your purchases once you’ve moved in. You worked so hard to declutter and make your new home tidy. The last thing you should do is let the clutter pile up again.

Of course, that doesn't mean you can never buy anything again. Just make sure anything you buy supports your new desired lifestyle and easily fits into your new place. That way, you can comfortably live the simpler, clutter-free life you dreamed of.

Pros And Cons Of Downsizing Your Home

Downsizing your home is a major decision. And while it has some clear benefits, there are some downsides to consider.

Pros

• You can save money on your mortgage payment, utility bills, property taxes and other living expenses.
• You finally let go of unnecessary possessions to live a more minimalist lifestyle.
• Less square footage means less maintenance.
• You can make money selling your belongings.
• A downsized home can be safer and easier to navigate when you’re older.

Cons

• Moving can be expensive, especially if it’s a long-distance move or you’re hiring professional movers.
• You may have to rent a storage space because your home is smaller.
• You may not be able to host family and friends as you did in your larger home.
• You may feel emotional leaving the home where you and your family created years of memories.

The Bottom Line

Downsizing your home is a major undertaking, especially if you’re moving from a very large home or one you’ve lived in for many years. If you can start the process early and approach it methodically, it can help make the process go a lot more smoothly.

And while you’re working on downsizing your home, it’s also important to start planning for your new one. Get a jump on it and start the process today.