Tag Archives: decluttering

The Ultimate Guide To Clearing Your Clutter

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Last year I became quite obsessed with decluttering. In fact, thanks to Marie Kondo I think we all did. I have never liked being surrounded by a lot of stuff. I have always hated clutter. Which is why I am feeling rather proud. My husband and I have got rid of thousands of things. There are still a few things earmarked to go, but we are the closest to minimalism we have ever been. The flat looks fundamentally tidy even though we have a toddler. Things are also much easier to find and we have even made some money selling things. Here is my quick, but comprehensive, guide to decluttering. It will change your life, trust me.

You need to put things into different bags,boxes or piles. The options are: Recycle, Sell, Keep, Mend, Give to Charity.

 

You don’t have to do it all at once so don’t get overwhelmed. You can do a room at a time, or even just a drawer of cupboard. Slow and steady is just as good as one full-on day.

My biggest tip is to keep a charity bag somewhere you can easily access. Put things in there you want to get rid of, and then when it is full you can take it to the charity shop. 

You can make decluttering fun by doing it while you watch your favourite TV show or listen to music. You can even get all of the family involved. Getting rid of old stuff always feels great.

Declutter for 5-10 minutes everyday. It all adds up.

Put the handle on the hanger in your wardrobe in one direction, if you wear the item, turn the handle around. Wait a certain amount of time, say, six months, then throw out everything you have not worn.

 

You can give away unwanted stuff while doing good for the environment via Freecycle.org

 

Get rid of all your old phones. Just remember to delete your personal information and remove the SIM card. There are plenty of good websites and companion websites which will give you the best price. I use https://www.mazumamobile.com/sell-my-mobile. Just make sure you check out their reputation on trustpilot.com

You can also sell old ink cartridges. The amount you can earn is so low that I would give them to chairty instead. Cash for Cartridges pay for old ink cartridges but you have to set up an account, the withdrawal limit is £25, and their prices are so low it would take an age to get there. http://www.cashforcartridges.co.uk/ink-cartridge-recycling-prices

Personally I think it is better to donate them to the British Heart Foundation. You can download their free post label here. https://www.therecyclingfactory.com/bhf/. Other charities that take old printer cartridges include the British Institute for Brain Injured Children, RNLI, Barnados, Sense, and the World Cancer Research Fund.

I have sold all of my old gadgets. After removing my personal data of course. I used eBay.co.uk as I found they had the best prices. There are other places of course. cashinyourgadgets.co.uk, musicmagpie.com and even Apple itself will buy your old technology. It is best to remove your old hard drive before selling your old computers. Note that Apple will give you a gift card in return. They also recycle things for free that they do not buy, including PCs.

Amazon.co.uk marketplace allows you to sell books, DVDs and some other stuff. They do take a huge fee however, a massive 17.25% commission. The good news is that it is free to list. They also give you a postage credit which does not always cover the cost of posting the book, then take it away in fees.

You can also sell by Car Booting. Car boot sales are not the best place to get the top price. I have never done it personally but there will be plenty in your area. Just do a search. They tend to charge a fee to pitch up your car and sell. I would mark your prices up a bit as people like to haggle.

Other good places to sell your stuff.

 

Facebook groups

There is even a sell option on Facebook. You can also join groups and sell your stuff on the group.

The best way I have found of getting rid of stuff is to give it to charity. You do good and give back to the community while clearing out your home. Win win.

You can donate pretty much everything. For instance, the RSPB, DHIVERSE and the World Owl Trust will take old stamps. Your old glasses and sunglasses can go to charity shops. Branches of Boots Opticians and  Dolland and Aitchinson usually have recycling bins for old glasses. You can donate your foreign currency. RNIB will take it. Help the Aged, Marie Curie and Age UK will even take old currency that can no longer be changed. Many charities will also take your old phones.

Take your old clothes to a charity shop or a local clothes bank. H&M, Uniqlo and Marks & Spencer’s all take old items of clothing.

It is best to sell furniture on Gumtree.com, Facebook groups or other local resources. Furniture and homeware does not hold its value well. If you do want to get rid of your furniture and don’t want to sell it do not spend hundreds getting someone to take it away for you. We were quoted over £400 for someone to come and take our furniture away. I donated it to the British Heart Foundation instead and they came and took it away for free.

When it comes to donating furniture the Furniture Reuse Network will take your goods and then distribute them to a charity organisation in your area.  Oxfam and the British Heart Foundation also take furniture. You can also try Freecycle and Freegle where you offer your good for free to anyone who can collect them.

Gone For Good is a great social enterprise that puts people in touch with charities that will come and take away their furniture or anything else they want to donate. You use the Gone For Good app by taking a photo of your unwanted stuff on our phone and then one of the charities will come and take the goods away based on your postcode. The app is free to use and the charity will pick up your goods for free too. Great for people who don’t have a car.

When you give stuff to charity make sure you sign up for Gift Aid. This allows the charity to claim an extra 25p for every £1 you give and also lets you get some money off your tax bill. Don’t do it unless you pay tax though, you will have to pay the extra gift aid. To learn more about tax relief and gift aid go here.

My last tips are to get rid of old change via self services machines. No, the staff from the supermarket don’t like it but as long as you don’t overdo it I am sure it will be fine. I also find eBay.co.uk the best place for selling stuff. Even if there are some people on there that just want to steal your stuff. I send valuable things signed for. My other, and biggest, tip for decluttering is also the one that is best for the environment: stop buying so much crap. Seriously. I rarely buy anything these days other than food and it has changed my life. My sure everything has a place and goes back into that place. Everything else can be sold or given to charity.
Thank you for reading. Please add your own tips below.

Great decluttering books:

The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying: A simple, effective way to banish clutter forever

Stuffocation: Living More with Less

Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less

KonMari Method, Decluttering, Vowing To Be Frugal: Catherine Balavage On Her Quest For Less

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There are many perks to living in London: living in the greatest city on earth, always having something to do, the history, the beauty, the parks, the museums, the monuments, the restaurants….I could go on forever. Perks you do not have however usually involve space. My first flat in London was a tiny studio in Highgate I paid £595 for per month. Practically a bargain now. It even had a garden. The next place I lived was a tiny 9 foot by 10 foot room in a house share with five other people. There was a communal storage room, but it was always packed. It didn’t matter initially that I had no room as most of my stuff was at my parent’s home. When I was 24 I asked my parents to bring it all down. Boxes and boxes of stuff. They weren’t sure where I would put all of my belongings, and my room was stuffed and over-cluttered for a long time, but here is the thing: I sold it all. It helped pay my rent and I felt much clearer. And there the addiction started.

I think the first thing I sold was a hair crimping machine (Yes, I know). But it went for about £28. A fair amount of money. Now we live in a two-bedroom flat in South-West London, and my husband and I have been hit by the clearing out bug more than ever. We also have a child now so can’t use the second bedroom for storage like we used to. We both hate shopping, but seem to accumulate an insane amount of stuff. It doesn’t help that as a writer I get sent a lot of stuff to review, and that when we moved to our previous place my husband took his belongings from the family home and his storage unit. But we are feeling proud. I have got rid of thousands (yes, thousands) of things, and my husband has too. This article is a first in a series of decluttering and turning your house into a home. I previously reviewed the The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying which you can read here. It is a helpful book, my husband even used the phrase ‘tidy up properly once and you will never have to tidy up again’, so it definitely works!

Most of our stuff has gone to Oxfam and Fara. Some of it was sold on eBay.co.uk. There is no point in just throwing your stuff out to it ends up on some landfill site, harming the environment and creating waste. We have donated, sold or recycled everything. It has been a huge job and has taken a long time. Forget what is says in the The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying. I just don’t believe you can do it in a day. Well, not if you have a child anyway. Marie Kondo wrote her book before she had a child, it would be interesting to see if she thinks doing it in a day is possible now.

I hope you will join me on my journey. It makes such a difference to your life to get rid of the old and declutter. Watch this space.

 

 

 

National Clear Your Clutter Day Launches in March 2016

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Jasmine Birtles to launch the UK's first National Clear Your ClutterThousands more will be booking extra holidays this summer with the riches they acquire thanks to the first national Clear Your Clutter Day on March 19.

Hoarders will be encouraged to dig out their stash of unused items and to sell them at car boot sales, on classified and free local selling sites, and even at auction houses. They will also be urged to bin useless junk and to donate knick-knacks and clothes to charity shops and the homeless. Collectors will even be shown how to upcycle other curios to make free presents for family and friends.

It is hoped that the annual scheme, called ‘Clear Your Clutter Day’, will reduce the UK’s bulging mountain of unwanted stuff and give consumers a huge financial boost so they can afford an extra fun holiday this summer.

Organiser Jasmine Birtles, the consumer finance expert, said it will also help the one-in-five UK households in “bric-a-brac bother”.

She said: “Britain has long been a nation of hoarders, with 20 per cent of households admitting to having enough clutter to fill a whole room. Most people would like to de-clutter but either don’t have the time or are overwhelmed by the task at hand.“Clear Your Clutter Day is the long-awaited catalyst to  help people live stress and clutter-free lives. It is a time when hoarders can rid themselves of useless items once and for all.”

Jasmine, the founder of Moneymagpie.com and a regular guest on BBC Breakfast, Sky News and Channel 5 News, added: “The initiative benefits every one – the hoarder, bargain hunters, and UK charities.” which takes place on Saturday, March 19, a selection of how-to articles will be added to Moneymagpie.com.

A free ebook will also be available to anyone taking part in the Clear Your Clutter Challenge. On the day itself Birtles, dubbed the ‘Queen of Cash’, will be joined by a team of experts who will host live webinars on Google+ and Periscope.

To celebrate the inaugural launch of Clear Your Clutter Day,

Jasmine’s Top Five De-Cluttering Tips:

1. Make a bid for freedom. Look on de-cluttering as gaining space and freedom rather than having to get rid of things. If you see it as gaining something you’re much more likely to throw out things you know you don’t love or need.

2. Do it space by space. Don’t try and do your whole home in one go. Do it drawer by drawer and cupboard by cupboard. Start with the easiest room in the house (probably the bathroom) and once you’ve cleared that room, give yourself a quick break and then start on the next easiest room. Once you’ve done two whole rooms you will already have more of a sense of satisfaction and control over your life which should spur you on to do more cluttered parts of the house.

3. Do it with a friend. Get a friend or family member round to help you. It will make it more fun and help you sort more of your home than you would on your own. If you’re a natural hoarder, bring in someone who loves throwing things out, so that you’re not tempted to just keep everything.

4. Use the four box rule. Get four boxes which are marked ‘throw away’, ‘charity shop’, ‘sell’ and ‘recycle’. Everything you decide not to keep should go into one of those boxes. The ‘throw away’ one is easy (although even some broken electronic items could be given away through

 

 

The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying By Marie Kondo Book Review

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thelifechangingmagicoftidyingDe-cluttering is very in at the moment. In fact, it is a trend that does not seem to be going away, and when you think of our consumeristic society and all of the stuff we have is it any wonder? We buy too much and have nowhere to put it. Most of us are drowning in stuff. The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying By Marie Kondo is less of a book, more of a movement. People on Mumsnet rave about it and people say it has changed their life. It has 453 five star reviews on Amazon.co.uk. The hype is so high I was actually thinking about buying the book the very day it arrived to be reviewed. Happy me. I read the book quickly. We moved in to our new place in May this year and our flat is still overflowing with stuff, despite numerous trips to charity shops and selling stuff on eBay.co.uk. Can this book help? Let’s find out.

The books premise is that you should only keep things in your life if they spark joy. The KonMari method (a nickname of the authors) claims to tidy your rooms once and for all. You start with clothes, then books, then papers, miscellaneous items (like kitchen equipment) and, lastly, sentimental items. You leave sentimental things to last after your decision making skills have become better. Some of the book is great and other things seem harder. The tidying must be done all at once. Not easy when you have a baby. Whatever section you are doing must be put in a pile on the floor and then done all at once. I don’t know when I would find the time to do this. As for everything ‘sparking joy’. I have a lot of things that don’t spark joy but I need them. I am not going to get excited about my underwear or cutlery. Despite this, this is a good book. The book is not just about throwing things out, it is also about storing things, finding the place where things should go. Kondo even tells you how to fold properly (vertically, as it turns out). Some of the book is a bit hippy but Marie Kondo knows her stuff and following the method will result in a tidy and clutter free house. I will do this method fully and do a more in depth article soon. I just have to find the time. In the meantime, I like this book because it left me feeling inspired to get going and has great ideas. I have already thrown a lot of stuff out and this book even helps you make some tough decisions. Good if you want to get your life, and home, in order.

The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying: A simple, effective way to banish clutter forever is available here.

Transform your home into a permanently clear and clutter-free space with the incredible KonMari Method. Japan’s expert declutterer and professional cleaner Marie Kondo will help you tidy your rooms once and for all with her inspirational step-by-step method.

The key to successful tidying is to tackle your home in the correct order, to keep only the things you really love and to do it all at once – and quickly. After that for the rest of your life you only need to choose what to keep and what to discard.

The KonMari Method will not just transform your space. Once you have your house in order you will find that your whole life will change. You can feel more confident, you can become more successful, and you can have the energy and motivation to create the life you want. You will also have the courage to move on from the negative aspects of your life: you can recognise and finish a bad relationship; you can stop feeling anxious; you can finally lose weight.

Marie Kondo’s method is based on a ‘once-cleaned, never-messy-again’ approach. If you think that such a thing is impossible then you should definitely read this compelling book.

 

 

Time to declutter – four out of five people in the UK have too much stuff

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Time to declutter – four out of five people in the UK have too much stuff

Three quarters of people across the UK have too much clutter at home, according to a poll by Storage.co.uk. People love their “stuff” so much, they don’t want to lose it, even though they’ll never use it. The survey found that emotional attachment and the idea they may be useful one day are people’s top reasons for holding on to things they don’t need. Another common cause of clutter (one third of respondents) is the hope that their stuff may be valuable.

An unexpected find was that younger people are more motivated by nostalgia about the past than the older generation. Three in five 18 to 29 year olds cling to clutter because it brings back good memories, compared to only two out of five 50 to 69 year olds who hold on to clutter for the same reason.

As for decluttering habits, the survey found that women sort an area of the home more frequently than men, who mostly tackled the job once or twice in the last twelve months.

The main barriers stopping people from having a good clear out is lack of time and feeling they have better things to do, suggesting they struggle to put the task high on their list of priorities. In some cases, clutter can really get out of control and become a bigger issue in people’s lives. For around one in ten people clutter is damaging their relationships with others, affecting their health and sometimes having a negative effect on the amount of money they have.

Rachel Papworth from Green and Tidy, a professional declutterer and organiser, says: “We live such busy lives, it can be hard to make time for decluttering. If you’re struggling to fit it in, think about how much time you’ll save when you can easily put your hand on whatever you’re looking for. Plus decluttering saves money, protects your mental and physical health, and reduces your environmental impact”.

According to the survey, quirky items of clutter getting in the way at home include a train piston, “hundreds” of old train tickets for travelling to see a fiancé, a camel saddle, carpet samples for a would-be rug , an empty Rotastak hamster cage, seven inch white platform boots, “thousands” of LPs and a lifesize cardboard cut out of Justin Bieber.

Storage.co.uk surveyed men and women in the UK to find out attitudes and habits towards clutter as part of their National Declutter Week campaign to launch on 7 March.

Storage.co.uk is calling on all home occupiers to consider unused stuff sitting at home and to make a big decluttering effort in National Declutter Week from 7 to 18 March. Storage.co.uk has linked up with hospices across the UK to direct donations of saleable items. To view participating hospices, visit http://www.storage.co.uk/national-declutter-week/adopt-a-hospice.

Revealed: the Brits are a Nation of Hoarders

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There is more than £2.5 billion worth of unwanted goods cluttering homes across the UK, confirming that the Brits are a nation of hoarders.

The recent survey by Cash Converters identified that more than 75% of UK households have redundant items taking up valuable living space, when they could be earning the owners money.

Finances are still tight for many families across the country, so with the potential to unlock hundreds of pounds worth of cash by getting rid of unused items, we would be foolish not to. DVDs, Mobile Phones and obsolete games consoles topped the list of most unwanted items that are lying dormant in people’s homes.

The UK’s number one retailer of buying and selling pre-owned goods, Cash Converters has more than 190 stores across the UK that offer to buy and sell a wide variety of items, including musical instruments, HiFis, TVs, CDs and DVDs and DIY tools.

David Patrick, chief executive of Cash Converters is staggered at the value that is currently not being unlocked in people’s superfluous belongings. He said: “Almost 13 million homes have admitted to keeping hold of unused items. Often people come into our stores surprised at what we will buy from them not realising that the unwanted items in their homes could be making them money.

“At Cash Converters we’re keen to highlight how you can make money from items you already own, as we all continue to feel the pinch and look for ways to raise some extra cash. It may be you only need some money to tide you over, in which case we offer the option to get your item back, known as a Buyback.

“Buyback is a really straightforward and quick service to use. Customers bring in an item along with some up to date identification; a price is agreed and the customer gets the cash and up to 28 days option to buy back the goods. Of course, if you realise you can live without that old Playstation 3 or the guitar you meant to learn to play but never did, you can simply leave it with Cash Converters.”

For more information visit www.cashconverters.co.uk