In this episode, we are tackling what to do with all of our treasures – aka all that stuff we’ve collected over the years. It’s not easy. I’ve got some clients that haven’t chosen to ignore it – that’s not helpful – someone will have to deal with it sooner or later. In fact, one couple moved to a new house and has left all their stuff in their old house – they just don’t want to deal with all that’s been accumulated over the 40+ years of their marriage.
I’m going to talk about starting to take some baby steps, okay. And maybe doing putting some of your stuff to good use while you still can. That will make you feel good, I promise. There are a lot of good efforts out there is Chattanooga that need things that you may have and we are going to talk about some of those today. Finally I am also going to talk about how you can sort out some of these items as part of your estate planning without spending all kinds of time, money, on lawyers or creating conflict between family members over stuff after your gone. I’ve seen it – even saw family members fighting over old Christmas decorations that had been in a crawl space and were all moldy – yup.
Truth is, a lot of us – including yours truly are suffocating in stuff. We’re not squirrels, right. Storing nuts for the winter. But there we are squirreling away all kinds of things even in storage facilities.
One wise soul said, “If you have to buy stuff to store your stuff, you might have too much stuff.” Self-storage should not be the best option. But that’s big business in this country.
Check this out: These are recent numbers from March 2024. The self-storage industry represents a 44.3 Billion dollar industry in America. There are 52,300 facilities across the U.S. or 2.1 Billion Square feet. That’s 6.32 sq feet per person. We are spending an average of $85.14/per month on self-storage. We are bursting at the seams.
Well, we can do something about it. Today we are talking about strategies to do that. I hope you will start to consider some of these strategies before it’s a must.
Here are a few benefits in sorting out your stuff or decluttering:
- Give you clarity and peace in your space.
- May help with health issues and improve mobility and getting around your house.
- Help to determine who may or may not want certain family heirlooms and inherited items now versus later and give them a chance to enjoy them sooner.
- Enable to you get rid of some items you’ve been storing that no one wants.
- You will be able to find things much more easily thereafter.
- You will create new space.
- You will enjoy your home more.
So how to start? We’ll talk about tackling these in this podcast episode.
Resources mentioned in this episode:
How to Spare Your Heirs a Battle Over Your Estate | Estate Planning – Consumer Reports
Related Episodes:
- Episode 40: A view from across the pond – a few reflections on aging from Ireland
- Episode 39: Elder abuse, how to spot the warning signs and get help
- Episode 38: End-of-Life Care Directives, How to Plan and Why Do it Sooner than Later
- Episode 37: How to Avoid Online Scams with Nea Paris
- Episode 36: Hydration Tips for Older Adults
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