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Basement Organization

Tips to Know

The basement is the most elusive room in your home. It’s the blackhole for memorabilia, old toys, unwanted furniture, games, books, exorcise equipment…should I go on? The basement is such an easy place to get disorganized especially if it’s not a room that’s regularly used or cared for. Because most basements are out of sight and out of mind it can become a dumping for everything you don’t want to deal with. Let me tell you from first-hand experience that not decluttering your basement will come back to haunt you if you ever decide to move. Decluttering your basement will be a very harsh look in the mirror if you are trying to simplify your life. Here are five tips that hopefully help you not only manage your basement but keep it from being overrun with stuff.

Tip 01: Pull Everything Out of Its Place

This is a hardcore first tip but let me tell you it works. Start by assessing everything you have in the room and determine what it’s adding to your life. If your collection of VCR tapes and boardgames are really being used every month by all means keep them around, but if they are just collecting cobwebs it might be time to part ways. It’s harder with sentimental items but a good question to ask yourself is if you want the space more than you want the item.

Tip 02: Declutter

Once you pull everything out of its place make sure it’s actually removed from your home. Basement projects can be lengthy and tiresome so make sure to allot enough time to get through it all. If that means clearing some time during the week to run bags of donations to a collection center so be it. Make appointments with yourself to keep accountable. By the end of your declutter process it will be so much easier to care for the things you are keeping.

Tip 03: Make Categories

Because the basement is a room for many miscellaneous items start by making categories. It’s much easier to organize a bedroom or a kitchen because everything in the room has a purpose. However, in a basement it can be hard to determine which items should go where. Categorizing them will simplify the process of organization because everything will have a theme.

Tip 04: Make Use of Your Space

If your basement has crawl space or built in shelving, make sure to choose which items go where strategically. Any item you need extremely infrequently make sure to put it on the highest shelf or furthest back in the crawl space. This will allow your most used things to be in the most accessible places. Installing hooks, cubbies, shelves, or bins could be an option for your basement as well. Assess how you want the space to function and make the choice best for your home.
I hope this article will help your basement become less of a blackhole and more of a useful space! This room can be very tricky for most people and cause unnecessary stress. Choosing to tackle this project will be hard but very rewarding.