Moving On Up
Upon the fine art of (hopefully guilt-free) moving.
I'm getting ready to move. My already lengthy 30-mile long commute has recently turned into a nerve-wrecking 2 hour trip - one way. I simply cannot spend 4 hours a day trapped in my car fuming over metro-Atlanta's idiot drivers and cursing local transportation officials. The bad karma alone will get me for that. No telling what it's doing to my blood pressure. Recently, it was pointed out to me that my 4 hour round trip commute consumes about 25% of my waking hours every day, depending on how long I sleep. That is far, far too much. I could be doing so much more. And practically anything else would be better than that. I could be painting my toenails red. I could be meeting Mr. Right. I could be rock climbing. I could be shopping. I could be working. I could be learning how to cha-cha. I could be watching grass grow. I could be scrubbing the toilets. All of those are imminently better than sitting in traffic for 4 hours a day. But no, I'm not doing any of those things. Instead, I'm sitting in stinking traffic trying to convince myself that I don't really want to ram my car into the one in front of me 17 times even though the freaking jerk really, really deserves it. (Why didn't he go? He had a mile! Argh!)
So I am preparing my house to sell it, which is turning out to be an odd experience. I've never sold a house before. Predictably enough, I began by doing some research. I want to make as much money as possible from the sale, so it seemed reasonable to spend some time researching what I ought and ought not to do.
There are many, many TV shows dedicated to helping people sell their homes for as much money as possible. These shows' contents are often confusing and contradictory. In one home a designer will choose to paint over brightly painted walls with neutrals and in another the same designer will choose to paint over neutral walls with bright colors. I have yet to determine when walls should and should not be neutral.
Some of these shows would have us all upgrade our homes (at significant cost) just to sell it. I can understand doing this if the home is old with significantly outdated features. But for a relatively new home, why would they do this? And yet they do it on these TV shows all the time. It seems counterproductive. It seems like it would only add stress to the seller (now they have to deal with remodeling in addition to selling their home). It seems like the designers on these shows are making changes just to make changes. If I were staying in my home, I would remodel the kitchen (even if it is only 3 years old). But that's because of a preference, not because of necessity. So my kitchen will not be remodeled, even if it would add a slight value to the house. That slight value isn't enough to compensate me for the hassle.
The two things all of those shows agree on are the needs to de-personalize and de-clutter your house before showing to potential buyers. This is what I'm doing right now. The de-cluttering part is fairly easy. It's unbelievable how much junk you can throw away when you assess whether you truly need it and whether it's worth moving. It's also unbelievable just how much junk I've accumulated in the past 3 years. I cannot believe the money I've wasted on some of this stuff.
Take my cookie jar collection for example. It has become so large that there isn't a space large enough in my home to house it all together. It's currently sitting on metal shelves in my craft room collecting dust. So I'm culling that collection down to only the jars I truly love. This presents a problem. A good quarter of the jars were given to me by loved ones. While I don't particularly like the jars themselves, I love the people who gave them to me. So how can I get rid of them? It's the worst sort of clutter: It's guilt clutter.
I have much guilt clutter. I have inherited a large portion of my grandparents' furniture. And when I was first out of my parents' home, this furniture came in handy; I didn't have to buy much of my own when I moved into my first apartment. But now I have all this furniture that, to be perfectly honest, isn't all that appealing to me. There's sentimental value to them, but not much aesthetic value. And because they do mean something to me, I can't just throw them away or give them to Goodwill. I have to find someone in the family who will care for the pieces, which is further hassle. I'm trying to finance a new home, buy a home, sell my house, and move in the next 2 months. I don't need the hassle. And yet, because there's sentimental value to some of these pieces, I'll do it anyway.
And which pieces do I give away? Based on aesthetic value alone, most of the inherited furniture would have to go. I already know that I'm chucking the TV stand my uncle made - someone in the family will take that happily. But what about the bed currently in my master bedroom? I hate the style, but it was my grandfather's bed. It was the one he died in, for crying out loud. You know, upon typing that last sentence, I've just decided that the master bed is going. Thinking about it further, I'm not sure I'm going to be able to sleep in that bed ever again. (Oh, it has a different mattress, but still.) At least the bed in the guest room is comfy (and it's an inherited piece I'm going to keep).
I've got to also cut through a good bit of my craft supplies, which is a job I do not look forward to doing. I have one big hobby... I collect crafting paraphernalia. I collect all sorts of crafting paraphernalia. And now I've got to figure out which crafts I want to continue doing, and which I'm going to quit. It doesn't help that I am highly susceptible to every newest crafting craze that strikes every season or so.
Why did I want to make crepe paper flowers? (I blame Martha Stewart for this one.) The results are lovely. But is a single crepe paper rose really worth cutting out 30 petals individually? After having an unopened boxful of crepe paper flower supplies sitting in my craft room closet for the past 3 years, I'm beginning to think it's not. And I can't believe I wasted over 100 bucks on that particular hobby.
And then I have all the fabric from that quilting phase I went through. Why I thought I wanted to make a queen size quilt out of 2 inch teal and purple tie-dyed cotton squares is beyond my current comprehension. I've never even liked teal and purple all that much. I outgrew tie-dyed stufff somethwhere around junior high. And I've never wanted to decorate a room in those colors. So why did I buy 10 yards of fabric for it? Was it to be a present? Who do I hate that much? Seriously, they are teal and purple. Oy. (I blame HGTV for this one.)
And I've recently bought yarn for scarves. (I blame NeeNee for this one.) Oh, it's lovely, lovely yarn, too. And I've finished 3.25 scarves! But still, did I have to buy enough yarn to make 10 different colored scarves? I suppose that my loved ones will all get scarves for Christmas.
I haven't even begun to explore my jewelry making and scrapbooking accoutrements which currently occupy my dining room. I have hopes that I will someday have a dining room that I can use as a dining room, but I fear that hope will not be realized until the day before the house is shown to potential buyers for the first time. At least I'm actually making jewelry and scrapbooking. (Incidentally, my aunt is to blame for both of these hobbies.)
And then there's the clutter I bought on sale. Sale clutter is a particularly viscous and promiscuous form of clutter. You buy more than you need just because it's on sale. Or worse, you buy something on sale even though you really don't need it. Did I really need all those tea lights? Probably not, but they were 100 for $1.89. So I bought 500. At least I might be able to make some money on them if the power ever goes out and the neighbors run out of flashlight batteries. Other than that, I'm not sure what I thought I'd do with 500 tea lights. In the 4 years since I bought them, I've maybe used 20. I blame my new-found addiction to large scented jar candles for the desertion of my tea light craze. (I blame the White Barn Candle Company for my jar candle addiction.)
What's made all of this de-cluttering more complex is the fact that I'm downsizing. I've decided that one person really doesn't need a 2000 square feet house with 4 bedrooms, 2 baths, and 0.29 acres. Truly, I don't need it. So why pay for it? The problem is that I've filled all those rooms full of stuff. And the more I look at it, the more I realize that much of it is stuff I don't really need. And a good bit of it is stuff I don't really want. It's too bad that the yard sale season is over. I've been told that professional yard-salers really love craft supplies. I suppose there's always eBay.
I'm getting ready to move. My already lengthy 30-mile long commute has recently turned into a nerve-wrecking 2 hour trip - one way. I simply cannot spend 4 hours a day trapped in my car fuming over metro-Atlanta's idiot drivers and cursing local transportation officials. The bad karma alone will get me for that. No telling what it's doing to my blood pressure. Recently, it was pointed out to me that my 4 hour round trip commute consumes about 25% of my waking hours every day, depending on how long I sleep. That is far, far too much. I could be doing so much more. And practically anything else would be better than that. I could be painting my toenails red. I could be meeting Mr. Right. I could be rock climbing. I could be shopping. I could be working. I could be learning how to cha-cha. I could be watching grass grow. I could be scrubbing the toilets. All of those are imminently better than sitting in traffic for 4 hours a day. But no, I'm not doing any of those things. Instead, I'm sitting in stinking traffic trying to convince myself that I don't really want to ram my car into the one in front of me 17 times even though the freaking jerk really, really deserves it. (Why didn't he go? He had a mile! Argh!)
So I am preparing my house to sell it, which is turning out to be an odd experience. I've never sold a house before. Predictably enough, I began by doing some research. I want to make as much money as possible from the sale, so it seemed reasonable to spend some time researching what I ought and ought not to do.
There are many, many TV shows dedicated to helping people sell their homes for as much money as possible. These shows' contents are often confusing and contradictory. In one home a designer will choose to paint over brightly painted walls with neutrals and in another the same designer will choose to paint over neutral walls with bright colors. I have yet to determine when walls should and should not be neutral.
Some of these shows would have us all upgrade our homes (at significant cost) just to sell it. I can understand doing this if the home is old with significantly outdated features. But for a relatively new home, why would they do this? And yet they do it on these TV shows all the time. It seems counterproductive. It seems like it would only add stress to the seller (now they have to deal with remodeling in addition to selling their home). It seems like the designers on these shows are making changes just to make changes. If I were staying in my home, I would remodel the kitchen (even if it is only 3 years old). But that's because of a preference, not because of necessity. So my kitchen will not be remodeled, even if it would add a slight value to the house. That slight value isn't enough to compensate me for the hassle.
The two things all of those shows agree on are the needs to de-personalize and de-clutter your house before showing to potential buyers. This is what I'm doing right now. The de-cluttering part is fairly easy. It's unbelievable how much junk you can throw away when you assess whether you truly need it and whether it's worth moving. It's also unbelievable just how much junk I've accumulated in the past 3 years. I cannot believe the money I've wasted on some of this stuff.
Take my cookie jar collection for example. It has become so large that there isn't a space large enough in my home to house it all together. It's currently sitting on metal shelves in my craft room collecting dust. So I'm culling that collection down to only the jars I truly love. This presents a problem. A good quarter of the jars were given to me by loved ones. While I don't particularly like the jars themselves, I love the people who gave them to me. So how can I get rid of them? It's the worst sort of clutter: It's guilt clutter.
I have much guilt clutter. I have inherited a large portion of my grandparents' furniture. And when I was first out of my parents' home, this furniture came in handy; I didn't have to buy much of my own when I moved into my first apartment. But now I have all this furniture that, to be perfectly honest, isn't all that appealing to me. There's sentimental value to them, but not much aesthetic value. And because they do mean something to me, I can't just throw them away or give them to Goodwill. I have to find someone in the family who will care for the pieces, which is further hassle. I'm trying to finance a new home, buy a home, sell my house, and move in the next 2 months. I don't need the hassle. And yet, because there's sentimental value to some of these pieces, I'll do it anyway.
And which pieces do I give away? Based on aesthetic value alone, most of the inherited furniture would have to go. I already know that I'm chucking the TV stand my uncle made - someone in the family will take that happily. But what about the bed currently in my master bedroom? I hate the style, but it was my grandfather's bed. It was the one he died in, for crying out loud. You know, upon typing that last sentence, I've just decided that the master bed is going. Thinking about it further, I'm not sure I'm going to be able to sleep in that bed ever again. (Oh, it has a different mattress, but still.) At least the bed in the guest room is comfy (and it's an inherited piece I'm going to keep).
I've got to also cut through a good bit of my craft supplies, which is a job I do not look forward to doing. I have one big hobby... I collect crafting paraphernalia. I collect all sorts of crafting paraphernalia. And now I've got to figure out which crafts I want to continue doing, and which I'm going to quit. It doesn't help that I am highly susceptible to every newest crafting craze that strikes every season or so.
Why did I want to make crepe paper flowers? (I blame Martha Stewart for this one.) The results are lovely. But is a single crepe paper rose really worth cutting out 30 petals individually? After having an unopened boxful of crepe paper flower supplies sitting in my craft room closet for the past 3 years, I'm beginning to think it's not. And I can't believe I wasted over 100 bucks on that particular hobby.
And then I have all the fabric from that quilting phase I went through. Why I thought I wanted to make a queen size quilt out of 2 inch teal and purple tie-dyed cotton squares is beyond my current comprehension. I've never even liked teal and purple all that much. I outgrew tie-dyed stufff somethwhere around junior high. And I've never wanted to decorate a room in those colors. So why did I buy 10 yards of fabric for it? Was it to be a present? Who do I hate that much? Seriously, they are teal and purple. Oy. (I blame HGTV for this one.)
And I've recently bought yarn for scarves. (I blame NeeNee for this one.) Oh, it's lovely, lovely yarn, too. And I've finished 3.25 scarves! But still, did I have to buy enough yarn to make 10 different colored scarves? I suppose that my loved ones will all get scarves for Christmas.
I haven't even begun to explore my jewelry making and scrapbooking accoutrements which currently occupy my dining room. I have hopes that I will someday have a dining room that I can use as a dining room, but I fear that hope will not be realized until the day before the house is shown to potential buyers for the first time. At least I'm actually making jewelry and scrapbooking. (Incidentally, my aunt is to blame for both of these hobbies.)
And then there's the clutter I bought on sale. Sale clutter is a particularly viscous and promiscuous form of clutter. You buy more than you need just because it's on sale. Or worse, you buy something on sale even though you really don't need it. Did I really need all those tea lights? Probably not, but they were 100 for $1.89. So I bought 500. At least I might be able to make some money on them if the power ever goes out and the neighbors run out of flashlight batteries. Other than that, I'm not sure what I thought I'd do with 500 tea lights. In the 4 years since I bought them, I've maybe used 20. I blame my new-found addiction to large scented jar candles for the desertion of my tea light craze. (I blame the White Barn Candle Company for my jar candle addiction.)
What's made all of this de-cluttering more complex is the fact that I'm downsizing. I've decided that one person really doesn't need a 2000 square feet house with 4 bedrooms, 2 baths, and 0.29 acres. Truly, I don't need it. So why pay for it? The problem is that I've filled all those rooms full of stuff. And the more I look at it, the more I realize that much of it is stuff I don't really need. And a good bit of it is stuff I don't really want. It's too bad that the yard sale season is over. I've been told that professional yard-salers really love craft supplies. I suppose there's always eBay.
1 Comments:
At 10/23/2005 9:43 AM,
Anonymous said…
Timely...
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20051022/ap_on_re_us/cluttered_lives_abridged
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