Whether it’s the sunnier days that have got you in the mood for a spring clean, or you feel like there’s just too much stuff lying around the house, decluttering your home can be extremely rewarding.
Getting rid of what you don’t need makes your home a more enjoyable place to live, and carefully organising everything else will give you more time to relax – no more wasted hours spent searching for your passport or trying to find the right cable to charge your headphones.
If you can relate to the above all too well, it’s time to get organised. Read on for our tips on how to declutter your home, including a room-by-room breakdown and a decluttering timeline.
1. The bathroom
Since the bathroom is likely to be one of the smaller rooms in your house, it’s a great place to start your decluttering journey. Pick an area – for example, the cupboard behind the mirror or under the sink – and take everything out.
Throw away any products that are out of date, including prescriptions, makeup, and skincare. Then get rid of any products you haven’t used in the past six months. If they are unopened and in date you may be able to sell them second-hand or give them to a friend.
Get rid of any dried-up mascara tubes, empty bottles of moisturiser, or anything else that is taking up unnecessary space.
Give your cupboards and shelves a good clean, then replace the items you have decided to keep. Put the items you use daily at eye level, so that they are easy to access.
2. The bedroom
First, make your bed. If you make this part of your routine your bedroom will look less messy, and hopefully you’ll be motivated to keep it that way.
Pick up any clothes that have made themselves at home on the floor or on the chair, and either put them in the wash bin or back in the wardrobe.
Take everything off of your bedside tables or tops of drawers and clean the surfaces.
Put books you have finished reading back on the bookshelf, remove any mugs that might be lying around and neatly put away loose cables or phone chargers.
3. The living room
Decluttering the living room can be daunting, since it gets a lot of use and clutter can build up at a rapid pace. Living rooms also don’t typically have much storage, which means that they can quickly look untidy.
One of our best tips is to decide on a home for your most-used items, such as TV remotes, and make sure they are always returned to the same place.
Try to get into the habit of doing a daily tidy up of the coffee table so that things don’t start to pile up. It’s also a good idea to invest in some storage boxes or baskets that you can easily throw things into, like toys or blankets.
4. The kitchen
This is another frequently used area where clutter is often found. We recommend tackling it section by section, and it doesn’t all need to be done on the same day.
For example, you could decide to start with the cutlery drawer, or the glass cupboard.
Get rid of anything you never use and make sure you are not hoarding too many glass jars or plastic takeaway boxes.
Tidying the kitchen table can instantly make the place look more organised. Don’t just move clutter around – either put it back where it should be, put it in a box for sorting out later, or throw it away.
Create a decluttering timeline
Before you get started, you should make a decluttering timeline to keep things realistic. Don’t get carried away and start emptying all of the drawers and cupboards in your house on the same day, as you’re likely to run out of steam and end up with a more cluttered space than you started with.
Depending on how much your home needs organising, you might decide that it will take you an entire weekend, or even a whole month. Either way, we advise creating a plan and noting down which areas of the house you will tackle on which day or week.
You could even break it down more than this, with a goal to tidy one drawer in the kitchen each day in a week. Don’t worry if you get a little behind schedule – just adjust your timeline and get back on track when you can.
How to dispose of clutter
Once you have decided that you are going to throw something away, the next crucial step is actually doing it. Sort your unwanted things into piles to donate, recycle or throw away and set yourself deadlines if necessary. For example, “I will take this bag of clothes to the charity shop next weekend.”
Check your local recycling guidelines to find out what can and can’t be recycled, and try to minimise what goes in your general waste bin. Is there anyone you know who could make use of it? Could you sell it or donate it?
Hopefully these tips have inspired you to begin decluttering your home. Want to get organised but need someone to help? Find a Tasker near you today and get the job done.
