Dear Lifehacker, I really need some new clothes, but my closet’s already packed and a mess. Is there an easy Lifehacker-y way of getting rid of my clothes clutter? Thanks, Need New Duds
Dear NND,
We sympathise. Having too many clothes causes a kind of clutter that makes simply getting dressed or doing the laundry a hassle. It’s a good idea to tackle clothes organisation when the seasons change. While there’s no quick fix for clearing out your closet (you still have to go through all your clothes), we do have tips for what to keep and how to use your personal style to streamline your clothing choices.
Get Rid of Clothes That Don’t Fit You — Literally and Style-Wise
First, go through your clothes and find all the ones that you know you will never wear again because:
They don’t fit or fit poorly.
They’re damaged/stained.
They were just bad decisions or hideous (though well-intentioned) gifts.
You don’t look or feel good in them.
READ FULL STORY HERE >>
Monday, September 12, 2011
Decluttering and Organization - Yard-sale savvy: Turn clutter into cash
By Holly E. Thomas
Pssst . . . there’s money hidden in your house.
But don’t tear up the floorboards and rip up the mattresses yet. We’re talking about money hidden in plain sight — in boxes of knickknacks, stacks of books and bins of forgotten toys. Whether you deem it trash or treasure, the current craze for all things secondhand and salvaged means someone might give you cold, hard cash for it. And while hosting an old-fashioned yard sale isn’t rocket science, there are a few formulas for success. I put them into practice on a recent Saturday, combining treasures from three houses for a sale that ran from 7 a.m. to 2 p.m. After seven hours of selling castoff DVDs, books, furniture, clothing, toys and housewares, I had pocketed $500 and gotten rid of 75 percent of what I wanted to sell. Read on to see how a yard-sale rookie did it.
1. Combine forces. Collect extra sale items from family members to boost your offerings and created variety and visual impact. If your neighbors need to de-clutter, consider collaborating on a multi-family sale. If “yard sale” is music to frugal ears, then “neighborhood-wide yard sale” is akin to a symphony.
READ FULL STORY HERE >>
Pssst . . . there’s money hidden in your house.
But don’t tear up the floorboards and rip up the mattresses yet. We’re talking about money hidden in plain sight — in boxes of knickknacks, stacks of books and bins of forgotten toys. Whether you deem it trash or treasure, the current craze for all things secondhand and salvaged means someone might give you cold, hard cash for it. And while hosting an old-fashioned yard sale isn’t rocket science, there are a few formulas for success. I put them into practice on a recent Saturday, combining treasures from three houses for a sale that ran from 7 a.m. to 2 p.m. After seven hours of selling castoff DVDs, books, furniture, clothing, toys and housewares, I had pocketed $500 and gotten rid of 75 percent of what I wanted to sell. Read on to see how a yard-sale rookie did it.
1. Combine forces. Collect extra sale items from family members to boost your offerings and created variety and visual impact. If your neighbors need to de-clutter, consider collaborating on a multi-family sale. If “yard sale” is music to frugal ears, then “neighborhood-wide yard sale” is akin to a symphony.
READ FULL STORY HERE >>
Sunday, September 4, 2011
Estate Clearing: Selling your house? Avoid these mistakes
By Amy Fontinelle
Any problem with the property will be uncovered during the buyer's inspection, so there's no use hiding it. Either fix the problem ahead of time, price the property below market value to account for the problem, or list the property at a normal price but offer the buyer a credit to fix the problem. Realize that if you don't fix the problem in advance, you may turn away a fair number of buyers who want a turnkey home. Having your home inspected before listing it is a good idea if you want to avoid costly surprises once the home is under contract.
Mistake No. 10 - Not Preparing Your Home for Sale
Sellers who do not clean and stage their homes are throwing money down the drain. If you can't afford to hire a professional, that's OK - there are many things you can do on your own. Failing to do these things will not only reduce your sale price, but may also prevent you from getting a sale at all. For example, if you haven't attended to minor issues like a broken doorknob, a potential buyer may wonder whether the house has larger, costlier issues that haven't been addressed. Have a friend or agent with a fresh pair of eyes point out areas of your home that need work - because of your familiarity with the home, you may have become immune to its trouble spots. Decluttering, cleaning thoroughly, putting a fresh coat of paint on the walls and getting rid of any odors will also help you make a good impression on buyers.
READ FULL STORY HERE >>
Any problem with the property will be uncovered during the buyer's inspection, so there's no use hiding it. Either fix the problem ahead of time, price the property below market value to account for the problem, or list the property at a normal price but offer the buyer a credit to fix the problem. Realize that if you don't fix the problem in advance, you may turn away a fair number of buyers who want a turnkey home. Having your home inspected before listing it is a good idea if you want to avoid costly surprises once the home is under contract.
Mistake No. 10 - Not Preparing Your Home for Sale
Sellers who do not clean and stage their homes are throwing money down the drain. If you can't afford to hire a professional, that's OK - there are many things you can do on your own. Failing to do these things will not only reduce your sale price, but may also prevent you from getting a sale at all. For example, if you haven't attended to minor issues like a broken doorknob, a potential buyer may wonder whether the house has larger, costlier issues that haven't been addressed. Have a friend or agent with a fresh pair of eyes point out areas of your home that need work - because of your familiarity with the home, you may have become immune to its trouble spots. Decluttering, cleaning thoroughly, putting a fresh coat of paint on the walls and getting rid of any odors will also help you make a good impression on buyers.
READ FULL STORY HERE >>
Decluttering and Organization: How to Cash in on Clutter
By Marla Tabaka
Take a look around you. Are you surrounded by clean, uncluttered space or piles of paper, old magazines, dirty coffee cups and little items begging for a home? If clutter has taken over your space, think about how it makes you feel. Is your stress level high? How productive have you been lately? Is your creativity ebbing; fresh ideas distant? Are things piling up in your mind, just as they are in your office and home?
It begins with a few sheets of paper – meant to be filed at the end of the day. Soon, that pile becomes a stack, the books and magazines that we reference don’t get put away, and eventually nothing seems to find its way back to its proper place. The clutter virus that spreads from one room to the next can have a significant impact on our physical and mental state. Productivity levels drop and fatigue increases. Important tasks fall to the wayside and lost items are senselessly replaced with new; money spent for no practical purpose.
The good news is that you have a choice: check out or cash in.
READ THE FULL STORY HERE >>
Take a look around you. Are you surrounded by clean, uncluttered space or piles of paper, old magazines, dirty coffee cups and little items begging for a home? If clutter has taken over your space, think about how it makes you feel. Is your stress level high? How productive have you been lately? Is your creativity ebbing; fresh ideas distant? Are things piling up in your mind, just as they are in your office and home?
It begins with a few sheets of paper – meant to be filed at the end of the day. Soon, that pile becomes a stack, the books and magazines that we reference don’t get put away, and eventually nothing seems to find its way back to its proper place. The clutter virus that spreads from one room to the next can have a significant impact on our physical and mental state. Productivity levels drop and fatigue increases. Important tasks fall to the wayside and lost items are senselessly replaced with new; money spent for no practical purpose.
The good news is that you have a choice: check out or cash in.
READ THE FULL STORY HERE >>
Closet Makeover: GOT CLUTTER? Control that closet
By Patty McPherson
Does your bedroom closet need a makeover? To make it more inviting and less cluttered, you can work with what you have or install a closet system or other organizing products. There’s a range of products available for every budget. The goal is to create a space where you can see what’s what, where like items are with like, and choosing an outfit is not a taxing experience.
Keep all your clothes hangers the same color, preferably neutral. Swap out unmatched hangers if you are able, and toss/recycle wire hangers that came with dry cleaning and the free plastic ones that came with the garments when you bought them. While the slim, flocked hangers are great, just having all the same plastic tube hangers is an improvement.
Get as much hung up or on shelves as possible, aiming to get as much off the floor as you can (other than shoes or shoe storage). If you want a more involved closet redo, many home improvement stores sell closet kits that are fairly user-friendly. All you need are the measurements of your closet and some tools.
READ FULL STORY HERE >>
Does your bedroom closet need a makeover? To make it more inviting and less cluttered, you can work with what you have or install a closet system or other organizing products. There’s a range of products available for every budget. The goal is to create a space where you can see what’s what, where like items are with like, and choosing an outfit is not a taxing experience.
Keep all your clothes hangers the same color, preferably neutral. Swap out unmatched hangers if you are able, and toss/recycle wire hangers that came with dry cleaning and the free plastic ones that came with the garments when you bought them. While the slim, flocked hangers are great, just having all the same plastic tube hangers is an improvement.
Get as much hung up or on shelves as possible, aiming to get as much off the floor as you can (other than shoes or shoe storage). If you want a more involved closet redo, many home improvement stores sell closet kits that are fairly user-friendly. All you need are the measurements of your closet and some tools.
READ FULL STORY HERE >>
Saturday, September 3, 2011
Hoarders and Hoarding: Animal hoarding recognized as serious mental problem
By Donald Bradley
In 2002, animal control officers in Liberty went to a mobile home park on a report of hoarding.
They found 94 cats, four dogs, a rabbit and a ferret in a woman’s trailer. An officer, learning one of the dogs was diabetic, opened the refrigerator to check for insulin.
It was filled with dead cats, some in Tupperware containers.
In Kansas City, North, this week, officers carried more than 100 cats out of a woman’s house and found 50 or so dead and frozen in a deep freeze, tagged like hamburger.
Same woman.
Delores Metcalf, 56, seems to be a serial cat hoarder.
“She needed help back then, and she didn’t get it, and now she’s done it again,” a woman familiar with the Liberty case said this week.
Perhaps that’s because animal hoarding has only recently been looked upon as a mental disorder. It is relatively new to psychological research, and experts struggle to nail it down.
READ FULL STORY HERE >>
In 2002, animal control officers in Liberty went to a mobile home park on a report of hoarding.
They found 94 cats, four dogs, a rabbit and a ferret in a woman’s trailer. An officer, learning one of the dogs was diabetic, opened the refrigerator to check for insulin.
It was filled with dead cats, some in Tupperware containers.
In Kansas City, North, this week, officers carried more than 100 cats out of a woman’s house and found 50 or so dead and frozen in a deep freeze, tagged like hamburger.
Same woman.
Delores Metcalf, 56, seems to be a serial cat hoarder.
“She needed help back then, and she didn’t get it, and now she’s done it again,” a woman familiar with the Liberty case said this week.
Perhaps that’s because animal hoarding has only recently been looked upon as a mental disorder. It is relatively new to psychological research, and experts struggle to nail it down.
READ FULL STORY HERE >>
Decluttering Books: Turning the page on clutter with e-readers
By Eugene Kane
I've been getting rid of many of my books.
When I tell that to some people, they take it almost as a betrayal.
"What are you thinking? You can't do that!"
They are all book lovers like me, so many can't imagine a world without the magic of the written word.
Books can tell a lot about the owner. My personal library is heavy on African-American authors, particularly fiction, with James Baldwin, Toni Morrison and others leading the pack. I also seek out great writers from other backgrounds like Gabriel Garcia Marquez, John Updike and Philip Roth. In nonfiction, I tend toward biographies or autobiographies; I have Bill Clinton, Barack Obama and Sammy Davis Jr. on the shelves.
I also have Condoleezza Rice, black conservative writers Thomas Sowell and Shelby Steele.
I even have Salman Rushdie.
A love of books can get obsessive, which is why I recently purchased my first Kindle, the revolutionary e-reader that - along with other tablets like the Nook - some believe will eventually make printed books obsolete. I wanted to see if a paperless future can still be packed with satisfying reading.
So far, so good.
READ FULL STORY HERE >>
I've been getting rid of many of my books.
When I tell that to some people, they take it almost as a betrayal.
"What are you thinking? You can't do that!"
They are all book lovers like me, so many can't imagine a world without the magic of the written word.
Books can tell a lot about the owner. My personal library is heavy on African-American authors, particularly fiction, with James Baldwin, Toni Morrison and others leading the pack. I also seek out great writers from other backgrounds like Gabriel Garcia Marquez, John Updike and Philip Roth. In nonfiction, I tend toward biographies or autobiographies; I have Bill Clinton, Barack Obama and Sammy Davis Jr. on the shelves.
I also have Condoleezza Rice, black conservative writers Thomas Sowell and Shelby Steele.
I even have Salman Rushdie.
A love of books can get obsessive, which is why I recently purchased my first Kindle, the revolutionary e-reader that - along with other tablets like the Nook - some believe will eventually make printed books obsolete. I wanted to see if a paperless future can still be packed with satisfying reading.
So far, so good.
READ FULL STORY HERE >>
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