Downsizing your home may be a planned choice or it may be something you stumble upon. Downsizing was not on our radar when our son headed to college in September 2017. His departure made our house seem quieter and larger but we still hadn’t considered downsizing.

As a realtor, I get to see all of the houses that are new to the market on Bainbridge Island. One of the homes on tour I instantly fell in love with but it was tiny. Literally half the size of our current home at the time and so we asked ourselves: could we make it work? After several discussions and very little planning, we decided to move forward and downsize. Since our decision was unplanned, we just reacted to each hurdle and here are the tips we wish we would’ve known before we downsized.

Step 1: Decide What Are Things You Need vs Things You Want
Even if downsizing is a year or more away, start getting rid of stuff. The longer you live in a house the more stuff you’ve amassed. We didn’t realize it but we were hoarding old electronics, old electronics’ packaging, furniture, and file cabinets full of dated documents. We had stuff-stuffed behind every closed cabinet in our our garage and storage areas. Take advantage of the annual Rotary Auction to kickstart your effort. They’ll accept just about everything and for a fee, they’ll take sofas, doors and even a kitchen sink. If you wait to pare down closer to your move date, the decisions on what to keep will be more difficult.. and possibly emotional. Start early!

Watch for the FREE/donation shredding events too. When we moved, we spent over $250 on shredding alone because we had a week to get rid of our old files. In 2020, Bainbridge Island’s free/donation shredding event will be on April 25th in the Columbia Bank parking lot.

Step 2: Get A Home Inspection
Reduce the number of possible surprises by getting a home inspection. Rather than getting excited about available homes, make sure your current home is market ready. It’ll take some of the stress out of timing the sale/purchase process. A home inspection will give you an opportunity to make repairs before you fall in love with your next smaller home. We made the mistake of finding our next home before our current one was listable and almost lost out. While prepping our home for sale, the home we wanted went under contract. Fortunately for us, the deal fell through.

Step 3: Moving To Your New Home and Storage
The most important decision we made, after our sale/purchase went through, was finding a storage facility between the two homes. Half of the items we moved to storage were ‘we might need’ and half were waiting to be sold or donated. Either way, cramming everything into our much smaller house and deciding then ‘what to keep’ would’ve been a nightmare. The ‘we might need’ items sat in storage for 1 – 6 months to see if we needed them. If we didn’t, we donated the items.

Optional Step 4: Get A PO Box
If you’re staying on island or moving off, get a PO Box near your next home. You can have your mail forwarded to your new address but it’s risky and not 100%. With a PO Box, you can start changing your mailing address for your important mail in the months prior to your move.

These are just some broad downsizing tips that helped us during our move. Have some downsizing tips of your own? Please email me and I’ll try to share them in future posts!