Basement organization can be a very big project. This is especially true if you have stored items there for years without doing any organization at all.  However once you got the basement organized, you should do frequent checks so that the clutter won’t find its way there again.

Take care of all the extra stuff first

The first step as in any other organizing operation is to get rid of the stuff you don’t need. For many people, basement is a place to dump stuff that they don’t use anymore or think that they might need someday.

When starting the organization, have four different plastic bags for taking care of your basement. First one is for junk that you are actually going to throw away. You should categorize that stuff too so that items that go for recycling are in a separate bag. You might even find something worthwhile selling if it’s in good condition, so have a third bag for those items. And fourth bag is for things you want to donate. Naturally in some cases you might use boxes too, since some items might be too big for plastic bags.

For bigger things (and especially if you have lots of it), it’s a good idea to order a dumpster for them. Once again, you may need to categorize what to put there. In some cases some stuff may not be suitable for just throwing away and therefore you need to find out (by asking your city’s/town’s environment authorities) how to deal with that kind of stuff in general.

Clean the floor

Before you can start putting things into their places, it’s a good idea to clean the floor first. Get rid of the dust declutter and if your basement has windows, open them up for some fresh air.

Put things to shelves and categorize them

My basement is actually very small, so I have to take advantage of all the space there is. If possible, I try to store as much stuff possible on the shelves. However that might not be possible all the time. There are numerous reports on water flooding on the floors for example on extreme weather conditions and if you have stuff on the floors, it may ruin those items there completely.

So, try to put as much stuff on the shelves. You might want to put stuff to storage boxes and label them what they contain. Insert the boxes so that the items you need the most are easiest to reach.

Don’t store everything there

There are times when certain items are not very good for storing in the basement. This may be for example CDs, records, books or clothes. Moisture and insects are perhaps one of the most common enemies for those kinds of items.

Take time to do it

Organizing your basement may be a very big project (depending of the size of course), so you might want to dedicate some time for it (for example on weekends). After completing this, you realize how much new free space there is available and you start to figure out how you can take most out it.

Conclusion

After decluttering and organizing my basement, it went from being an overstuffed space to easy to use storage place where all the stuff that I need is easy to reach and use. It takes some effort to do the organization, but once you do it in small sprints (as I did), you eventually see it organized and feel good about that.

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