How practical would it be to rent a storage unit nearby? Can you limit the boxes to only one room?

If it is a big house can you use one bedroom for storage v having a little in each room?

Hi, saphire: It's not a very big house, 1600 sf or so; big enough for the two of us though. We have one downstairs bedroom jammed with stuff already;we could get a few more things in there, I guess. We could easily rent a storage place, but DH groans at the thought of moving twice. Also, there's no place in our new house to store things because the floorcoverings aren't in yet. That's about all the alternatives for storage, I guess.

You could put it on the market in mid-April with a note "no showings until May 1". You'll still get pressure to show it, but at least then if the buyer, or their agent, really, really pressures you to see it early, you'll have earned a little fudge factor if it's still full of your stuff. Meanwhile, as soon as you possibly can start moving stuff over to the new house, bit by bit. All this will work unless your new house is delayed for some reason then you will have to rent a storage unit, anyway.

If you truly feel (and your agent concurs) that it's important to get it on the market ASAP weigh that factor against the cost of a storage unit for a few months and renting a UHaul and paying some strong guys to schlepp your stuff there and then to the new house. If getting an early sale would net additional thousands of dollaras, why complain about something that would cost only hundreds?

Moving is always a pain, having a storage unit where you could park stuff might actually be a benefit in the long run.

Molly~

DH recently moved a whole bunch of boxes and furniture from his office building for about 400. It was quick and painless. Honestly DH could probably do it himself in an afternoon. The advantage of boxes is that they are easy to stick in the car to move as opposed to furniture. I have considered doing this just to get some of my furniture out of here when I am ready to list

I think it might be best to wait until you are close to show ready. If the market is slow there and there are a lot of homes, you want your home in the best condition it can be.

I called the realtor we bought this house through,and he said now that the weather has turned nice buyers are active and we probably shouldn't wait until the new house is ready. That may have just been realtor-speak, but I think putting stuff in storage is the best plan. DH doesn't want to "move twice", but how hard can it be? Moving's never fun, but I don't think it's that bad to put some boxes and tables in storage and get them out later. The storage place is 3 miles away.

Thanks for all of your advice. I appreciate it very much.

susanka- do you have a PODS available to you? They just became available to us here. They are really cool. They drop the container in your drive and then you can either have it dropped at your new house or at their facility. I checked yesterday and their larger container was about $90/mo if you stored it on your property. The benefit is that you're only moving the stuff once.

I had to call PODS b/c a realtor friend from church called me last Thurs to tell me that she had a buyer from Arkansas (we're in MI) who was looking at houses in our town. Our house isn't even on the market yet, she just knew we were planning on putting it on some time this Spring. She said that were coming up some time the latter part of next week - the realtor is on vacation until Sunday, so I won't even know for sure until then if the couple wants to definately see our house.
Talk about putting a fire under your bum...we have 5 kids (oldest will be 9 in May) and our current house is just under 1200 sq ft (w/ full basement). We have to paint (we've had the paint for awhile now) and need to replace the carpet. My goal is to just get the house decluttered and painted. I'm not even sure if I'll get it painted, but it needs it desperately! The housing market (and economy) here totally stinks, so I need to at least see this one potential buyer out....I keep hoping the "decluttering and painting fairies" will come overnight and do it all for me...ahh well.

whoops - I blathered on and didn't even answer your question - I say put the house on the market now. Worst case scenario? You have a buyer right away. But if your market is anything like ours, it won't sell too quickly.

onlygirlsmom, thanks for the PODS suggestion. We actually used PODS when we moved from our last location here, and it worked out just great. We really liked it. Our new house is only a half a mile from this house, though, and we had thought we could do much of it in our truck and then hire movers for the piano, etc.

I think DH is being way too much of a baby about moving stuff into storage. It's not that big of a deal. After all, he's not doing it by himself, he has wonderful me to help with everything!

I hope you don't get yourself too bent out of shape for these potential buyers -- my sister had her home on the market for way over a year, more than once had a buyer that just had to see it and knew they wanted it, blah, blah, and none of those buyers plunked down the money at all.

BTW, I happen to have a heretofore undisclosed connection to the decluttering and painting fairies. I am sending them an emergency message. I hope they show up for you!

Thanks for posting.

onlygirlsmom: After talking it over, DH and I decided to use PODS again, only to find out that they don't service our little dinky zip code. Thanks again for the suggestion, though -- if I had any money left I'd invest in PODS, it's a great concept, I think.

Onlygirlsmom, I am living your pain, my kids are 10 (just turned), 7, 5 2 and 2! Our house is 1900 sq ft plus basement and I cannot get my act together! Send those fairies over here please

saphire: You got it! Feel the power!

Susanka

saphire - you only get the fairies after they come to my house!! :) Our kids our 9 (in May), 7 (next week), 5 1/2, 3 1/2, and 13 mos - we have soooo outgrown this house!!

susanka - looks like your DH and mine are exact opposite. I want to put as much stuff into our garage as possible since people don't really care about the garage too much. My DH doesn't want to give up beloved garage space. He just said that maybe we should rent a storage unit and put all of the extra stuff in there - not a PODS though @@.
I should be at least getting the house clean as my sister is coming in tomorrow night from Cali, but I just can't seem to get motivated! Now, my DH just went downstairs and when I asked him what he was doing he said "picking up" I looked at him and said "why are you picking up downstairs? she won't even go down there?" "Because" he says "I'm getting it ready to sell" Oh brother! Never tell a man what to do :)

onlygirlsmom: LOL! Sometimes I forget that. My DH has agreed to the storage option, so that's the route we're taking. Good luck with selling! Maybe your sister will help you declutter when she's there?

nope! she's just staying overnight here before heading over to Chicago, where I'll be joining her on Sat. with multiple other family members to help celebrate my other sister's 50th :)
Now thats something to get excited about as I'll be going sans kids...DH will be hanging out with them :)

Ladies,
If you haven't tried FlyLady, you're missing out on a terrific resource.
I'm depending on her to help me jam my 2800sf + basement + garage full of stuff into our new 2000sf house!

Here is a link that might be useful: Flylady Website

c9pilot, this site is hilarious! DH is a flight instructor. Now I'm going to have two flight instructors telling me what to do! Thanks, I think.

Actually, FlyLady is a fly fisherman.
But I'm a flight instructor so you can count me in!

I'll tell you what, I would be completely lost without FlyLady's "15-minute boogie". I even have my kids help -"Boys, I'm setting the timer for 15 minutes, let's boogie!" They can get their room really, really picked up in 15 minutes. Legos, that's a different story.
I don't clean my house anymore, I do a series of 15-minute boogies in each room, and my DH thinks I've been slaving away. Keeps me moving through the house instead of stuck in a room, trying to reach perfection. Okay, enough of a testimonial for now...

c9pilot: Well, thanks for the link. DH and I are the only boogiers around here at this point, but I'm still not organized. Looks like FLYlady might be a big help. You're not in Colorado, are you? Wondered if you're one of DH's coworkers.

No, currently in California and moving to Florida this summer. Basement full of stuff and sailboat in Maryland. We've got a busy year getting organized ourselves.
I've got a desk job right now. Can only fly so long in the Navy before they put you behind a desk. Retiring in July but hoping to find some flying work in FL.

Onlygirlsmom, I would re-think using your garage as storage. People usualy *do* care about the garage, especially if they have a boat, camper, ATV's etc. It would be easier to visualize with all the clutter removed.

I have to rent storage as I would be embarassed to let prospective buyers see all my junk. ;o)

patty_cakes

As a realtor, I've found the biggest consideration that people fail to make on this point is how expensive it can be to keep up two houses. Besides mowing two lawns, two utility bills and, in most cases, two mortgages, *really* add up. I've seen multiple houses where the people didn't want to put it on the market until they were in their new place, but then they had meltdowns by the 3rd month of double bills. If you have any big expenses (like mortgage left to pay) on your old house, I strongly suggest that the cost and effort of storage will be less stressful for you. (Listen to your realtor! :) )

And as far as filling up your garage goes, buyers around here (Northeast) tend to be very understanding that you are trying to move out and don't mind tons of boxes in a garage or basement... these are typical storage places and as long as they can sorta see around it, and the realtor showing the place knows it's there temporarily, it's not a huge deal.

Good luck with your move!

I think it depends on the type of garage you have. If it is really nice with a cool work area then for men it is the equivalent of using your Sub Zero and granite kitchen counters for storage. I remember a post recently about someone whose neighbor sold their similar house quickly because he had a 3 car heated garage. The comment from men was that some guy wanted that garage and could live with the house it came with (house was not huge so that you would expect such a large garage)

OTOH, in my area garages are really nothing special, usually a tiny one car so no one cares if you fill it with junk

As for flylady I have never been able to get into her and watch out for the emails, you can have a clutter problem just from the amount the site sends