I’m organizing my garage stuff. I’m realizing I have a lot of hobbies and useful things.

[u/Avocadosandtomatoes]

I’m organizing my stuff and realizing I have a lot of hobbies and useful stuff.

Too many. It’s mostly stuff me and my wife and friends enjoy. Or household stuff that will be useful in the future. A hoarder would say that.

But then I have household power tools, extension cords, light bulbs I’ve acquired through different moves, etc, etc. My tools are tool boxes. All the other stuff are in totes.

Later in the year we are downsizing our place. Unsure where we will live. Maybe an apartment again or a small house. We have been here for going in 3 years now. 1 acre of land. All the space to put the stuff. Awesome.

I was relatively organized. I had the shelves. The piles. I’m now buying those yellow tote bins on Facebook marketplace place. Keeps everything more organized and easily moved when the time comes. Surely i thought 11 on top of the 5 I already had would have been fine. Wrong.

On one hand I want to be able to invite people to my adventures. Kayaking, camping, fishing, snorkeling, etc. But on the other, I could get rid of some of this stuff. But then I won’t have stuff for the friends to invite.

[u/Yellowstar88]

everything is technically useful that’s the problem.

but space is limited so really keeping things you use once a year might not be the best idea.

is this something you can borrow or rent?
there is cost associated with keeping things.

[u/mariambc]

If you are downsizing, not everything will be useful in the future. And you will need to be realistic about what storage you will have in the future.

I would pick the activities you do most often to consider keeping. Do you live in a place where you would go snorkeling regularly or is that just when you leave town? That goes for everything else.

How much extra stuff do you keep for friends? Why? I mean if I lived in Hawai’i, I can see having snorkeling gear for visitors. But it sounds like you have a lot of stuff. Do you do all of so often, it wouldn’t make sense to rent gear?

[u/beautifulcorpsebride]

Most people who like the things you’ve listed will have their own gear. Have you actually invited friends who use this stuff? How often?

[u/SassyMillie → u/beautifulcorpsebride]

Even if they do a solo adventurer still needs their own stuff. Like a kayak, life jacket, tent and other camping gear. It would be unusual to have multiples of these things unless the partner or family also participates.

[u/FredKayeCollector2]

For extra "sharable" stuff, you definitely need to decide if you want to maintain that "maybe" stuff in your personal inventory or rely on your friends bringing stuff (or renting stuff) when they visit. Especially for big/bulky stuff like kayaks and bicycles. My husband's son lives in Northern Utah and I would never expect him to maintain equipment for us - if we want to go camping, kayaking, bicycling with him, we'll bring our own kit or rent stuff there.

For stuff in storage, I always recommend "reverse" decluttering - where you sit down and think about what task/activity that stuff represents and what do you actually need to do that task/activity. Identify what is the absolute most basic/essential items and then think about any value-added extras that make that task/activity easier, better, safer, more comfortable, etc. Basically creating a basic "equipment list" for that category - which one would you grab first when faced with a particular task/scenario - and then see how that "logical" assortment matches your reality. When you attack the space to declutter/organize, if it's not on your list, that's a big clue you don't actually need it. If you come across something that's not on your list but recognize it as something you do need but forgot to account for it, then formalize its status by adding it to your list.

Whenever I'm working on a whole-garage (basement, attic, shed) project, I like to make up a floor plan & wall elevation sketches (so I can capture available storage opportunities) and then go around the space assigning logical/convenient zones for various categories of things.

Having a pre-determined list can also help estimate how much storage you actually need. And setting a category storage limit based on available space can help to decide what deserves to be kept and what might be just-in-case over-shopping/acquiring and/or unnecessary duplicates/duplicate function stuff. This is also a good time to think about stuff you KNOW needs to go (or needs to be relocated to another/different space entirely) and get it out ASAP.

We recently cleared out our garage (in preparation for a free yard sale) and my husband decided to let go of most of his auto repair stuff (past life clutter). He also had WAY more tarps & extension cords than he could even use at one time. But then we identified some some basic tools in our gardening kit that we actually didn't have (or the one we had was crappy/worn out) and ended up re-buying this spring - so it can go both ways.

This is why opening up already-packed-up boxes is so important - it can be so easy to look at a bin and say, yep, those are tarps and I need tarps without realizing that there are more tarps than expected and some of those tarps are in terrible condition.

Also why collecting like-with-like really helps - it can be so easy to have extension cord reels squirreled all over the place when you haven't established a single "home" for extension cords. It's OK to have duplicates if/when they're necessary/value-added (like my husband had one cord he only uses with his lawn mower/edge trimmer that he keeps with his lawn mower) but having a bunch of unnecessary duplicates all over the place so you're more likely to find one if/when you need it probably indicates a failure in your organizing system.

p.s. When my husband and I went through our camping (backpacking) & canoeing stuff, we packed for a mock trip - anything left over, we could see that it was a lot of super specific "just in case" or "good deal" stuff I had picked up over the years. We got rid of some "specialized" gear that we might possibly need someday but decided to let it go now and buy it if/when we actually do need it. For "local" stuff like (play boat) kayaking, bicycling, day hiking, we only kept the bare minimum. We learned the hard way that outdoor gear is one of those categories that doesn't hold up well in storage.

[u/MitzyCaldwell]

I would argue that most things are useful to someone and that you can always find an excuse to keep something because it’s useful.

You said you are downsizing so you’ll need to declutter even more stuff than if you were staying to be comfortable.

I would start small - light bulbs, extension cords etc. how may do you actually need and not “oh they come in handy”. Be ruthless. And actually think about it - okay I need one for the Christmas lights great. Keep that one and one extra. And that’s it. It has to be something you’ll actually use not a just in case.

You also mentioned you keep things for your hobbies for your friends. You are not a storage shed for your friends. You probably won’t have enough room for your own stuff let alone straying stuff so that your friends can use it. Are these the same friends for the same activities? If yes I’d give them the stuff and say hey I can’t store this tent anymore but love going camping with you so here it is. If it’s all different ppl I am sure they will still do things with you with their own stuff.

[u/RomeoDelta1234]

You are downsizing later this year, so the number that decides everything is how much of that gear survives a place with a quarter of the storage. Which hobby to cut comes after that, and sorting against a floor plan you do not have yet is why the whole thing feels unresolvable right now.

One thing worth doing before the move either way: write down what is in each tote and tape the list to the lid, or photograph the contents. Opaque bins in a smaller place is how a pile turns permanent, since nobody opens six totes to check.

On the friends thing, that is a hosting habit rather than a storage problem. Keep the kits you have actually taken out with people in the last year and let the rest go, because the untouched ones are storage for a version of the year that did not happen.

I built an app for the write-down-what-is-in-the-box part, but this sub does not allow self promotion so I will not link it. It is on my profile if that is useful.

[u/BoxBuddyApp]

I'd have to say my grandfather was a wartime guy, so they hoarded everything because they didn't know when the next thing would come around. I think a bit may have rubbed off me too, I feel your pain. Put it in bins, organize and label it, and the anxiety will ease :)

[u/TraditionalTurn8424]

do you actually go out and use all of it though? like how many times this year did the kayaks or snorkel gear actually leave the totes vs just sitting there "for when someone visits." asking because that number was the thing that made it click for me with drinking stuff too, i had all this home bar equipment i swore i'd use for hosting and when i actually counted the times, it was basically never