Call (888) 786-7243A few days ago, the Post carried an article titled, “De-Clutter to Create Space for a Life Well-Lived.” It was full of tips for getting organized, like making lists, setting deadlines, and if necessary, calling in professional organizers. In other words, it was a filler article — all fluff and no substance, not based on real life, where many of us don’t have time to make lists and set deadlines. In real life, sometimes we have to wade in and organize a space in a day, an afternoon, or even an hour.
Moving out can be one of those times. If you Google on “moving tips,” you’re bound to find tons of articles that explain how to make checklists for a move, and timelines that tell you what should be done as you count down the months, weeks, and days to moving day. But those articles always seem to assume that you have unlimited time and unlimited money with which to plan a move. Usually that just isn’t the case. Sometimes you have little warning; sometimes you suddenly realize that you can’t pay the rent, or you’re a student who has been busy with schoolwork up until the last day of the semester, or a roommate situation is making you crazy and you have to leave right now, or…you can fill in the blank with whatever “must leave now” situation you have faced in your own life. Where are the cute lifestyle news articles to tell us how to handle that kind of a move?
Here is my advice.
- First, this is one of those times that self storage is made for. If you have to move before you have a place to move into, your best bet may be to find a friend whose couch you can camp out on, and put whatever you don’t need every day into a self storage unit. Put just what you need into a suitcase or two — a few seasonal clothes, toiletries, and the things that you really can’t live without (your laptop computer, if you have one; your schoolwork or the work supplies you use in your job; and a few items of sentimental value to keep your spirits up). Likewise, if you are an entrepreneur who has lost your work space, storefront, or office, you may want to put just your archives or inventory into self storage. Then you can take home just the things that you really need every day: your computer, your printer, your desk, your working files, your unread mail, etc.
- One issue is that you will need to separate the things you are going to keep out and use every day from the things that are going into storage. One method, if you are being moved by professional movers, is to put the stuff that is going into storage in the moving truck, and put the things that are going with you, wherever you are going, into your car. That way you can feel relatively safe in the assumption that you won’t have to constantly go back to your storage unit to look for things that were accidentally stowed away there.
- Another issue is the packing itself. When you are packing in a hurry, you don’t have time to sort. Here is my method of organizing this kind of slapdash move. Invest in plenty of stackable file-size boxes and a couple of permanent markers. Give each area that you are packing items from its own box (or set of boxes). Then label the boxes based on where things came from. For example, if you are throwing stuff from a bookcase into a box, label the box “tall bookcase, top shelf,” or something similar. Small items from desk drawers can be summarily tossed into clear plastic zip lock bags, and labeled, “top drawer,” “middle drawer,” etc. This way, even if you are unable to sort as you pack, you can still find things later based on your memory of where you would have looked for those items prior to the move.
- The zip lock bags full of small items from your desk drawers should probably go with you, wherever you are going. Put those into one of the boxes that is headed for your car. Label all the boxes, whether they are going with you or into storage, on both ends. That way, when you stack the boxes, you will be able to immediately figure out what items are in what box. If, as I suggest, you use stackable file boxes, you will be able to fit quite a few boxes into a relatively small storage space. If you need to fit tables into that space as well, you can stack the file boxes under and over the tables to save space.
It is not easy to move in a hurry, but if you put a few minutes of thought into the move as you pack, you can still organize your move in a way that will save you time later.