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Days are getting hotter by the day, beaches are quickly filling up, and humidifiers are working extra hard. These could only mean one thing. Summer is finally at your doorstep.
What’s the big deal?
Well, everybody’s favourite season is usually bombarded with fun and refreshing activities. These include trips to the beach and water gun fights across the neighbourhood.
In other words, it’s a busy time for homeowners, and your garage has to be ready for all the coming action. Take out all the unnecessary items and make way for summer fun.
Overwhelming?
Not at all. Just follow these 10 Summer garage clean-out tips to help you get started.
1. Take everything out
The sight of a fully packed and disorganised garage can be overwhelming. Hence, it’s often difficult to know where to start.
If that’s the case, then reserve the thinking for later and pull everything out of your garage. This way, you’ll see how much space you have, and you’ll get to clean every inch of your garage without many obstacles.
2. Sort items by size and function
Now that everything’s out, you’ll have a better view of the items you’ve been storing in the garage for years. Next, sort these items by size and function. It’ll help you decide later which ones to keep or discard.
Gardening tools can be categorised as small items while gym equipment, bicycles, and your lawnmower can be grouped together as large items.
3. Establish your keeping criteria
After sorting, you now have to decide which items should stay and sashay away. And that can be challenging, especially for sentimental clutter. You might want to keep everything, so it’s best to lay down fixed criteria that will help you decide.
You can start by asking yourself the following questions:
- When was the last time I used this?
- Is it still in good working condition?
- Am I keeping this for a good reason?
4. Find alternative storage
Sometimes, while deciding which ones to keep or discard, you’ll find items that are caught in between the two options. They’re still valuable but are not exactly for garage storage (e.g. photographs and books).
The best thing to do for these items is to simply find alternative storage inside the house.
5. Segregate
Sort the discarded things again by function. There might be items that can still be recycled or given out.
Ultimately, segregating will help ease the burden on landfills and will even give some of your discarded items a new purpose.
6. Decide what to do with the discarded items
There’s a bunch of things you can do to items that didn’t make it to the ‘keep’ list other than sending them to landfills. Some of your options are:
- Donation
Australians are generous in nature. This is shown by the abundance of organizations and charities that facilitate donations in the country. Some items they accept are furniture, toys, and clothes.
- Garage Sale
You can earn a little money from your garage discards by hosting a garage sale in the neighbourhood. If keeping a physical store is a hassle, sell your items in online marketplaces like Gumtree and Freecycle.
7. Clean the space
Before placing back the items for keeps, give your garage a good scrub and disinfection.
Make sure to clean from outside to inside, top to bottom, and cleanest to dirtiest to save time.
8. Hire a professional rubbish removal
After sorting out discarded items that can still be donated or sold, you’re still left with large pieces of trash on your lawn. Sigh.
Well, it’s time for you to rest and leave rubbish removal to the experts. They have the expertise and appropriate tools to properly dispose of your garage clean-out.
9. Organise your garage
After decluttering and deep cleaning your garage, you’re now set to bring the usable items back. But, this time, make sure to have a floor plan and use properly labelled bins and boxes.
10. Install shelves and overhead storage
After organising, you’re now left with lots of space. But the season is just starting, and you might need more by the end of it. Hence, it would be wise to utilise every area you have now.
Shelves can be attached to your garage walls to store small items, while big boxes and other things can be tucked away from your sight with overhead storage that has as much space as your floors.
Final Thoughts
You might think that these are all too much work. But, when summer finally comes, you’ll eventually see how convenient having an organised garage is, knowing where to put the tools, and having just enough space for every item.
With these tips, you can kiss spring goodbye without worries and be ready just in time for summer.
