Crap hoarding

[goraman]

How much crap sits around in the average home that dosen't even get used once a year?

Here in the U.S. it seems a lot of very large homes are nothing more than storage for alot of useless crap.

I have been soul searching and getting ride of so much clutter and stuff I was saveing just because it seemed to good to throw out.

I am really starting to think before buying something and adding it to our smallish condo of just under 1000 sqft.

It feels liberating to reduce ones worldly possesions to what we use or need.

There is really just so much crap people pile in closets and storage mostly forgotten till they have to dig through it looking for something.

I have been scaleing way down,I even gave away my sons beautiful Canadian Maple crib to a neighbor for free just to make room for his new twin bed.
I also gave away tons of really expencive baby cloths from Baby Gap,Carters and Baby's R us.

How often do you take inventory and reduce your crap?

[Beechwoods]

How often do you take inventory and reduce your crap?

Every 3 or 4 months! We live in a small house, small by Bristol standards anyway. We have learnt to be careful and not accumulate things that don't get used. We recycle, freecyle, and the local charity shops do very well out of us.

There is something cathartic about letting go of stuff when you know you don't really need it. Sometime this year I'm going to have to go through some of my gear, and move some on, so I can refocus some of what I have in terms of sources on the higher end. This is probably good discipline :)

[Tim]

I'm in the middle of a 'de-clutter' period right now! I moved abroad a few years ago and I had to get rid of boxes of stuff in the loft before I moved, stuff I hadn't seen or used in years - it took ages sorting through it all. :(

When I returned I spent 5 years in my last place (which also had a loft) and I moved again last year....... I had yet again managed to collect more crap! Now my current apartment doesn't have a loft, so at the moment the spare room is full of stuff and everything is going. I have been to the tip and the charity shop loads of times, the rest is going on eBay. I gave away hundreds of books, as I now have a Kindle and my vinyl is going too - haven't had a TT for years! I will be moving again before 2015, so the next move is going to be a lot less painful and it's quite liberating getting rid of surplus crap :)

[DSJR]

I'm the hoarder in our family and it's now of mega proportions. Now we hardly ever use the car (I'm 5 minutes walk from my workplace) the garage will have to be cleared out so I can put the car in there. The loft isn't too bad and it's tidily laid out, but the garage is something else...

[goraman]

As kid I remember thinking maby my Dad won't scew this one up, after we bought a very nice 4 bedroom house with a big back yard and both vacant lots on the left side of the house.Now there are 3 homes there.
So we had a lot of room to store stuff.We moved all the stuff into the house first and both my Mom and Dad where epic shit collectors.I had hoped they wouldn't fill the new house up with crap so I said,OK we have the importaint stuff can we just leave the rest of it or take it to the dump?
My Dad was so pissed.
The 2 car garage was so bad I used to tell my freinds not to go in our garage because there where Japanees soldgiers in there that didn't know the war was over yet!

In less than a year we had a large camp trailer packed,no less than 3 large sheds full and no room in the 2 car garage for even 1 car,we had a couple of camper shells,piles of pipes,old lumber,bike frames and 3 old cars on the side lot.
It just kept getting worse and worse.
The large covered patio in the back yard was then covered in boxes of crap and the lawn in the back yard died off.
I hated comming home,and I hated school.My only retreat was my room I kept very uncluttered and listined to music most of the time.

And he spent his whole life dragging it home,makeing a trip once and awhile to the dump when rats would infest some of it,he even put stuff in old dressers out there.Also rusty metal gas station cabnets and metal trash cans full of stuff.Any old pile of crap he could drag home.
When he died my step mom had a huge yard sale then had to get help to fill several 22 yard dumpsters.
It took over a year to get the back yard cleared out.My Dad never used any of it.


Hording affects everyone around you,your family,neighbors ect...
I have been told by my wifethat I get rid of everything,she said she thinks one day I'll get rid of her too..
That upsets me,I just don't like a house full of stuff,I don't like cluttered rooms you have to navagate through,I need room to move around .

[Reid Malenfant]

I'm a bit of a hoarder as well :eyebrows: I have boxes full of electronic components & literally loads of stereo kit that i could never use, there is just too much. I guess my excuse is i never thought i'd be able to afford decent hifi kit so i was going to build what i couldn't afford, so i gathered up anything & everything that might be useful :doh:

I have a garage full of stuff, an 8 x 16ft shed full & even the greenhouse has loads of stuff in it :eek:

I'm gradually clearing stuff out though & seeing as the projects have been knocked down to a more suitable scale i can & will get things in order - eventually :lolsign:

[goraman]

Free your self of all the crap ,youll feel great donateing it to second hand stores.
Just do it!!!

[Reid Malenfant]

Perhaps i should have added that a good bit of it doesn't work :doh: I used to buy stuff from car boot sales & repair & then sell the stuff to make a bit of money ;)

[goraman]

Perhaps i should have added that a good bit of it doesn't work :doh: I used to buy stuff from car boot sales & repair & then sell the stuff to make a bit of money ;)
I would send it to e waste.
Or give it to a electronics repair shop for parts.

[Alex_UK]

The 2 car garage was so bad I used to tell my freinds not to go in our garage because there where Japanees soldgiers in there that didn't know the war was over yet!

Yep, that's my garage! :o

I am terrible - I spend so much money on crap I don't need, and then it just sits in a drawer or cupboard or the "garage" which is actually no such thing as it is full of my junk...

I do have a plan, though - Freecycle (http://www.freecycle.org/) - I've joined up, just got to get on with it now :)

[Jonboy]

i'm almost down to a double garage full of crap, got rid of the barn full i had a couple of years ago, including 5 tractors and various vintage machinery, just 1 tractor plus implements left and about a dozen stationary engines (http://www.stationary-engine-magazine.co.uk/), and thats not counting my Hifi bits which take over the upstaairs of my garage, oh yer there must be 20 clocks knocking around and a box full of watches, i like my toys

[The Grand Wazoo]

Yep, that's my garage! :o

I am terrible - I spend so much money on crap I don't need, and then it just sits in a drawer or cupboard or the "garage" which is actually no such thing as it is full of my junk...

I do have a plan, though - Freecycle (http://www.freecycle.org/) - I've joined up, just got to get on with it now :)

Don't fool yourself, Alex.
Freecycle is full of adverts by folks who're giving stuff away too you know. You will succumb!

[MartinT]

I have been slowly e-Baying crap to the point that my house is tidy. I now need to de-crapify my garage. I still have some audio components to sell, but it's making the time to test them, photograph them etc.

[Rare Bird]

anything intresting Martin? :eyebrows:

[MartinT]

I have a Croft SIP preamp, Series 4S power amp (one channel not working), Leak Stereo 20 (highly modified), Rogers Cadet II that I can think of. I would like to find the Crofts a good home and doubt that the power amp would take much sorting out.

[Beechwoods]

Bruce Sterling wrote an interesting, if wordy, essay on working out what is important to keep and what is OK to lose... it's interesting to find some universality to my own home grown philosophy on the subject.

http://www.viridiandesign.org/notes/451-500/the_last_viridian_note.html

[DSJR]

I have a Croft SIP preamp, Series 4S power amp (one channel not working), Leak Stereo 20 (highly modified), Rogers Cadet II that I can think of. I would like to find the Crofts a good home and doubt that the power amp would take much sorting out.

A mate with a Series 4S lost a channel and I believe it was only a fuse. The amp went back to Glenn for a check-over last year I understand and there was nothing amiss after 20 years reasonable but not excessive use :)

[Rare Bird]

Hi Martin
Are you sure it's a Cadet 'II' or 'III'?

[MartinT]

Are you sure it's a Cadet 'II' or 'III'?

Well I've perused images online and it looks very much like it's a Mk. III because of the shield between the caps and valves. Well spotted! I must dig it out and power it up sometime, fabulous little amp.

[Rare Bird]

Well I've perused images online and it looks very much like it's a Mk. III because of the shield between the caps and valves. Well spotted! I must dig it out and power it up sometime, fabulous little amp.

Aye.. Of course you don't want old tat like that hanging around :eyebrows: