Category: Selling Our Stuff

Storage: What We kept and What We Shouldn’t Have

Post author By Sam
Post date June 18, 2017
3 Comments on Storage: What We kept and What We Shouldn’t Have

When we sold our house in Lehi, Utah 6 months into our travels, we got rid of mostly everything. What we kept was stored in a 5ft by 10ft storage unit and we have added a few things from our travels over time. We recently emptied it out on our way to set up a condo as an AirBnB in Driggs, Idaho and have some thoughts about what we kept. We figured it could be useful for anyone considering what to keep and what to lose as they set out on a full time travel adventure.

Stuff We Kept in Storage

Tools

Sam kept most of his small hand and power tools. They were compact and easy to store, and he wasn’t going to be able to recover enough money from selling them to make replacement easier. The only larger tool he kept was the planer. And a collapsible ladder. Gone were the table saw, band saw, shop smith, and other large tools. Keeping the smaller tools has been handy while setting up the condo, and the pain of storing these was low. Sam’s brother eventually grabbed the planer and took it up to Driggs where he has a garage/workshop and that’s been super handy to have around as we’ve made furniture.

Kid Toys

The kids were very willing to give up some of their toys, and these we gave away or sold at garage sales. There were some toys that they really wanted to keep. Recognizing this, we told the kids they could keep anything they wanted, and we’d store it. They didn’t realize that they’d be years older, and mostly not interested in the same toys (Barbies come to mind). With the exception of the wooden train tracks (which are my favorite anyway) & possibly the Imaginext Castle & Aircraft carrier the kids have not been very interested in the toys they kept. We are NOT sorry we kept these, as the decrease in child stress as we transitioned to travel was totally worth it.

We did keep a bucket of baby toys as I have quite a few younger nieces and nephews, including a small-ish plastic kitchen set. I figured its always nice to have a few things around to keep babies and toddlers entertained. These are coming in handy as now we can advertise the condo as “baby friendly”.

Family Pictures

We had a decent appreciation of good photography prior to travel. We had a collection of nicely printed family pictures: canvas wraps, nicely framed photos, and mounted prints. As we are setting up the condo as a rental, we are not hanging them up. Part of me is sad, but I’m sure our renters don’t want a 20×30 canvas of my children on the wall. We may make some changes after Hawaii, when we plan to spend more time here but mostly I’m not sure what we will do with them. There are a few I still love but are too personal to put in a rental space, so we may just keep our favorites for some future date and throw away the rest.

Yearbooks and other Mementos

A small number of boxes contain things like high school yearbooks and items from childhood adventures. These will stay in the garage. I’d like to come up with a better way of preserving these memories, but until I do, we’ll keep them.

Folding Chairs and Storage Tubs

We kept some folding chairs and extra storage tubs that we didn’t have contents for. Some of the tubs have worn out in storage and developed cracks. We’ll throw these out and use some of our spares instead. We wouldn’t be hurting if we hadn’t kept the extras. The extra chairs have come in handy as we’ve had visitors to the Condo, but folding chairs are pretty inexpensive and it would have been fine to just buy some.

My Old Office Decorations

Just a few months before we left for the house swap never to return, I had redone my office downstairs in the Lehi house. It was perfect. I painted one wall a deep shade of purple, had white furniture and then brightly accented decorations all over the room. It was a happy place and I loved being in there to edit photos and work on my photography business. I didn’t keep any of the furniture, but I did keep my favorite small rug, a vase with bright pink & yellow gerber daisies, and some bright storage bins. It made me smile when I pulled them out of the storage tub and they’ve actually all found a place here in the condo. Its been perfect.

Pots & Pans

We’ve had our set forever and its still in great shape. Since buying a new set can be slightly prohibitive (even just picking out which one I want!) I’m glad we kept these. Its been great to have cooking gear from the get-go without any effort.

Select Comfort California King Bed

For our wedding, Sam’s parents bought us a California King Select Comfort bed. We love it. They are crazy expensive and easy to fold up and store in the original boxes (which we’ve always kept – makes moving really handy) so it was a no brainer to keep. Its the only bed/mattress we kept though and I’m happy about that. It was also really strange to go from a smaller-than-a-double bed in the Airstream, to a Cal King. I think I got lost the first few nights.

Holiday Decorations

We did garage sale quite a few of our holiday decorations, but there were also a lot I made and loved. Ironically, we are going to Hawaii this year and won’t be here over the holidays, but I’m still glad we kept them. We have some seasonal decorations for spring/summer, some for Halloween and then Christmas. We’ll see how they fit into our lives before we decide what to keep.

Games

We kept quite a few games, and have actually switched them out in the Airstream a few times. We are avid game players and I’m not sorry we kept the ones we did. We’ve added a few group games and they are stored on a shelf in Rachel’s closet. We’ll leave them out for guests to use and continue to swap out which ones we want in the Airstream.

Stuff We Lent To Family & Friends

We loaned out quite a few items to friends before we sold the house and were able to collect them during our mad dash to load up the moving truck. Various family members babysat our TV, entertainment center stand, waffle maker (double Belgian flip – my favorite!), bread maker, some framed photos, an IKEA chair and two dressers, a lamp, and some miscellaneous kitchen dishes. My sister got married a few months before we needed to gather things and no longer needed our stuff; pretty good timing. While these items would not have been too painful to replace, having them is a nice bonus. They weren’t worth the space to store however, so I’m glad we had good people to watch over them.

Items We Are Happy We Didn’t Keep:

Furniture

Our 2400 square foot house is vastly different than the 1300 square foot condo. While I loved our large, oval, pedestal dining table in the house, there’s no way it would have fit in the condo. Same with a lot of the bookshelves, couches, chairs, and other furniture. We are different people and love different things now, plus its honestly a lot of fun to switch things up.

We did manage to pick up a really comfortable $50 couch from my mom’s neighbor which we transported in the moving truck. So much better than any couch we could have stored. See? Things work out. We also did the Costco run of all Costco runs and picked up three mattresses (two twins and a queen), in addition to paper towels, toilet paper, flour, sugar, and other miscellaneous items. Loading them in the moving truck was a fantastic way to transport everything up to Driggs.

Everything Else

As I sit here and type, there’s not a single thing that I think “Oh, I wished we would have kept that.” Maybe its been too long and I don’t remember, but perhaps that’s also a testament to how much stuff we really don’t need. We’ve been very deliberate about buying items for the condo, making sure we really need it and that it serves a purpose. Okay, we probably didn’t need to buy an Instant Pot, but its sure been fun to have.

Stuff we kept, but shouldn’t have:

The Armoire

When Sam was a kid he finished a large, freestanding armoire. They used them to store clothes in their small home, and for most of our marriage we’ve used it as a game closet. Super handy. Except the stupid thing is ridiculously heavy and huge. We had thought we’d bring it up in the condo, but after moving it up from Utah we have no desire to do so. Our rooms are fairly small and it would take over the space. We’ve since listed and sold it, but not having to lug that thing around would have been much better!

Clothes

Sam and I each kept a bin of clothes that we didn’t want to part with, but didn’t want to bring in the Airstream. If there’s one thing I’ve learned in this process, its don’t keep things that don’t bring you joy. Going through my bin it was easy to donate most everything I kept. If I don’t want it in the Airstream, why would I want it elsewhere? I think in hindsight we could have kept quite a bit less.

Photography Business Supplies

I ran a boutique business with cute packaging, welcome packets, and had samples to show at client consultations. Since I wasn’t sure what the fate of my photography business would be, all my supplies went into storage. While I still love photography, I have no desire to take on clients so now I have a large box of paperweights. Sigh. Its just one more thing I have to deal with and get rid of now.

Books

This one is hard. We’ve had a bit of a “roving library” with all our books stashed at my parent’s house in Sandy, UT. When we went through to visit (every 6 months or so) we’d swap out books. I also have a love for used bookstores. There are some books we simply couldn’t get through the library Overdrive system to read on the kindle and I searched for used copies in various states. Now we have boxes of books, some which I’m sure the kids won’t ever read again. We need to go through them and decide which ones to sell back to a bookstore, and which are our favorites to keep. It’ll take time and I’m not exactly looking forward to it.

Conclusion

Overall I feel we did pretty good. We don’t have a ton of excess stuff, and most of the items we kept have been useful upon re-entry. We have spent quite a bit of money outfitting the condo. By the time we are done we estimate close to $10,000. We are doing a really nice job as we want to AirBnB the space, so I’m sure it could be done for less money otherwise. We knew it was coming and our main purpose for hanging out in the southwest last winter was to work a ton, live cheap, and save money.

The more you get rid of, the more you have to buy on the flip side, but if you add up the storage costs over three years I feel like its a pretty good trade off. Plus, the freedom of not owning a lot (or even having it in storage weighing on your mind) is amazing and we would definitely do it all over again!

Selling Our Stuff Video

Wandering Video Update: The Storage Unit & How We Keep Track of the Stuff We Kept

Post author By Jess
Post date July 11, 2014

We already had a great storage system in place before we started this whole downsizing thing, so I just kept the system. If it’s not broken, don’t fix it, right? We have 38 tubs all purchased at various times from Lowe’s and each one has a number that coordinates to a spreadsheet in Google Docs. This way I don’t have to label the tubs with what is in it, and if I empty one and fill it with something else I just update the spreadsheet. As I emptied them out to our DI and Yard Sale piles I would fill them up with things we were keeping and update the contents in the spreadsheet. Easy peasy. Once we had moved the bin to the storage unit (it took about 8 trips to get everything over there) I would highlight that line in BOLD.

Hopefully we can keep track of everything! I was going to organize the tubs in the storage unit so anything we might need would be easily accessible, but that just didn’t happen. We’ll have to dig. The boxes at the bottom of the list are Rachel’s old clothes ready and sorted for Cara to wear when she grows into them. I’m hoping we can either swing through and grab a box when needed, or convince my parents to go get it and mail it? We’ll see. I have a feeling we’ll just end up mostly buying her new clothes instead of using hand me downs. I guess we’ll put that in the “con” category of full time travel.

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Here’s a video of Sam talking about our storage unit and what we kept:

While it may not be the perfect solution, we’ll see how it goes over the next year or so. Hopefully we have everything we need with us which will make trips to the storage unit few and far between!

Tags minimaism, storage unit, storing stuff to travel full time

Selling Our Stuff

Getting Rid of Our Stuff and {Our House Cooling Party}

Post author By Jess
Post date July 10, 2014
2 Comments on Getting Rid of Our Stuff and {Our House Cooling Party}

You just can’t take it all with you. Part of the process of getting ready to live on the road full time in our Airstream was to minimize all of our stuff. This was a gigantic project, as over the last 10 years we’ve accumulated quite a bit. We started this process when we first arrived back to our house in April of 2014 and finished in June. It really took almost an entire 2 months (with a 2.5 week break for our trip to Southern Utah). We had a couple of approaches to downsizing, and while our methods weren’t super organized and streamlined, it seemed to work well. We survived. If you are looking to do the same, here’s what we did:

1. Decide What to Keep and Pack It Up.

Sounds a lot easier than it actually is. We went through the house room by room and decided what we absolutely had to keep. Mementos, decorations, special toys. If we were done using them they got packed away in our storage bins and then stashed in the garage ready for a trip to the storage unit. Much of our “keep” stuff we packed away in the last two weeks. In fact, for my birthday on June 16th all I wanted was everything we were keeping out of the house and packed away in the storage unit. With a leave date of the 20th, we figured we could just live in the Airstream until then.

Once we decided what to we absolutely were keeping, then came the challenge of deciding what to do with everything else. Since throwing it all away was neither economical or responsible we used a combination of sell it/loan it/give it away.

2. Sell It.

There are LOTS of ways to sell your stuff. Some worked better than others, and a lot depending on what we were selling. As depressing as it is to sell things for pennies on the dollar, it was also kind of addicting to watch our stuff fly out the door. As we watched our house empty out, my stress levels also declined.

Online yard sale Facebook groups. This worked surprisingly well. As we went through each room, I took photos with my phone of everything we wanted to sell. From there, it was easy enough to log in to Facebook, upload the photos and attach a price. The nice part is that you don’t have to really go anywhere, they buyers generally come to you. My biggest problem with this was making people mad because I wouldn’t hold something, or deciding to sell to a buyer with a higher price. It got a little competitive a few times. I’d generally list things on a day when I knew we would be home and then just told people to come anytime. Once they arrived, I would seriously walk around the house pulling things off the wall.

KSL/Craigslist: For items worth more (tools, bikes, some furniture) I would also list on the local KSL classifieds, or on Craigslist (surprisingly not as popular in Utah). These were items I knew would take longer to sell, so we tried to get them up ASAP and give them the longest time frame possible. We did have a couple of tools and a bike leftover that are still listed and are being stored with friends until they sell.

Yard Sale(s): Probably my least favorite option, but worked well. Our First Yard Sale was a success despite the crazy rainy weather, and our second Tool Sale/Misc sale also went rather well despite being in the afternoon. We held one about a week after we returned home to Utah, and the other at the last possible Saturday before we left for good. This allowed us to do an initial purge of clothes, kitchen items, lots of little things, and then as the months progressed I would either list stuff for sale using the methods above, or start a pile for the next sale. I listed the yard sale dates and times in all the Facebook groups I could get in to, plus also on KSL as well trying to get as many people to come as possible. We also posted signs on the major street crossings.

3. Long Term Loans.

There were quite a few items that we weren’t sure we were ready to get rid of, but would be useful for friends and family in the meantime. Dressers, our backyard picnic table, some tools, flat screen TV, some wall art, and our Sonos Player are a few. These we loaned to friends and family with the mindset that we could get them back when we were done traveling, although we don’t really expect to. If it works out great, if not we’ll buy new ones. None of these items are irreplaceable and “loaning” wasn’t as permanent as selling, plus we trust and know the people that will be watching our stuff.

4. Give It Away.

We did A LOT of this. Friends, family, and neighbors were definitely on the upside of our downsize. The very last event we held was a “House Cooling Party” the night before we moved out of the house. As opposed to a warming party where friends and neighbors bring you items for your house, we warned everyone that they would have to leave with something of ours. It was a huge success! We doubled it as a good-bye party and rented a bounce house for the kids as well as ordering Costco pizza and other goodies. We showed off the Airstream, saw old and new friends, and generally had a fantastic time! What amazed us though was that people really did come and take. We piled everything left in the garage on tables, the floor, wherever we could fit and our friends went through our stuff and took what they needed. Total win-win. We didn’t have to cart it off as a donation and they got things they needed.

5. Throw It Away.

Last, but not least was our final purge to the dump. After the house cooling party, we piled everything we couldn’t donate (which was 99% of what was left) into our truck and took it to the nearby dump. We figured it was stuff no one wanted and it was the easiest thing to do the morning we left. We also had one previous trip to the dump after the First Yard Sale, but that was mostly things we had lying around the house that needed to be purged anyway.

As difficult as it was to slim down our possessions, we really feel it was worth it! Not having to store a lot (brings down the cost of a storage unit) is a definitely plus, but also having to really decide what was important to us and learning to let go of the rest.

Tags Minimalism, selling your stuff

Selling Our Stuff

What is Left After Downsizing from 2500 Sq Feet to 180 – Our 10×5 Storage Unit

Post author By Jess
Post date June 26, 2014
7 Comments on What is Left After Downsizing from 2500 Sq Feet to 180 – Our 10×5 Storage Unit

Our 10x5 Storage Unit Downsizing is such a simple word isn’t it? Maybe not. Maybe just in my imagination. When we decided to sell the house, we knew we’d have to sell, donate, or throw away almost everything in it, but the magnitude of that project didn’t really impress itself into our brains until we were already knee deep. It was tough. 10 and 1/2 years of marriage, 3 kids, and years of “plenty of space” led to a house full of things we rarely used, and definitely did not need. We are actually really good about not being packrats, yet stuff managed to proliferate anyway.

Getting the kids to clean out was probably the hardest part. Knowing they needed some security, Sam and I agreed that they could store whatever they felt they wanted (within limits). We had plenty of storage tubs (34 to be precise) and since we knew WE were keeping very little, we’d most likely have room. For the most part, they did really great. I’ll admit I cleaned out most of their room without them, but we saved their treasure boxes, Andrew wanted his orange comforter (me – I’ll buy you a new one. Him – MOM! It has to be this EXACT SAME ONE), Cara had some toys, and they all had stuffed animals I refused to let them bring. I drew the line at 3, but I’m pretty sure they all snuck in a few more.

Sam kept his planer since it was the one large tool he’d buy over again. The other tools he would rather upgrade so they were sold. After at least 2 months of going back and forth, I finally sold off the rest of my cute office furniture (I JUST redid that room!), my green velvet chaise, and our dining room table. All replaceable in the future. We did keep our Select Comfort Mattress (sold the bed frame) which boxed up nicely, as well as an Armoire Sam finished as a kid. It has been such a handy (if heavy) piece of furniture. Being a photographer, we also had plenty of wall art which we bubble wrapped and stored in the Armoire. Other items we kept: wooden toy train tracks (these are my favorite and I LOVE them and we have LOTS), folding chairs with our name on it, the toy kitchen (Cara insisted), suitcases (the kids ALL insisted), some games, and just other random memorabilia and home made decorations.

Every time we would make a pile to go to the storage unit, Sam and I would look doubtfully at each other and think “There’s no way we are going to fit!”. Once we packed it all in with room to spare though we were pretty proud of ourselves!

I know that we will be different people when we are finished with this part of our journey. That’s okay. When we walk back up to the storage unit, and think “Why did we save all this?” maybe some people will think “I told you so” but for now, its what we needed in order to let go of everything else. I think we needed some tie to the life we’ve built together over the last decade, and that’s natural. We’ve also had people tell us (almost jealously), “Wow! Its like you get to start all over and buy everything new again!” This is true, although I’m sure we will be a lot more picky about what we let into our lives. This is not a process I desire to repeat anytime in the near future!

So, there you have it: all the stuff not wandering with us will live here till we are done.

Selling Our Stuff Utah

We No Longer Live In a House?

Post author By Jess
Post date June 23, 2014
2 Comments on We No Longer Live In a House?

We did it. We are out! We still can’t believe everything came together so perfectly. Other than the fact that we are still fairly exhausted, we couldn’t be happier. I don’t do many “real time” posts to the blog, but this one is pretty important I think.

For starters, we are extremely grateful. Grateful to friends, family, neighbors, ward members who helped us clean, our Instagram traveling family, and to the many people who bought our stuff. 🙂 We couldn’t have done this on our own. Taking 10 years of married life, kids, and a house full of belongings down to a 188 sq foot Airstream, the back of a truck and a 5×10 storage unit was a lot of work.

We’ll have more detailed posts in the future (final post about the remodel, our House Cooling Party, the Storage Unit and still many, many backdated adventure reports) but for now we are relaxing in Bryce Canyon for a week for some much needed decompression and recovery. What a perfect way to start this new chapter of our lives!

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