How to Organize Your Home on a Budget

If you're like me you want your home to be organized and clutter free, but as is often the case what we want, and what is reality are two different things. The longer you live in a home, the more difficult it is to keep your home organized. Add to this the problem of being on a budget, and sometimes the idea of organizing your home can seem as though it is the largest undertaking you have ever thought of doing.

No matter the size of your home, whether it be a studio apartment or a four bedroom house it is easy to accumulate a lot of stuff. The more stuff you have the more important it is to keep it all organized. Also, the longer you wait to organize your home, the more likely it is that you won't do it. It's like a catch 22, you look at your home, you see the clutter and the disorganization and think, "It's too much!" or "I don't have time to organize!" or my all time favorite "I'll do it tomorrow, or next week, or next month, or when I have more time." Whatever the excuse you give yourself for not organizing, remember that the longer you wait, the harder it is going to be, and the longer it is going to take you to organize your home.

So, you've gotten past the procrastination part of the program, and now you want to organize your home, only there is one problem. You don't have much money. So what do you do?

There are a number of things you can do if you are on a budget or even have no extra money at all and still be able to organize your home. Here are some ideas to help you get started.

1. Remember that you don't have to go out and buy a lot of fancy designer containers and things to organize your home. It is amazing to me that people actually think that you have to buy containers to organize your stuff. While there are a lot of stores that cater to the crowd that does this by providing color coded, and decorated containers, it is in my opinion a waste of money. Personally, I'd rather buy the next romance by one of my favorite authors than purchase some flourescent pink box with a beaded lid to hold stuff in, especially when it's going to get dirty over time and eventually wind up being one of the things I end up getting rid of.

2. Become a collector of empty paper boxes. You know the ones I'm talking about, the ones that come from the office supply store and are delivered to where you work. So what usually happens to those boxes once the reams of paper have been removed or used? That's right, they normally get recycled. So, instead take them home, trust me you will be glad you did. If you don't work somewhere that you can get these for free, you can also go to copy places and ask them if they have any empty paper boxes with lids they'd be willing to donate to your cause. These boxes are perfect for storing things, and if you don't like the fact that they have the paper company's logo, no problem, simply cover them with white or brown paper. Brown postal paper looks great. If you have children, you can even make a project of this for them, by allowing them to decorate their own storage boxes once you have wrapped them in brown paper.

3. Collect or purchase milk crates. Plastic milk crates are another wonderful way to store things, in particular hanging files because the letter sized ones fit inside perfectly. However they are also great for books and other things as well. If you choose to purchase them, most stores sell them for $3 or less which is not bad. The only draw back to these is that dust can collect on them and they are very hard to keep clean.

4. Get started by taking your organizing one day at a time. You don't have to do it all at once, and in fact you shouldn't. Instead pick one room or one area in a room each day and go through it. Throw away anything you are never going to look at or use again. Don't save anything with the idea of, "Well, I might need it someday, and if I get rid of it now, then the day I need it, I won't have it." Particularly if the item is inexpensive to replace or easy to find if you do need it again, it is a good idea to chuck it. Once you've cleared either an area or a room, then put away those things that already have a place. What you are left with is what you will probably be storing in one of your paper boxes or crates.

5. As you finish clearing out either an area of a room or an entire room and you find yourself with full boxes or crates, find a place for them as well. Good places to store paper boxes and crates are closets and corners. If your closet is already full and has been organized then consider either clearing out a corner of the room to put these storage boxes, or, and only do this if there is no other option, rent some storage space. Renting storage space when you are on a budget when it comes to organizing is really a last resort and defeats the whole purpose of organizing in my opinion, but sometimes it is necessary.

Another thing to keep in mind when storing paper boxes is to write on the box itself, or add a clear page cover with a list of what is in the box. Make sure that this list is easily visible and accessible. If you are going to be stacking your boxes, then of course putting the list on top of the box doesn't make sense does it? Instead find a side that you know will be visible or make sure it is visible and put the list there. This way when you go looking for something you don't have to open every box and rifle through it to find what you want. This also works well with crates. Make sure that even your crates have a list that is easily visible, don't assume because most of what is in a crate is visible that you will be able to find what you are looking for. The idea of a plastic page cover with a list is good in this case, just carefully tape it to an area of the crate that you can easily see, and still be able to extract the sheet when necessary, say when you add or change the contents of the box.

6. What about storing small things though, like jewelry and beads for example. You don't have to purchase expensive slotted plastic containers to store your beads, or expensive jewelry boxes for your jewelry. Instead why not use empty egg cartons. Either the styrofoam (and keep in mind you're keeping something out of a landfill that doesn't break down easily if you go with this one), or the cardboard kind work very well to store both beads and jewelry. You can store a necklace or a pair of earrings in one segment, or loose beads as well. Since most of us eat eggs, this is a great way to recycle those egg cartons. Then you simply store your recycled containers in a drawer. You can make this into an art project with your girls by giving them markers, glue, glitter, beads or whatever and allowing them to decorate the egg containers that are going to hold their jewelry.

These are just a few of the many ideas available to organize your home when you are on a budget, I'm sure with a little thought you can come up with many more!