Distractions....

Yes, here's another posting apologizing for the absence of postings. Right now, I've shifted my priorities a little to saving money in a little different way. When we first put our house on the market in February, we thought it would be a good idea to rent a storage unit (a big one- 10x20) and move some excess furniture and storage bins into it so the house didn't look as full. We had a LOT of furniture in our house, and removing several pieces does make the house look larger. The unfinished portion of our basement was crammed full of storage bins and toys that we rotated out and removing those items opened up a lot of space.

Well, it's the end of October and we still haven't sold our house. We've had tons of showings and open houses (we're up to 40+ now) with great feedback and still not a single offer- it just haven't been the right buyer yet or the right time yet. So, about two weeks ago I decided that $85 per month on storage unit rent was NOT a good use of my money and have been working to sort and purge enough to get the things we still may want back into the house. I started out by working on the items we had kept in the basement, and am happy to report that after 2 weeks and many trips back and forth from the storage unit I've taken two HUGE loads of clothes and household items to Goodwill and have I think we're up to 11 empty storage bins that were previously housed in the storage unit.

Does your house need a good purging? I had good intentions with lots of the things I'm finally purging-- someday, I will lose enough weight to wear those clothes again, so-and-so gave me this item that I don't have a place for, I could sell that at a garage sale.... but the reality of it is for us right now that at $85 per month, the value of anything I could potentially get from a garage sale next season would not offset the cost of storing the stuff for now.

My personal challenge now (I don't know if I can accomplish this or not) would be to try to empty the unit before the rent is due in mid-November.... I'm not quite sure if I'll accomplish that- but I'm sure making great progress so far!