https://www.bin-store.com/blog

Most people have a junk drawer—a random drawer somewhere in the house which has intentionally or otherwise become a receptacle for everyday arbitrary clutter. But you might also have a junk room.

Of course, no real estate agent taking homebuyers on a tour ever says, “And here you see the junk room …” No room is ever supposed to serve this purpose. Chances are good your “junk room” was meant to be a guest room, spare room, craft room or so forth—until you unwittingly repurposed it.

Wondering how to clean out your junk room? A junk room makeover can be one of the most overwhelming tasks you will take on while decluttering and organizing the house. Here are some tips to declutter your junk room quickly:

• Re-conceive the purpose of the space. No, you do not want it to be a “less cluttered junk room.” It should be restored to some other more valid purpose. If it was supposed to be a craft room, it should functionally be a craft room. If it is supposed to be a guest room, it should comfortably accommodate guests. Reframing your perception of the room will help you to be more effective in deciding what should stay and what should go.

• Get a set of four large plastic storage containers. Label one of them “Trash,” another one “Thrift,” a third, “Repair,” and a fourth “Relocate.” Bring these into the junk room with you.

• Declutter first, organize second. One of the biggest mistakes in organizing any room, but especially the junk room, is trying to get organized before you have decluttered. You should not tackle a huge job like organizing until you have removed all the stuff you do not need to organize in the first place. That is what those bins are for. Remember, never throw away any item which you can reasonably thrift.

• Focus on large items. The more space is in the junk room, the less overwhelming it will be from a visual standpoint, and the more physical room you will actually have to work with when you are finally ready to organize. So try and get large items cleared out first, and then work on getting the smaller ones decluttered.

It is important to accept that you are not going to be able to declutter and organize the junk room into something beautiful and functional in a single afternoon. In fact, you will probably spend quite a few afternoons working on the project.

So come up with a system of checkpoints for the job. Whenever you accomplish one of these objectives on the way to success, reward yourself for your achievement. This will give you the motivation to keep following through day after day on the project.

If you do a thorough job, by the time you are finished, you will no longer have a “junk room.” Instead, you will have a functional space which can enhance your home and improve your life in some way.