Decluttering Tips & Hacks | 8 Best Ways to Declutter For 2023!

Decluttering your home can feel like an overwhelming task, especially if you’re feeling the pressure to get organized for the new year. But don’t worry – it’s not as daunting as it seems! With a little bit of planning and some decluttering tips, you can declutter your space with ease and get a fresh start for the new year.

Here are our top 8 decluttering tips for getting your home in tip top condition:

Decluttering Tips #1: Start small. Focus on mini-wins

Don’t try to tackle everything at once – it will just feel overwhelming. Instead, start with a small area or just a few items and work your way up. I recommend starting in a smaller category that does not overwhelm you. So for instance, if you want to fully declutter your kitchen, select a category within the kitchen to declutter first (i.e. utensils, small appliances, etc.). Start with smaller categories and work your way up until you have a decluttering process that works for you. I share more on this in this blog

Decluttering Tips #2: Get in the habit of decluttering often.

I always recommend that people get in the regular habit of decluttering. Decluttering your home or different spaces in your home doesn’t have to be reserved for specific times of the year, like annual spring cleaning. In fact, I strongly recommend you to declutter more than once or twice throughout the year. I recommend decluttering often.

1. When spaces get hard to maintain- focus on decluttering that space

2. When you notice certain items are no longer needed/wanted- focus on decluttering

3. When you’ve had an influx of things come in your home and they’re creating messes around the house- focus on decluttering.

Hopefully you can see these are only examples, but the point is this… you can and should be decluttering your home often. The hope is to get to a place where EVERYTHING in your home is intentional (which leads me to tip #3).

Decluttering Tips #3: Focus your items on being intentional.

Having a home that is intentional incites a level of peace you may not have just yet. And let me tell you… it’s an amazing feeling! The idea here is to ensure that everything in your home is wanted. The parameters I set for myself and clients is to ensure that you love, use, or need the things you allow in your home. The power of creating order in your home is that ultimately, you are the gatekeeper in your home. You absolutely get to decide what stays and what goes. So you might as well make sure it’s intentional, right?

Decluttering Tips #4: Create a dedicated space for everything you own.

I know you have heard this before, but it’s a very fair statement- everything in your home needs to have it’s own home. Be sure to create a dedicated space for everything you own. It makes maintenance 10x easier. It makes resetting your home 10x easier. It makes delegating tasks 10x easier. Ultimately, it makes home more exciting to be in because you know you’re in control of what’s going on.

Decluttering Tips #5: Get comfy with the idea of letting go.

I like to remind people that decluttering items from your home is not the practice of ditching things you absolutely love, use, or need. Instead, it’s all about creating space for those things. When you get comfortable with the idea of letting go, you’re able to maximize the space in your home all while doing good in your community by giving back items that people need. 

If letting go is still a challenge for you, try this.

1. Start in a category that doesn’t have great sentimental attachment, but will yield some visible results for you. So maybe work on decluttering your clothes or old electronics or worn down kitchen utensils, for example.

2. Research donation centers or organizations that align to your beliefs that are actively looking for donations of things you are trying to get rid of. That makes letting go a tad bit easier.

3. Join No-buy Facebook Groups. This is a great way to let go of items that are taking up quality real estate in your home that your neighbors would be excited to have. And the bonus, you get to choose where they go.

Decluttering Tips #6: Honor the limitations of your home.

This is a big one for sure. I hear so often my clients saying they don’t have enough space in their home. From my perspective as a professional organizer, this is typically not the case. Most times people are overcrowding their space by not honoring the limitations of their home. 

Now yes, there are several ways to maximize the space in your home. You can utilize your vertical space by using shelves and door racks and you can add additional storage solutions by investing in multi-functional furniture, but at the end of the day, the space you have is the space you have. You have to honor your space and create order within that space. A solid rule of thumb is this- smaller space means you’re going to have less. 

Decluttering Tips #7: Schedule 30 minute a day to declutter a space/category in your home.

30 minutes a day is all you need to create more order in your home. Set aside 30 minutes a day to declutter. Again, the goal is to build your mini win cycles. The more you practice decluttering on the daily, the better you get at making objective decisions on the things you own. 

Decluttering Tips #8: Manage the hot spots in your home.

Hot spots are areas in your home that accumulate clutter rather quickly with clutter and tend to be flat surfaces like tables, counters, stairs, etc. My recommendation to combat hot spots is to add elements of decor or to create drop zones in those areas. For instance, if a common hot spot in your home is your dining room table, add elements of decor that make it more difficult to turn it into a hot spot. Or if your stair get crowded with clutter quickly, a stair organizer like this may be exactly what you need.