Buying begets buying: how stuff has consumed the average American's life

[HFWR]

Get rid of that junk, and make room for this:

A Keurig for Home Brewing Beer Will Give You Small Batches on Demand - Bloomberg Business

[Tadpole]

My problem is that I am a pound foolish sort of person who loves toys. So, I decide I want to watch TV without bothering my husband. I know, I know many simple solutions, but I have to find a cheap headset with high Amazon ratings and a cheap transmitter with USB charging. The transmitter produces noise when it first switches to charge mode and the headset is pretty good except for the hard, poorly placed, cable between the ears. So I decide to keep the transmitter but I can't get comfortable with the headset. I buy a cheap one ear Bluetooth earbud. Now I get high noise level all the time. So I get a slightly more expensive, presumably more comfortable, headset. Worse! So I'm now back to the original headset but own more STUFF. My power strip with usb charging station (another stuff in the collection) is full of headsets and the top of my nightstand is full of charging toys with USB cables. All I ever wanted was a Bluetooth transmitter with USB charging and a one ear receiver so I could lay on my favorite side. Now that I have spent so many $15s, I can't allow myself a good quality solution. Perhaps I just like getting Amazon packages in the mail (with free shipping on the cheap stuff).

[Bamaman]

I had to liquidate the household of my aunt who had to go into assisted living. She told everyone she met that her nephews kidnapped her and brought her to this awful place--when it was a rather luxurious assisted living. She lived another 11 years--dying last year 3 mos. short of 100 years old.

We ended up filling two 30' dumpsters completely. She had handfuls and handfuls of rubber bands secured by more rubber bands. And she also recycled used aluminum foil. And she saved jelly jars--probably 500 lbs. of glass jars. Her garage was full of toxic ag chemicals, and she had been extensively manicuring her woods.

We realized she'd been living on Ramen Noodles and canned Tuna.

I'm approaching the age where we need to start getting rid of unused items. I don't want to pass my two houses on to my children in this shape.

[athena53]

Quote:

Originally Posted by zedd We moved from a 2400sf house to a 800sf mobile, filling a 10x20 storage locker in the process. I was taking stuff to storage the other day and it occurred to me that we haven't so much as opened a stored box or even needed anything from storage in the past year. Why do I need all this stuff?!

I was reading an on-line article on downsizing advice, most of it duplicates of what I read here, and one tip was "Don't rent a storage locker. You'll never get rid of it." One book I've recommended before, "Rightsizing Your Life", tells the story of a woman who just couldn't bear to part with all the beautiful pieces of furniture that had graced her previous, larger house, so she put what they didn't need in storage. For $300/month. She finally bit the bullet and got rid of the items after 3 years.

[MBAustin]

Great article and love the George Carlin video ("their stuff is s**t but your s**t is stuff" had me ROTFL) - he was ahead of his time on this one!

We certainly have more "stuff" than we need but keep paring back slowly - I try to take at least one (preferably two) items out of my closet every time I buy something new, same with books. Fortunately I don't enjoy buying decorative items for each season - our house is the same all year except for Christmas.

[FIREd]

I grew up in a sub 1,000 sqft apartment for 4 people, so space was at a premium. Plus my mom is a clean freak so clutter was never allowed to build up. Then I went to college and, for financial reasons, I had to live in a 165 sqft studio apartment, so I had to keep my possessions at a minimum.

Then I moved to the US for graduate school so I downsized (sold all my furniture) and when I arrived, all of my possessions could fit in 2 bags. As a graduate student, I kept my apartment pretty bare because I always thought I would go back to Europe so there was no point in accumulating a lot of stuff.

Then I met my future wife, we moved in together, combining 2 households into a 2-bedroom apartment. Stuff started to pile up. Then we got married and we bought our first house (2,000 sqft). The dining room, living room, and guest bedrooms were completely empty so we slowly filled them up. Shockingly, by the time we moved three years later, we needed a semi truck to hold all of our stuff!

We moved into an even larger home (2,500 sqft), which needed even more stuff to feel homy, so we kept on buying. After a few years, the house was completely furnished, yet we only used 4 rooms out of 8 routinely .

Then we decided to move to the West Coast where real estate is super expensive so we had to downsize again to a 1,100 sqft, 2-bedroom apartment. So we had to let go of roughly 70% of our stuff. The apartment was fully furnished from the start, so we have spent very little on new furnishings over the past 3.5 years. In fact we have decluttered even further. My rule is if I don't use it or love it, it's going to Goodwill.

[Ronstar]

I grew up in a family of 4 in under 1000 sf. Now it's just DW and I in a ~3500 sf with a 900 sf attached garage and 500 sf detached workshop. I want sell almost everything and downsize to around 1500sf. With a workshop. DW is willing to declutter but doesn't want to move. So I spend most of my time doing home and grounds maintenance


Sent from my iPhone (:.using Early Retirement .//82339)

[pb4uski]

Ah... the good old days of college where I could put all of my earthly possessions in a 4 door sedan... and did so a couple times a year (plus I had a couple boxes at my parent's house).

[ERD50]

Quote:

Originally Posted by aaronc879 I've definitely noticed the extreme amount of "stuff" that people buy but have never understood why. I grew up in a house around 1000 sqft for 4 people. Since I have lived on my own i've never had a place over 860 sqft and that is more than I need. My current home has 860 sqft with no basement, garage, attic, or other storage. I have more than enough room. ....

To each their own. Others have hobbies, like woodworking, musical instrument collecting (and occasional playing ), general project stuff, and that takes space. I like my hobbies, and I have the space for them, and can afford the space for them. I fail to see this as a problem.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Midpack A somewhat popular topic here, but never gets tiresome IMO. ....

And, IMO, it does get tiring. Why can't some people understand that other people like to have 'stuff' and the space for stuff? I've never criticized anyone for not wanting to collect stuff.

When it gets out of hand, and is controlling you rather than you controlling it, that's a problem. But that can happen at any level.

Quote:

Originally Posted by pb4uski When I purge (which is not as frequently as I should) my screening is: Have I used this item in the last year? Do I anticipate using this item in the next 12 months? Is this item valuable? Does this item have sentimental value? If the answer to all of the above are no, then I recycle, donate or trash it as appropriate. ...

I look at it differently. I look, and say "I have room for this, if I might use it for some repair anytime in the future, and it saves me a trip to the hardware store in the middle of a repair, why not keep it?"

But if that plan works for you, that's good - for you.

I honestly don;t think I'll have any problem tossing all that stuff when I no longer see any need for it, like when I just stop the DIY repairs, or am ready to move to a place where it's not needed. Then it becomes junk, toss it.

-ERD50

[ERD50]

Quote:

Originally Posted by pb4uski Ah... the good old days of college where I could put all of my earthly possessions in a 4 door sedan... and did so a couple times a year (plus I had a couple boxes at my parent's house).

Ah... the good current days when I have room for all the stuff I feel like keeping, and don't have to live like a poor college student! One of the reasons I went to school, was so that I would not have to live like a poor college student the rest of my life! And life's been good!

-ERD50

[aaronc879]

Quote:

Originally Posted by ERD50 To each their own. Others have hobbies, like woodworking, musical instrument collecting (and occasional playing ), general project stuff, and that takes space. I like my hobbies, and I have the space for them, and can afford the space for them. I fail to see this as a problem. And, IMO, it does get tiring. Why can't some people understand that other people like to have 'stuff' and the space for stuff? I've never criticized anyone for not wanting to collect stuff. When it gets out of hand, and is controlling you rather than you controlling it, that's a problem. But that can happen at any level. I look at it differently. I look, and say "I have room for this, if I might use it for some repair anytime in the future, and it saves me a trip to the hardware store in the middle of a repair, why not keep it?" But if that plan works for you, that's good - for you. I honestly don;t think I'll have any problem tossing all that stuff when I no longer see any need for it, like when I just stop the DIY repairs, or am ready to move to a place where it's not needed. Then it becomes junk, toss it. -ERD50

I don't intend to criticize anyone for having a lot of stuff and space to store the stuff. I just point out that you will have to postpone ER and spend more time at the dreaded job to pay for all that stuff and space. If you think the trade off is worth it then that's fine. I personally don't think it's worth working longer.

[pb4uski]

Quote:

Originally Posted by ERD50 ....I look at it differently. I look, and say "I have room for this, if I might use it for some repair anytime in the future, and it saves me a trip to the hardware store in the middle of a repair, why not keep it?" But if that plan works for you, that's good - for you.....

I get what you are saying, but what inevitably happens is I need something and say... ah, I have one of those around here...... somewhere... and spend a boatload of time trying to find it.

A few years ago I needed to use a siphon hose that I "knew" that I had. Searched high and low... for days since it wasn't a time sensitive task. Couldn't find it so I bought another one and did the task. Two days later I found the original... now I have two.

For me, the less stuff cluttering my life the better. YMMV.

[ERD50]

Quote:

Originally Posted by aaronc879 I don't intend to criticize anyone for having a lot of stuff and space to store the stuff. I just point out that you will have to postpone ER and spend more time at the dreaded job to pay for all that stuff and space. If you think the trade off is worth it then that's fine. I personally don't think it's worth working longer.

Fair enough. My ER date was influenced more by certain gates in my MegaCorp benefits than it was a specific $ amount.

-ERD50

[ERD50]

Quote:

Originally Posted by pb4uski I get what you are saying, but what inevitably happens is I need something and say... ah, I have one of those around here...... somewhere... and spend a boatload of time trying to find it. ....

That is a factor. I do need to go through and occasionally organize on a rainy day. And when it does seem like there's more stuff than I can keep organized, the excess gets tossed. I did that with my lumber pile a while back, threw out several boxes of cut offs and scrap, put another couple boxes on the 'burn' pile, and got the rest way more organized.

Works for me

-ERD50