Staging your home before putting it on the market to sell can really make life easier on moving day. However, these helpful organizing tips can also simplify your life by clearing your home of clutter even if you’re not home staging for selling a house.

1. Entry and bedroom doors must swing clear.
2. Clear stairs, walkways and halls to eliminate any trip hazards.
3. Clear kitchen and dining tables of clutter and add decorative centerpieces.
4. Remove personal items and collections. Buyers want to envision themselves living there.
5. Make sure all incoming mail and paperwork has staging area and bill paying activities are cleared once completed.
6. There’s a common belief that rooms will feel larger and be easier to use if all the furniture is pushed against the walls, but that isn’t the case. Instead, furnish your space by floating furniture away from walls. Reposition sofas and chairs into cozy conversational groups, and organize pieces so that the traffic flow in a room is obvious. Not only will this make the space more user-friendly, but it will open up the room and make it seem larger.
7. Walkways around furniture should be clear of any trip hazards.
8. Show buyers that there is substantial room in your closets by removing 50% of what is currently there, add high wattage lighting to make the space look bigger, get “stuff” off the closet floor, organize clothes by type and color and use matching hangers.
9. Remove debris from yard. Mow, trim trees and shrubs, and mulch flower beds.
10. Make sure all major household systems and appliances are in working order.
11. In the kitchen, clear all unnecessary objects from the countertops. If it hasn’t been used for three months, put it away (if you know you will never use it, donate it!). Clear refrigerator fronts of messages, pictures, etc. (A sparse kitchen helps the buyer mentally move their own things into your kitchen.)
12. In the bathroom, remove any unnecessary items from countertops, tubs, shower stalls and commode tops. Keep only your most needed cosmetics, brushes, perfumes etc., in one small group on the counter. Coordinate towels to one or two colors only.
13. If you need room to store extra possessions, organize items in the garage, rent a storage unit, or a POD.
14. Before you call Great Day Moving to schedule your moving date, walk around your home and refer back to these home staging tips. Place a red sticker on the items you want to keep and a green sticker on the items you want to donate, sell, or give to friends or family.
15. Get rid of all the items you don’t want before moving day so they won’t accidentally get moved to your new home.

Packing for a move is a great excuse to organize, purge, and remove unused items from your home. Why move items that you don’t absolutely love? You are not throwing out the items; you are giving someone else the opportunity to enjoy them.

Patty Hoyt shared these practical home staging tips with us and is a Principle Organizing Consultant with Abundance Organizing located in Olathe, Kansas. She is a self-proclaimed “reformed clutter junkie” and can totally relate to the overwhelming stress caused by piles of stuff all around. Patty has been organizing professionally for almost 3 years and specializes in working with adults and children with ADHD and other special needs. Contact Patty to help organize your home and life! She can reached at 913-912-0504 or patty@abundanceorganizing.com or visit her website.