Costs of Clutter: The Ultimate List
As always, if you’re satisfied with your home, I’m not here to tell you that you have a clutter problem!
If you are feeling overwhelmed, though, here is a big, big list of the costs of clutter that might just help motivate you.
Literal Financial Costs:
- Repurchasing items you can’t find
- Renting a storage unit
- Using part or most of your home as a storage unit (based on your mortgage/rent and the square footage of your home, you can calculate the actual cost of storing your clutter)
- More expensive costs to move
- Paying additional money to cleaners – even though they will be less effective
Time Costs:
- Time spent looking for things (want two full days a year back?!)
- Time spent replacing things
- Extra time cleaning takes (not to mention dust!)
- Wasted time doing the “clutter shuffle”
Opportunity Costs:
- CHAOS (Can’t Have Anyone Over Syndrome – Thank FlyLady for the acronym!)
- Feeling stuck in the past so you don’t see opportunities to move into the future
- Missing spontaneous fun moments (like not being able to play a board game because no surface space open)
Emotional Costs:
- Frustration
- Depression
- Overstimulation
- Overwhelm
- Guilt over wasted money
- Guilt over keeping things others could have used
- Shame, feeling like a failure
- Stress of constantly looking for things
- Less positive surroundings – the things you love are hidden amongst the clutter
- Dread – coming home should feel like a breath of fresh air, not inducing feelings of dread
Relationship Costs:
- More arguments
- Resentment over the other person’s clutter
- Less socializing in the home with friends
- Less time relaxing together as a family around the dinner table, for example
Health Costs:
- Allergies to dust and mold…
- Tripping hazards
- Difficult for EMTs to enter house in an emergency
- Less likely to cook at home; more take-out usually means more calories/fat/sugar/salt