Are you keeping a bunch of empty boxes in your basement? Or are those extra boxes just clutter? Do you have a special place in the basement of your home to store boxes?
Do you hold onto all of the boxes of your electronic devices just in case of a potential better resale of your electronics?
We’ve done both of these and wondered if we should be holding onto them or not. We were finally able to let the extra cardboard boxes go. What was so surprising to us was the amount of space they took up once we got rid of them. It was also easier for us to care for the basement and feel less doom when we ventured down.
If you’re working on decluttering your home, you may have wondered about those extra boxes or how to do the box method and if it requires keeping more boxes.
Just in Case Extra Boxes
Typically, the boxes end up taking up too much space and sadly end up with bugs all over them, so I don’t even want to touch them anyway, so we end up disposing of them anyway. At least they are recyclable, and where we love, they get picked up by the team that does this.
Electronics Boxes
As for the electronics boxes, they have been hit or miss. Sometimes, they have come in handy when we sell a device on eBay, but other times, we may end up accumulating an outdated pile of technology. The best thing to do to avoid this is to consider what will likely be resaleable over the years genuinely. Things like TVs usually go down in value and aren’t worth shipping, but something like an iPhone can hold some value, and you may be able to resell those. The boxes are usually much appreciated, and they don’t take up a lot of space.
It might seem useful to have them on hand. If you’re working on decluttering, and you’re likely to, since you’re here, you might even think you will use all those boxes in your decluttering process. Some of the methods of decluttering use boxing methods.
Decluttering with Extras Boxes
Four-Box Method
There’s a four-box method, where you use four boxes for sorting. Each box is labeled clearly with either “Donate,” “Dispose of”, “Recycle,” “Put Away.” If you want to do this, you can select four of the best boxes to use and get rid of the rest. Then, order some large bags to place opened up for use within each box. That way, you’ll have a support structure for what you’re putting in the box and still be able to pull out the sack when its full and take it to its appropriate destination. Then, you’re free to get rid of the rest!
Box Method
Another use for boxes during decluttering is to take some of your belongings that you don’t think you will use and box them. Box them up, seal them up, choose a date to label them with that indicates what day you will donate the box if you don’t get into it by then.
Put Extra Boxes to Use
Instead of accumulating moving boxes, ask your friends and family if they need them. Isn’t it great if you can give them to someone who will put them to use instead of them being bug collectors in the basement?
Simplify & Need Less
Remember, you’re decluttering! You don’t need to hang onto extra storage because the real goal is to simplify your life. A helpful thought experiment for this is to think about what it would be like if you were to fill those boxes up with your stuff is stored. Why would you do this? What would be in them? Will you ever want to get the items from the boxes? Do you need that much extra stuff?
