0:00

Look around your house and think for a minute

0:02

. Do you have too much stuff ? Does

0:05

your house feel cluttered ? Do your friends

0:07

think you are a candidate for hoarders

0:09

? Well , there's a way you can fix

0:11

this . My guest today is Lucy Milligan

0:13

Wahl . She's the founder of LMW edits

0:16

, a boutique professional organizing company

0:18

based in San Francisco . You

0:20

don't have to throw up your arms and give up surrounded

0:23

by all that mess . After you hear what Lucy

0:25

has to say , you'll want to dive

0:27

right in and create some space

0:30

. I'm George Siegal and this

0:32

is Home Owners Be Aware the podcast

0:34

that teaches you everything you need

0:36

to know about being a homeowner . Lucy

0:39

, thank you so much for joining me today .

0:42

Thank you for having me . I am happy to be here .

0:44

All right now as I look over what you do

0:46

and I find it fascinating

0:48

because we could do this entire podcast

0:51

just on the mess in my house

0:53

and how . I would need you Explain

0:55

to people exactly what your role is and how

0:58

you help them with what you do .

1:00

Absolutely so what I do is professional

1:02

organizing and basically I take care

1:04

of stuff , so I make sure that

1:07

the stuff in your house is the right stuff , it's

1:09

the stuff that you need , and you can find that

1:11

stuff quickly and easily , so you can stop worrying

1:13

about the stuff and just get on with the rest

1:15

of your life .

1:16

Yeah , I probably spend half my time

1:19

finding things and it's

1:21

such a waste of time . So let's go through

1:23

some typical things and we'll

1:26

kind of solve my problems . It'll be like a free

1:28

consultation , but I think most people have

1:30

this problem as well . My office has

1:33

got papers stacked all

1:35

over the place because I moved from one part of the house

1:37

to the other , so I have things that aren't filed

1:39

yet , things that are sitting on desks and

1:42

I don't look like a hoarder , but it's really

1:44

unorganized and hard to find things . How do I

1:46

even begin to tackle something like that ?

1:49

Yeah , a lot of people struggle with paper

1:51

. We're at this funny time in society

1:53

where everything is moving to digital

1:55

and yet we still can't quite shake

1:58

the need to have some paper documentation

2:00

. Obviously , it's different depending

2:02

on what work you do , what kind

2:04

of like personal situation you have with

2:06

like estates and property and whatever , but in

2:09

general , I apply a very strong

2:12

index of suspicion to any

2:14

paper whatsoever . When I'm working with somebody

2:16

on organizing documents , my

2:18

first assumption is that we probably don't need

2:20

most of it , because the only reason

2:23

to keep a piece of paper is because you

2:25

will need it again , which sounds

2:27

really basic , right , like that's super basic . But

2:30

think about what you keep in terms of what you

2:32

file . Like , did you file it because you're like

2:34

okay , I know I'm gonna need this again . It's gonna be this

2:36

specific situation . Here's where I'm gonna look

2:38

, or are you like ? I know

2:40

this seems kind of important , I guess

2:42

I should file it . And

2:45

so , with my clients , I'm drilling

2:47

down to why do we need this , exactly

2:50

what for ? And then where do we store it

2:52

? How do we file it so that you can find it again when

2:54

that occasion comes ?

2:55

Yeah , now give me an example , like if a trade comes out

2:57

, a plumber comes out or somebody installs

3:00

shelves or somebody puts something in the yard

3:02

, I just tend to have that receipt

3:05

from them somewhere and okay

3:07

, so why do I need that ? Well , three years from now , or

3:10

three years ago when I had that person here , now

3:12

I need them again . So I'm just

3:14

I'm at a loss of how I would even move

3:16

forward to get started tackling this

3:19

.

3:19

Yeah , absolutely so . For someone like

3:21

you it's sounding like the reason you need that information

3:23

is it's contact info . So then I'd

3:26

like just rip their business card off the

3:28

off the invoice or whatever , and have

3:30

a folder that just says home

3:32

professionals I like . There

3:34

it is , and then when you're

3:36

looking for a project you're like all right , there's the plumber

3:38

I use , there's the contractor I use perfect

3:41

. I mean , obviously , if

3:43

something was done to improve your home

3:45

that you aren't going to take with you and you own your home

3:48

you do want to keep the whole invoice because that's

3:50

that's sort of like helpful , helpful for evaluation

3:53

of your home . But if you rent or it's

3:55

something you can take with you , or it's just a basic repair

3:57

, you don't actually need to keep the whole invoice .

3:59

Okay now another thing I see when we walk our dogs

4:02

around the neighborhood is some people

4:04

when they open their garage , it looks

4:06

like it's just a thing of beauty

4:08

organized , not trash

4:10

everywhere . And then you see garages where

4:12

they look like they're an episode of hoarders , where

4:14

there is stuff everywhere

4:17

. What do you do about

4:19

that ?

4:24

With garages they become

4:26

a dumping ground , right , like that's just like I

4:28

don't know where to put it , I'm just going to shove

4:30

it in the garage basements , attics , also

4:32

similar . And so when

4:35

I'm working on a garage with somebody , it's about

4:37

what in here do we actually need ? I mean

4:39

, it's back to that right . And a lot of times in

4:41

garages you will find items

4:43

left over from a previous

4:45

activity , a previous

4:48

home , someone who used to

4:50

live in the home and doesn't anymore , and

4:53

they just kind of make their way into the garage

4:55

by default . And so just asking the simple questions

4:57

of like do you still ski

4:59

, for example ? And in this case

5:01

, this case happens to me a lot because I live in San

5:03

Francisco , we have access to mountains . There

5:06

are a lot of people who ski . I myself am a skier and

5:08

I can tell when they don't actually ski

5:10

anymore because I know how old those skis are . So

5:14

there's a little bit of insider info I have about certain

5:16

activities . It can be the same with camping gear

5:18

, like is this camping gear and good enough

5:21

repair that you could use it tomorrow ?

5:24

Yeah , so if you still have wooden skis in your garage

5:26

, that's probably right .

5:28

Well , hang those suckers up . It's great decor .

5:30

Yeah , now another one . Okay , in a laundry

5:33

room it seems like screws

5:35

, bolts , hardware , stuff all

5:38

gets thrown in drawers and all

5:40

of a sudden you've got these drawers full of stuff and

5:42

I'm always afraid to throw something out because

5:44

then I'm afraid something's going to break . And I'm going to have that flashback

5:47

and going oh , I saw where that bolt was

5:49

. What would you do with all that stuff ?

5:51

So this is a place where self knowledge

5:54

is really helpful . So I have some clients

5:56

who are quite handy . They do

5:58

a lot of their projects themselves and

6:00

they know they know

6:02

hardware well enough that

6:05

if we do like little drawers of different kinds

6:07

of sizes of screws and nails and stuff

6:09

, that's going to be helpful to them . For

6:12

someone like me who's not especially

6:15

handy , having a bunch of different sizes of

6:18

screws is actually not going to help me because

6:20

I don't actually know what I'm looking for . So

6:23

it's important to know , like , where your capabilities

6:25

lie and where it's just not going to happen . So

6:28

, for example , say you put together a shelving

6:30

unit and it comes with all the stuff to put

6:32

it together and there's like an Allen wrench and some screws and they always give you

6:34

some extra and

6:37

the temptation is to keep that extra . And

6:40

my question is is

6:42

the shelving unit really going to ever need those things ? And

6:45

if it does , are you going to fix it

6:47

or are you probably just going to buy a new one ? And

6:50

that's an uncomfortable question to ask , because

6:53

just buying a new one sounds

6:56

kind of wasteful to some

6:58

people and it can sound like that's not

7:00

the correct decision . But

7:03

it's important to be realistic and know like , if

7:05

I'm in a jam and this thing falls apart

7:07

, what am I actually going to do

7:09

and what am I actually going to need on hand ?

7:11

Okay , now it's interesting . Now I also have a lot of broadcast

7:14

equipment and I know this . But it happens

7:16

to my wife , it happens to my kids . We all end up with

7:18

these older plugs , things that

7:21

used to connect stuff . So if I open

7:23

my closet , there's probably 20 plugs in

7:25

there and cables and wires and all this stuff

7:27

and my fear again is throwing that out

7:29

. And then I go gosh , I need to do something with my computer

7:31

and I'm missing cable number seven

7:34

that has this and this and this . What do

7:36

you do in that case ?

7:37

So I run into this a lot . Everybody's

7:40

got all kinds of plugs and wires and stuff

7:42

, even if they're not doing broadcasting . And

7:44

what I do is I separate it all out and we go through

7:46

it individually and I ask the question

7:48

of what is this for ? And you , being

7:51

a broadcasting professional , you probably know what everything

7:53

is for . And once we separate out

7:55

the individual pieces , it becomes a lot clearer

7:57

which ones you actually need , which

7:59

ones you don't . What we do with our brains

8:01

is we chunk . So it's like

8:03

when you memorize a phone number , you chunk the sections

8:05

of the phone number . When you see a pile of

8:08

wires , you chunk that as one pile

8:10

and you sort of tell yourself

8:12

I either keep the whole pile or I get

8:14

rid of the whole pile . And my job

8:16

is to pick it apart and figure out

8:18

what pieces you need and what pieces you don't .

8:22

I need to get on that too , boy . It sounds like I got a lot to

8:24

do . Now . A lot of people have older parents

8:26

and the parents are living

8:28

their lives , but they're not necessarily thinking

8:30

of the day that they're not around

8:32

and all that stuff is just left behind

8:35

, and then you've left your children with

8:37

just way too many things to make

8:39

tough decisions . The first thing I would say is

8:41

how can parents make it easier

8:44

for their children , or should they not even bother

8:46

? And it's just the kids fault when

8:48

that tragic or sad day happens .

8:50

You know , there's a wonderful book that you may have

8:52

heard of that I think it will

8:54

help people think about this and it's from

8:57

the perspective of someone going through this

8:59

herself . It's called the Gentle

9:01

Art of Swedish Deaf Cleaning and

9:03

it is written by an elderly woman who

9:06

has done this process herself

9:08

and she sort of lays out not only how you do

9:10

it but why you do it . And I

9:12

think it's so helpful because , you know , coming from me

9:15

telling a senior person that they

9:17

need to clean out their stuff so they don't burn their children that

9:19

can be a little presumptuous sounding

9:21

, because I myself have never been in their shoes

9:23

. I don't know what that's like , and I try

9:26

to greet moments like this , where things can

9:28

be very emotional , with a lot of empathy and a lot

9:30

of understanding . And so I think if

9:32

you know someone who's thinking about

9:34

should I downsize , should I not ? Should

9:36

I get rid of stuff , should I not ? This book can be

9:38

helpful because it really puts it in context in

9:40

a way that's like from someone who's been

9:42

through this experience . I generally

9:44

think if someone

9:47

is older and they're thinking about this

9:49

and they're thinking about what they're going to do with

9:51

all of their stuff , you're already on the right

9:53

track . You're already thinking into the future

9:56

about what's what life is going to be like for your children

9:58

, and I think that's a huge gift . And I

10:00

do believe that the more you can do now

10:03

to save your kids from having

10:05

to go through all the stuff , the better it is , because

10:07

what we have is sort of the sandwich generation

10:09

right , the people who have both children

10:12

young children to manage and senior parents

10:14

to manage , and you know these people

10:16

are trying to raise their kids . They don't

10:18

necessarily have bandwidth in their

10:20

lives to take on the project

10:22

of dealing with a deceased

10:25

parents , lifetime of belongings

10:27

and many people do , and

10:29

that's that's great . But from

10:31

my perspective , it would be an incredible gift

10:34

to not force your kids to do that

10:36

.

10:37

Yeah , we can also turn that completely around . So

10:39

because I experienced this when my when my father passed

10:41

away is you go into their closet

10:43

and you just don't even know where to start . I saw it with my

10:46

dad when his mother passed away , where

10:48

he was just sitting in her house surrounded by all this stuff

10:50

, just paralyzed , not knowing what

10:53

to do and how to even approach something like

10:55

that .

10:56

Yeah , it's really difficult because

10:58

when you think about things

11:00

, truly it's just stuff . The memories

11:03

are in our brains and our hearts

11:05

. They're not in the things , and

11:07

so once the person to whom these things are

11:10

attached is gone , the things tend to lose

11:12

a lot of meaning , especially if you didn't have the context

11:14

previously . So , again , for someone who's thinking

11:16

about what they're leaving behind , to

11:19

at least sit down and have some conversations

11:21

of like this is important . This

11:23

is not , don't worry about it , at least give

11:25

people the lay of the land .

11:27

Yeah , I think one of the things that makes that more difficult is then when you

11:29

hear stories about somebody that

11:31

just cleans out everything , and then there's some garage

11:33

sale where some valuable painting ends

11:36

up being discovered that you

11:38

had no idea about , and there's also that fear

11:40

of giving away some kind of family heirloom

11:42

or something of value that then you'll never

11:44

get back .

11:46

Yeah , and I think that's where the value of working with

11:48

professionals comes in . I don't specialize

11:51

in estate clear outs myself . There are many

11:53

organizers who do , and

11:55

they can really help a family go

11:57

through stuff and identify what might have

11:59

some value and what

12:01

is just kind of not worth their time

12:04

to deal with . And so I

12:06

think worrying about

12:08

something of value not being capitalized on can

12:11

be very paralyzing . And when

12:13

it comes to getting rid of things that might have value , even

12:16

if it's not in a downsizing or an estate situation

12:18

, I encourage my clients to think about

12:21

. You know , the trade-offs

12:23

. There's always a trade-off when it

12:25

comes to stuff . If you're going to keep a bunch of

12:27

stuff in case it has value , that has

12:29

a cost . It has the cost of you

12:31

storing the stuff , you cleaning the stuff

12:33

, you taking care of the stuff . There's no costless

12:36

alternative . So a lot of what I

12:38

talk about with my clients is okay , you can keep that

12:40

, but let's talk about what consequence

12:42

that has for your goals , for the project

12:44

.

12:45

Yeah , I think it's things to like . It could

12:47

be jewelry , it could be baseball cards

12:49

, it could be Some

12:52

kind of statue or figurine

12:54

that you just don't know about

12:56

. There's that fear of my gosh . This . This could

12:58

be worth a fortune , and here I just gave it away

13:00

.

13:02

Yeah , there's a really quick and easy way

13:04

to at least get a little bit of a handle on whether

13:06

something has value , especially if you know what it is

13:08

. Go on eBay , search

13:10

for that item and click on sold

13:13

Not what people are listening for

13:15

people what it actually sold for , and

13:17

that will give you at least a quick and dirty

13:19

like okay , this has some value . Like

13:21

I'm sold for twenty five bucks , alright , whatever

13:23

.

13:24

Okay , now here's another problem . Again , this

13:27

one's mine , but I'm sure a lot of people can relate to it . I

13:29

have a seventeen year old and a thirteen year old , and

13:32

a few weeks ago they decided to swap rooms

13:34

. Oh yeah

13:37

, just seeing what each kid took out

13:39

of their room and move to the other room exposed

13:42

how they had way too many things

13:44

, and it's tough to get your kids

13:46

to get rid of things . How do parents tackle that

13:48

?

13:50

So I actually work with teenagers quite a

13:52

bit and I really enjoy it because

13:54

I teach will tell you what's

13:57

up , they will be really straight up with you , they'll

13:59

be super honest and we have some really great

14:01

conversations . And I love working

14:03

with teens to , because it's a chance to

14:05

set them up for success before they sort of calcify

14:08

their ideas of what , like adult life should

14:10

be . But

14:12

it's it's working through the process with

14:14

a goal in mind , which is the same way approach

14:17

any . Any a project for an adult is like

14:19

alright , what kind of space do

14:21

you want to live in , what kind of life do

14:23

you want ? And then going through the stuff

14:25

in the space and does this stuff support

14:27

that or does it take away from that ? And

14:30

I think sometimes we get in a

14:32

mind frame where it's just like hey

14:35

, kid , you got to clean your room . Like just go clean your room

14:37

, just deal with it . But taking

14:39

a step back and sort of walking them through

14:41

the whole process can be a lot

14:43

more . You have a lot better

14:45

results in the end and you're in your serve . You're

14:48

respecting their autonomy , right like you're empowering

14:50

them to make decisions about their space instead

14:52

of like go clean your room .

14:55

Well , you know this , it's tough and

14:57

I think , especially with

14:59

teenage girls . My daughter on her bathroom counter

15:01

, and that's one of the reasons they switch , because this room had a bigger bathroom . There's

15:05

products all on the counter , all in

15:07

the shower , all under the sink . I mean I

15:10

would think you need two or three things . I wouldn't think

15:12

you would need two hundred things . So getting kids to pair that

15:14

stuff down is like it's pulling , like pulling teeth .

15:18

Yeah , we actually do a lot of projects like that . My

15:21

my organizing assistant that works with me is a big makeup and skincare

15:23

person herself , and so I often have her do that job With

15:28

with teen girls , because they can have a good conversation

15:30

about what the products are , what use they have , and

15:32

I think it's it's it's helping them figure out what's part of the daily routine

15:34

, what's part of the

15:36

party , like special day routine , and then what

15:38

do I actually not need ? Because I tried it , I don't like it , the

15:40

color doesn't work for me . These

15:45

are the conversations that we have , and

15:47

I think people try and skip over that

15:49

part . They try to just be like , hey , get rid of it all . But we have to have the conversation

15:51

to understand what we want to get rid of and why . Now , it's part of working

15:53

with clients once you've helped them get rid of a lot of

15:56

stuff .

16:01

They are on kind of a maintenance program , so when

16:03

new stuff comes in they know how to

16:05

avoid getting to where they

16:07

were when they had to get rid of all of it .

16:09

So I will say I appointed

16:12

pride is that I have very few recurring clients

16:14

. My my structure

16:16

of the way I work is to set someone up

16:18

with a system that they can maintain so that even

16:20

if they fall off the wagon a little bit , the

16:22

structure is still there and they can come back to

16:24

it on their own time . I get return clients

16:27

when people are repurposing a space . For

16:29

example , say , we organize a home office

16:31

and now they're having a baby and that

16:33

needs to be a baby's room will do that . But

16:36

I try to avoid a maintenance program because I

16:38

don't want people to become dependent on me

16:40

. I don't think that's particularly healthy . I want

16:42

, I want to know that I have taught them

16:44

the skills that they need and they can come back

16:46

to that whenever they want to .

16:48

You have an example that you can share of maybe the worst

16:51

situation you ever walked

16:53

into . Where you're going . Oh my god , this , this

16:55

is just going to be difficult .

16:57

So I will say I I don't

16:59

take on any , any job

17:01

that could be classified as above level

17:04

one . Hoarding . There is a there is a clutter

17:06

and disorganization scale that goes from one

17:08

to five . I don't do anything

17:10

above a level one . Level one is sort of like

17:12

clutter in multiple rooms , which Most

17:14

people have , honestly , so we're all a little

17:17

bit harder inside . That's

17:19

not the kind of work I do . I know that

17:21

about myself . I refer to other organizers

17:23

that said , I think what is what

17:25

is very difficult and I really Try

17:29

to screen for this in advance if

17:31

someone is not willing to change how they

17:33

do things , it is not possible

17:35

to help them get organized , because just doing more

17:37

of what you did before Is

17:40

not going to get you different results . So

17:42

if someone is saying I want you to come in

17:44

and wave a magic , want to make it all good , but I'm not going

17:46

to change a single thing about the way I operate , I

17:49

can't help them .

17:51

I imagine minimalists are bad for your business

17:53

.

17:55

Minimalists are great , because it's hard

17:57

to become a minimalist . People need a lot of

17:59

help and I've actually had

18:01

multiple clients who have said I want

18:03

to become a minimalist and then , in the process

18:06

of working towards it , realize they're

18:08

not ready , it's not for them . I

18:10

had a client who stated goal was to become

18:13

a minimalist and it was a very tightly packed

18:15

, clean , nice but tightly packed

18:17

space and

18:20

so and we kept working through it and this client was

18:22

just not willing to get rid of anything , like I said , not

18:24

willing to change . And so finally I had a brain wave

18:26

. I was like let's just see if this is what

18:28

you really want . So I picked a corner of the space

18:30

, we pulled everything out of it and

18:32

I said we're going to add back things

18:35

one at a time until you decide

18:37

that's the minimalist look you're going for

18:39

. So we did that , added

18:41

back a lot more stuff than I would personally define as minimalism

18:43

, but that's fine , it's all the clients choice

18:46

. And then I said , ok , now turn around

18:48

and see how much stuff is left that you didn't add back

18:50

. That was there before . It

18:52

was quite a bit . And the client was

18:55

really stunned

18:57

and also realized

18:59

that they were not ready . They could not

19:01

do it . This was not going to be possible for the rest of the

19:03

space , and so it was

19:05

a failure . But I treated it as a

19:07

success , because I was able to help the client understand

19:10

how , or how not , they were able

19:12

to come to the goal .

19:13

That's interesting . I think anybody that's ever gone house

19:16

hunting knows , when you

19:18

walk into a house , that they really want

19:20

to sell it and it's staged to show so it looks

19:22

like there's a lot of room . And then you walk into

19:24

some houses that look very lived in , where

19:26

there's stuff everywhere and

19:31

it's hard to see it the same way . So it

19:34

even hurts your value . If you're selling your house , you

19:36

really want it thinned out , don't you ?

19:38

Yes , you want it as little as

19:40

possible and it sounds

19:42

people have a hard time with this because it sounds

19:45

like the realtor is telling

19:47

you to get rid of your personality and

19:49

get rid of what means something to you

19:51

. But in fact , selling

19:54

a house is a financial transaction . It's not

19:56

about you , it's not about your family

19:58

, it's not about the memories and the wonderful

20:00

times you had in this space . It's about the financial

20:02

transaction and getting the most value out of it

20:04

that you can . So if you're able to take your

20:06

own identity out of the process and just say

20:08

what do I have to do to maximize value in

20:11

this transaction , that reframe can really

20:13

help .

20:14

Okay , let's come back to my problem once more time . One

20:17

more time , just so I can come away something

20:19

with something here . So my office you

20:21

see this interesting set behind me , which

20:23

, which is it is organized . There's , there's a method

20:25

to the madness , but my desk has all these

20:27

papers . Do I just start one at a time

20:29

and just start whittling away at it ? So I'm

20:31

, I'm just thinning that out .

20:34

The bad news is it does take time

20:36

and it has to be gone through step by step . I

20:38

I am often in the position of telling people

20:41

that there are no shortcuts . The fact

20:43

is , there's a whole pattern

20:45

that got you here and you have to understand

20:47

that pattern to be able to move forward . And

20:49

I often find myself saying you're

20:51

, you're , cluttered . Your stuff tells you a story . It

20:54

tells you a story about the choices you make , the things

20:56

that are important to you , how you live

20:58

life on a daily basis , and when you can understand

21:01

that story , then you're in a position

21:03

to possibly change the pieces of it that

21:05

aren't working for you . But if you don't know what's going

21:07

on and if you just either dump everything

21:10

or leave everything , you're not

21:12

really understanding what has led you to

21:14

this place and for people that are tackling

21:16

a whole house .

21:18

Where's a good place to start ? Is there a place where

21:20

you kind of start here and then work your way through ? Do

21:22

you just pick what you think is the worst ? Start with

21:25

that .

21:25

I I have two ways that

21:27

I start . For a client who is really

21:30

Motivated and they want

21:32

some results fast , I pick

21:34

the spot that they use the most so

21:36

that it will make them biggest immediate impact

21:39

on their daily life . If I'm

21:41

working with someone who is more fearful

21:43

of the process , not sure it's gonna

21:45

work for them , I start with

21:47

something small , really

21:49

small like , maybe even just like a corner

21:51

of a room , just so that they can feel like , oh , I

21:54

understand how this works , this is gonna work for

21:56

me . Now I'm ready to tackle something a little bit larger

21:58

. So it sort of depends on what energy you're coming

22:00

into the project with .

22:02

Okay , now what should it typically and I know it's probably

22:04

different in every part of the country to have somebody

22:06

, a professional , come in and help you tackle

22:09

this ? Is there a range of what people can understand that

22:11

it might cost them ?

22:12

There is a range and it

22:14

of course it depends on what market you're in . It also

22:16

depends on how experienced the organizer You're working

22:18

with is . You can find somebody on

22:20

task rabbit for 25 bucks an hour . You

22:23

are going to get a 25 bucks an hour Experience

22:26

. I'm sure that task right person is wonderful and they're

22:28

gonna do their best for you , but they don't have the

22:30

years of experience and working with multiple

22:32

types of clients as I . As I say to people

22:34

, I have a lot of data . I've been doing this for 10 years , so

22:36

I have a lot of clients

22:39

. I have a lot of experiences that I can give people

22:41

a better idea of what happens when

22:43

they make certain decisions . Someone who just

22:45

started out , who doesn't do this full-time

22:47

. They just have less data , less experience . But

22:49

yeah , in sort of in major Simon San Francisco

22:51

major market , you're probably looking at around

22:54

a hundred to two hundred dollars an hour

22:56

. If you're in a smaller market , you're looking

22:58

at maybe fifty , seventy five an hour

23:00

. It really depends on on

23:02

where you are and how much experience you want your organizer

23:04

to have .

23:05

Okay , now that sounds like you could get expensive

23:07

. So what ? How much time is typically needed

23:09

? So you know , if I

23:11

want to thin stuff out of my house , am I looking to I

23:13

have to spend thousands of dollars , or is it ? After

23:15

three or four hours , we're gonna have made a pretty good dent

23:18

in everything .

23:19

Right . So my general estimate to

23:21

declutter a room is between

23:24

four and eight hours and I that is

23:26

a lot . I and again I'm I'm

23:28

sort of giving the maximum full

23:30

service estimate because I

23:32

work with very busy Professionals and their

23:34

families . They're willing to throw money at this

23:36

problem . They don't have the time to sit

23:38

down and do it all themselves . They need me to

23:40

come and accelerate the process . There are

23:43

organizers who don't charge as much , who

23:45

have a little bit of a different perspective on

23:47

the time it takes to declutter , but I

23:49

am very thorough so I'm getting

23:51

through absolutely everything .

23:53

If I could just win the darn lottery , I'd fly you in

23:56

.

23:56

You're right .

23:57

That's something that I'm certainly gonna think about . So

24:00

let's give people a takeaway here . I

24:02

have a mess in my house and

24:04

I want to get going . I want to do something positive

24:06

. Tell me the first thing I should do .

24:10

So the first thing is to pick a small

24:12

defined area , pull everything out

24:14

of it and decide what you're gonna keep . So I'm

24:16

talking about like one drawer , one shelf

24:19

, just one little thing , because if you try

24:21

to tackle too much at once , it becomes

24:23

super overwhelming and then you kind of quit

24:25

halfway through . And quitting halfway through is sometimes

24:27

even worse than starting , because you have a bigger mess than you

24:30

started out with . So

24:32

if , especially if you're gonna tackle this on

24:34

your own , I would take a little piece by

24:36

little piece . The

24:38

I'm gonna organize my whole house in one weekend

24:40

Doesn't have a good , a

24:42

good success rate .

24:45

Yeah , and I think if people could just

24:47

get up to speed with this then if they ever

24:49

decide to relocate or they want to do things

24:51

, they're not , you know , even even when

24:53

you move . Somebody once told me

24:55

if you have a box that you haven't opened

24:57

in a certain amount of time , just get rid of it once you've

24:59

gotten there , because you're you're probably never gonna use

25:01

it . What do you think about that ?

25:03

Yes , I absolutely agree

25:05

and I would say a corollary , which is

25:07

the experience of throwing something

25:09

out and the experience of putting it in a box

25:12

in the garage are functionally the same Day

25:14

today . You're not looking at it , it's not

25:17

part of your life , it's not there . So

25:19

if the , if , the , if the impulse

25:21

says I'm gonna box this up and leave it for later , I

25:24

would examine that impulse .

25:27

Well , you've motivated me . I'm gonna start making

25:29

a dent in this office today , because I . Drive

25:31

me crazy and I always feel like I just

25:33

didn't complete something , and then I

25:35

get really OCD about what you

25:37

know . It's just then and everything just completely unravels

25:40

.

25:41

Yeah , and I always tell people to

25:43

like don't , don't worry about

25:45

it being perfect , don't worry about getting

25:47

it all done at once . Every little step you make

25:49

is a step in the right direction . And With

25:52

with stuff like organizing , we often let perfect

25:54

be the enemy of the good and it doesn't

25:56

really help .

25:58

Yeah , so so with the office , a lot of

26:00

electronic , a lot of files , maybe just scan

26:02

stuff and and just have it all electronic

26:04

and don't just don't even file the paper .

26:07

Absolutely . And and then , before you scan

26:09

, do I even need to scan this ? Because back

26:11

to trade-offs scanning is not costless , it

26:14

takes your time and scan is actually

26:16

kind of slow , unless you're

26:18

outsourcing it completely , in which case then

26:20

there's a monetary cost there as well . So

26:22

, even with digitizing , keeping

26:25

in mind , like , what do I , what information do I actually

26:27

need and I can't find anywhere

26:29

else , and what information do I

26:31

not really need at all and I don't need to scan ?

26:33

All right , well , hey , lucy , so much great information

26:36

. Your plane ticket will be in the

26:38

mail . But

26:41

thank you , this has been great . I really appreciate

26:43

your time . And all your contact information will be in the show

26:45

notes so people can follow you on social media

26:48

and get in touch with you .

26:50

Fantastic . Thanks so much for a great conversation .

26:53

I'd love to hear your stories good or

26:55

bad , of experiences You've had as a homeowner

26:57

. There's a contact form in the show

26:59

notes . Let me hear your story and you

27:01

may end up being a guest on an upcoming

27:04

episode . Thanks again for listening

27:06

today . See you next time .