15 Ways to Keep Your Home Decluttered

I’ve written a post on the 30 Day Challenge to a Decluttered Home and made a Simple Guide to Decluttering Your Home. If you haven’t read those yet go read them, then come back here! Both of those posts are so important to successfully decluttering your home, but now the question is “what do you do after you are done?” I’m going to share with you 15 ways to keep your home decluttered.

Sure you can do all of the steps, take the challenge, and get your home decluttered but what happens afterwards? If you don’t keep it up, there’s really no point in doing it in the first place. This means you need to come up with a plan and take steps to continue keeping up with your decluttered home, which brings me to my very first tip!

1. Realize that this is a lifestyle change.

Realize that decluttering and living in a decluttered space has to be a lifestyle change. I’ve talked about it in my previous blog posts. This is just like trying to lose weight, you have to start by creating better daily habits. It isn’t something that’s going to happen over night, so give yourself some grace and start slow. The long term is where your focus should really be. If you declutter your home but you don’t continue those same habits, you will go right back to square one. We don’t want that!

2. Give everything a specific spot.

This is a must. Don’t just throw things wherever and hope for the best. That’s exactly how clutter happens. Once you organize and find a space for everything, it’s so much easier to keep clean and decluttered. If a particular item is worth the energy to find a specific space for, then it’s worth hanging onto. If it’s not worth the energy, get rid of it. Don’t hang onto it forever as a maybe, just get rid of it.

3. Think about what you are bringing into your home.

Make sure that every single item that is in your home, you 100% want there. This means you need to really think about the things you bring into your home. Always ask yourself these questions, “Do I really need this item?”, “Is this item worth finding specific spot for?”, “Do I have room to make space for this item?”

4. Limit your spaces.

Give yourself some limits. For example, say you have a cabinet for china and special serving dishes. Only allow yourself to keep the things that fit neatly inside that cabinet. If something doesn’t fit, you don’t keep it. If it’s an item you really want, get rid of something to create the space. This will help you stay organized and keep yourself from collecting clutter.

5. Organize all spaces and make them pretty!

This is personally my favorite tip and one that has helped me stay organized. I believe that if you create a beautifully organized space, you are more likely to keep it that way. Use pretty colored or wicker baskets and chalkboard labels, take your soaps out of their containers and put them in pretty bottles, the possibilities are endless. This will create a beautiful space that you love, give a limit to store things, and adding the labels will help everyone in your home know exactly where everything goes.

6. Get rid of your junk drawer.

Listen I’m totally guilty of having the dreaded junk drawer, but seriously you don’t need it. Don’t allow yourself to create a messy space. If you do, you will carry that habit through to other spaces in your home. Just get rid of it!

7. Use the touch it once rule.

My Mother in Law taught me this rule as a young mother. Before you set down an item you’ve picked up, make sure you do something with it. Throw it in the trash, put it away in its spot, whatever needs to be done. Just don’t set it down to “deal with later”. Touch it one time and that’s it. Obviously there are exceptions, but for the most part try to follow this rule. It will really help you create those good habits. This is also a good concept to teach your kids so they don’t leave stuff laying around as much!

8. Identify your hotspots.

Identify spots within your home that always become cluttered. Shoes next to your garage door, mail on your coffee bar, clothes piling up on your bedroom floor, make up and hair tools on your bathroom counters, whatever it may be. If you can identify those spots and acknowledge that they tend to collect clutter, then you can make sure you take the extra time to keep those spaces clean.

9. Create a drop off zone.

This is such an important thing to have. Create some sort of drop off or landing zone for kid’s school papers, mail, and whatever else is brought into your home on a daily basis. Take a few minutes at the end of each day to make sure you go through and get rid of or put away anything in this space. The key is to make sure you are doing this every day, if you don’t things will pile up.

10. Keep flat surfaces clear.

Keep all of your flat surfaces clear of clutter. This includes kitchen and bathroom counters, dining room and coffee tables, etc. If you keep these spaces clean and clear, I promise your home will feel so much better and way less cluttered. If everything has a home, it should be easy to make sure you are putting away everything you use on the daily.

11. Always have a donation bin.

Always have a designated basket or bin that you can put things you’d like to donate. Just make sure that you take this bin and donate the items every week. Do not keep them laying around! If you truly don’t want an item, get rid of it sooner than later. You don’t want it laying around for you to question and pick up again.

12. Create a plan for managing paper clutter.

Paper clutter is the worst. Kid’s school papers, mail, old receipts. We all have them. Create some sort of system that works for you to keep this to a minimum. Every system is going to look different for each person, do whatever works for you. Just make sure you are throwing away unwanted papers and filing others away. Don’t leave them untouched. A few papers a day is a lot easier to deal with than a month’s worth of them.

13. Make tidying up a daily habit.

Take 5-10 minutes at the end of the day to tidy up around your home. Having 3 kids, 2 dogs, and a husband myself I know things just get put down randomly all over the place. Make it a rule to have everyone take a few minutes before going to bed to make sure everything is picked up and put into it’s place. Remember it’s about creating those good daily habits.

14. Flip your hangers.

As you wear your clothes flip your hangers around, so you can tell which clothes you never wear. After 6 months if a hanger is not flipped, donate that piece of clothing. Clearly if you are not wearing it after 6 months, it’s not that important to you. Don’t let it take up room in your closet.

15. Box a few things up every month.

The last little tip I have for you is to box a few items up every month. This could include items that you are not sure if you need anymore but are just “hanging onto because”, kid’s toys, old electronics, etc. If you don’t miss these items by the next month, donate and start over. This will help you figure out those “maybes”. If you find yourself missing an item, take it out and keep it. Just make sure it’s worth finding space for.

I hope you saw a trend while reading my 15 ways to keep your home decluttered. All of these tips work together, so make sure you keep all of them in mind while starting your new decluttered journey. Most importantly remember that this is a journey, it’s a lifestyle change. It’s okay to stumble, just make sure you keep going and always try your best. You got this!