Can I sort this out with barely any money?

[eggsinarow]

Posted in DIY but hoping for more people to see it on here.
Need the wise MN advice on organisation and house stuff!

DP has recently been struggling with keeping up with his work. He's self employed and has to spend most days out seeing clients and as a results is falling behind on admin. I work evenings so he has DS and I also work Saturdays so that's out too.

He's said in the past it'd be great to have an office in the house as that would mean he can work after putting DS to bed.

We have an attic/loft that we've done up in the past, it's all plastered, painted and has carpets down but ATM it's full of DPs things, clothes and shoes, memorabilia, boxes etc you can't really walk there.
I'm thinking of sorting it and putting a small office space in there.
We need it ASAP so any ideas would be really appreciated.

We don't really have any spare cash ATM but could probably find a small amount.
I think to sort it ASAP we will need some cheap fabric wardrobes, clothes rails and shoe racks to get his clothes in order, we would move the boxes and bits to one side of the room and set up a small office space initially which can then be gradually expanded and sorted as DP sorts through his things.

I feel like I need to do it myself as DP can spend hours on menial tasks (Last time when he went up there he spent over an hour arranging his CDs). I can't sort his boxes and stuff out but can probably tackle the clothes. The room has an awkward shape, as its where the roof is so it has a high point and then goes really low at the sides so tricky for space.

Any ideas and recommendations?

What would happen if you simply threw it all away? If his clothes, shoes and junk are in the loft I'm going to guess that they aren't being used so why not get rid of it all in favour of having a usable space?

@nocake he does use them.
We have very limited space in the bedroom (and that's where the loft hatch is) so he keeps bare minimum in there and the rest is in the loft, he goes up everyday.

There's also lots of memorabilia from when he used to compete in a certain sport at a national level so we would like to keep it, we are planning on having room for it once we upsize.

Of course it's possible - try freecycle and gumtree etc for the pieces you need. If you have an ikea nearby they're great for storage ideas too

Get furniture second hand. There are usually large warehouses with furniture in them which are charity shop run in most areas.

Or look on Ebay locally as well as Gumtree and Facebook.

Probably clothes rails rather than a fabric wardrobe as you should be able to push them right up to the slope of the roof. Fabric wardrobes are quite boxy so you won't get them in as far. I would use the space behind the clothes rails to store not in use things. What about shoe racks for low level storage in the eaves - you can get really cheap ones from places like poundstretcher. They'd work well for CDs! Personally I would chuck CDs and get Spotify but maybe he's very attached to them

For a v cheap desk you need a bit of wood placed over some of his boxes. Gives you at least 4 good size boxes worth of storage space, again with things not in use that you can ask him if he misses after 6 months

Cheapest workbenches/desks I make are 4 or 5 pallets just stacked and screwed together.

I'd recommend him making the desk, it really is just as simple as a board of some description with boxes at either end [the same height] and a chair.

I notice Ikea has a understairs system that might be possible to use as storage under a sloping roof in an attic, that is more permanent. No idea of cost though. it might be something to consider for the future.

Lucky bloke to have you!

I wish someone would come and do the same for me;!

Be careful what you throw out, us old men are rather attached to old cardi's and pullovers and the like!

The IVAR shelving from IKEA is very good and fairly inexpensive. You can pick the height to fit your space and have as many, or as few, shelves as you like. I would put clothes on there and store anything else in plastic crates.

Whatever you put up there will be restricted by the size of the loft hatch.

I agree that clothes rails rather than fabric wardrobes is the way to go, for the reasons previously mentioned. Ikea clothes rail £6.95

Is the boxed stuff in cardboard boxes? Would be worth getting plastic boxes, if they are.

For a desk, Ikea do tops and legs separately. So you could get this top for £6 and Four of these legs for £10.

This office chair should be able to get through the loft hatch. (£20)

Kallax shelving units can be used upright or on their side, so could be used along the eaves and you can buy boxes to fit inside the cubby holes.

HTH

Does he really need an office to be able to do admin once the dc are in bed? Why can't he use a kitchen table? I work with a small laptop table in front of the sofa, it was £15 from Ikea.

Thank you for all the suggestions so far!
I'm currently browsing shpock/gumtree etc for cheap bits.

DP is a bit concerned there's more work involved than I think.

@GregsGirl he needs access to a printer and fax machine and also there's files and other paperwork. And he's got a specific system set up on his computer that would take time and £££s to transfer onto a laptop - that we would also have to buy. We have a tiny house as it is and I'd rather have a designated space for it somewhere out of the way otherwise I'm worried I'm risking random crap and bits of paperwork all over.

Will he be accessing the loft via a hatch or do you need to factor in cost of stairs?

Could you buy the cheapest of desks and just a screen/partition thing. Move all his stuff that isn't work related to one end, put partition in front so it's not distracting / annoying to look at then set up cheap desk so he can get going asap?

I would definitely look on eBay / gumtree - DH's office desk and chair cost £25 on eBay around 5 years ago and is still going strong!

@Coulddowithanap no need to factor in stairs as the hatch has those pull down stairs fitted.

@HandbagCrazy it's a good idea but a screen wouldn't work it would be way too cramped in there like sitting in a box. Just have to get the stuff organised I think

You could just push all the junk up there into a corner, neve rmind sorting it and then put a desk and the computer up there leaving the junk behind a piece of cloth and just get on with it. We had a loft ladder up to our loft space in our first house (no windows up there) but we had a strip light and flooring put in.

Sounds really as though the main problem may be finding space for the clothes - do they all really need to be hung up, or could most be folded? If the latter then you could perhaps consider shelves and some form of supports (bricks or books that aren't needed) and just add in extra height/width for the section that DP needs for PC/printer/fax etc.,

On the other hand, Houzz may have some ideas for how you could get creative with proper shelving from IKEA/Gumtree/Freecycle although IKEA or other flat pack could be your best bet given everything has to fit through the loft hatch. Roughly what are the room dimensions?