Decluttering plan for a move - keep me accountable!

[Tenantindespair]

We have bought our first house and are moving at the end of the month from a rental full of issues (hence my username!). We’d planned to have a weeks overlap but it’s looking like we may have to hand the keys back here the same day as we complete so I’m now panicking!! I need to get the house decluttered and deep cleaned. I’ll give it a final clean on moving day/closer to the time but want to tackle as much as I can in advance so there isn’t too much to do. The house was filthy when we moved in so I’m not aiming for perfection anyway but would like our deposit back!

My current plan is:
18th - declutter bedrooms
19th - deep clean bedrooms
20th - declutter bathrooms and ensuite
21st - deep clean bathrooms and ensuite
22nd - declutter office and airing cupboard
23rd - deep clean office, clean airing cupboard
24th - declutter living room and dining room
25th - deep clean living room and dining room
26th - declutter kitchen and shoe cupboard
27th - deep clean kitchen and shoe cupboard
28th - declutter garage and conservatory
29th - clean garage and conservatory
30th - final touch ups
31st - move!

how does this look? I’ve got other things going on, at home on maternity leave so have time but busy with baby/fitting things in around naps. Is this realistic? Would you make any tweaks? We are using a full packing service so I don’t need to worry about packing particularly just sorting things out/minimising what we take.

I’m mainly posting this to keep myself accountable, and get some feedback on whether it’s realistic. Please feel free to join in and share your own decluttering efforts, especially if you’re moving too!

Now off to declutter the bedrooms, I’ll update on how I get on!

Do you have some spare cash to pay for a declutterers help for a day or even an afternoon.

I've just done this a year past retirement as I was going to sort out my office ( was self employed and working from home before retirement) and it just hasn't happened.

I do have some chronic health problems that have made things more difficult but the help was really beneficial.

He was able to do a tip run and a charity shop run for me too which was brilliant.

I was going to say you should be able to declutter AND clean a room in a day rather than over 2 until you said you were looking after baby at the same time! Any chance you could have somone keep an eye on baby to allow you to get really stuck in?
It depends how much you have to declutter and how rigorous /thoughtful you're going to be. Deciding what to get rid of is hard and somewhat negative. Try it from the reverse perspective - look at a drawer of babygrows /toys /kitchen utensils .... Tell yourself EVERYTHING is going out APART from the ones you decide to keep. Pull out the ones you want the most. This is enjoyable and positive. You'll get to a sweet spot when you think "enough" then what's left goes OUT.
Factor in time to get rid of the OUT pile, be it charity shop or bin

Sounds realistic. Very helpful that it was a mess when you moved in so you most likely will get deposit back with lots of pics/evidence and don't have to kill yourself cleaning
However when I did a move many yrs ago with infant dc I did set aside money for an end of tenancy clean. But landlord was decent enough so didn't feel I needed to in the end.

I delegated lots to DH and was very ruthless with clothes and misc items. If I could replace in under £20 it got binned

Today I am decluttering my dc clothes in their bedrooms!

thank you for this!!! I had looked into an organiser before but the lady I found previously quoted over £1000 which was way out of budget and was quite far from us. I had a look and a new business has started near us offering organising/decluttering. I got in touch and because we’re short on time she’s going to come tomorrow to make a start!!!! I’m so excited!

our main focus with her will be the garage and conservatory - they’ve become a complete dumping ground and are totally overwhelming! So I can’t wait to see how we get on.

Today, I decluttered one of the bedrooms completely, and managed half of the nursery. Baby blessed me with a very long nap which was fabulous, but unfortunately she was in the next to me in the master bedroom so didn’t manage to get in there!

day was slightly derailed by someone popping in unexpectedly and being out for most of the morning. Just putting baby down and then I’ll tidy downstairs and try to get the nursery finished while I’m waiting for DH to finish work!

Sounds like you have made some good progress. I hope your session with a declutterer goes well. I have found it does help so much when you feel overwhelmed!

The fact that you're using a packing service will concentrate the mind. I know you've most probably already agreed a sum with them but think a) would I pay good money for someone to pack this item? and b) do I want to be unpacking this item in 2 weeks time?

@BruceAndNosh that was my logic with the packing service - free up time to declutter without worrying about packing. When we moved here last year I started decluttering, was doing really well then started to panic as I was running out of time and just threw everything in boxes randomly. It was carnage to sort out, and we still have boxes in the garage that haven’t been unpacked a year on. I’m taking that as a positive - whatever’s in there we clearly don’t need so they can go!

Woohoo! Great day today. We had our first session with the professional organiser and it was fabulous. We focused on the garage, and I went through all of the baby clothes putting them into size piles while DH sorted other things with the organiser.

once I had them all in piles she came to work with me, and we managed to get rid of 9 big black garden sacks for charity, and 2 black sacks of rubbish. There was an unbelievable amount of clothes - we brought all the clothes down from the loft down and sorted those. I’m now down to three clothes storage bags instead of about 12!

DH has listed some things to sell that he wants to get rid of, and we’ve got a pile for the tip. He’s also gone through lots of his things, and his clothes too.

Here’s the before and a progress picture - pretty good going for 4 hours work I think!!! Some of the things in the progress photo are for the tip, so that’s our plan for tomorrow! Feeling much more in control already.

I have another session with her on Monday to sort out toys - cannot wait!

Nothing to say except I am trying to clear my late parents' house 200 miles from my own. You have my sympathy!

Well done! You sound like you've done an amazing amount! I've managed a little bit of shredding plus sorting some paperwork into like with like piles since my session with a declutterer on Tuesday!

How did things go today?