Downsizing is so hard

[BG2015]

Our house is going on the market next week. We live in a 3 storey townhouse, with 4 bedrooms, 2 en-suites and main bathroom, plus an integral garage. Large kitchen diner and south facing garden. We have a great 15 foot square living room with a massive corner sofa.

We are downsizing to get rid of our mortgage. This next house will be our retirement house. I've had a number of health issues so we need to make this move to take it more financially viable for me to finish work.

DS 20, is still with us and will not be moving out anytime soon, so we need 2 large double bedrooms.

We have viewed a few houses and 2 stand out but both would need compromises if we bought them.

We knew it would be hard but not this hard.

When I had to downsize following my divorce, I literally cleared whole rooms so they were completely empty.
I set myself targets such as reducing my books by 80%, kitchen dishes by 50%. I actually found it quite enjoyable once I got into. I told myself that memories are in my head, not in belongings and that helped me be ruthless when clearing out.
I paid someone to bring everything out of the loft and to do runs to the dump. I probably threw out 90%.
Then I looked in a cheaper area than my original choice and found a very spacious ex council house. Even then I had to accept that some things just wouldn't fit such as the living room suite, piano, some wardrobes etc.
Once I'd actually moved (took 15 months) it was (and still is) a fabulous feeling.
I've very little clutter, I know exactly what's in the loft and I've got a warm, cosy home all of my own.
You can do this OP. You just need to clear out and lose the attachment to specific items eg the corner sofa.

Yes agree . We downsized over 2 years ago and it’s a modern house , less bills etc which is great . But the storage is the problem . When you have a bigger house you fill it . Plus unfortunately we had relatives houses to clear so that caused arguments about what to keep . Be brutal about getting rid of stuff now . Because we are still doing it 2 years later and it’s exhausting. I miss most my dressing room and my wardrobe here is a mess , but I know deep down I don’t wear a lot of it so just starting on Vinted . So yes my hints declutter now and write a list of what you need from the house . Being mortgage free is worth it .

Also just buy somewhere with cupboards. We live in a 2 bed flat and have a cupboard for our hoover!

The best of luck with stopping work, I hope it helps. I think 'negative' moves are always really hard, good for you for doing it.

I don't know the area and there's undoubtedly reasons why this isn't a option - it needs a lot of work. But it definitely has potential and I wondered if a place that you have to make a mark on might end up feeling more yours.

bungalow

I like this one. You could make the garden lovely .

We have a house with a boxroom and use it for storage, we bought a Pax wardrobe from Ikea and kitted it out for storage rather than clothes and it holds loads, the Dyson is fixed to the wall in the same room and the carpet cleaner lives in there also.

In this market, buying anything is hard (unless you have unlimited funds available in cash). Perhaps it would help you feel better about downsizing to think of it as the housing market rather than the “fault” of having to downsize.

Having just done this, I agree, it was very very hard. I am glad of it now though! We were rural and isolated before, winters were hard and always driving to places. The upsides of the new house are it is walking distance to bus, train and shops. I miss the old house much less than I thought I would!

It took probably two years to move, we fixed things that needed fixed, decorated in neutral colours and decluttered on a huge scale, clearing whole rooms and donating furniture we knew would not fit in the new house.

There is a garage here for storage though and that helps keep the house clear, the loft is empty and we don't plan to put anything in there, ever!

weve been thinking if this fir last 2 yrs properly
im 66 and dp is 69, upto now now real health problems
but I do know now that I don’t want stairs !
id like modern built apartment 2 beds, ground floor with bit of patio. Not a retirement flat though
or , bungalow

I dont want issues say 5-10 years down the line
having to get stair lift, there so bulky and maintenance service costs.
my sister moved in her 60’s to 3 bed semi. Thinking her family could stay over. They stay 1 night boxing night !
She has knee and hip problems now and struggles with stairs and cleaning it Now.
She wish she had bought an apartment, but says she can’t go through all the hassle of selling/buying again

It is hard OP. My PILs have been looking to downsize as they are still in the 4-bed family home and are starting to find it hard to cope with the house and garden. The problem is that they still want somewhere detached and with a garage, just with fewer bedrooms. Not sure there are many small detached properties around!

One piece of advice I read was don’t move into the same type of space that’s just smaller or you will constantly be comparing in a negative way. So if you live rurally, move to somewhere better connected or vice versa. If you have three stories , think bungalow or apartment. Big garden to patio/low maintenance- or again vice versa. Make a complete change where you gain some new advantages which aren’t about space. Apparently it makes you far happier!

You need a 2 bed so isn’t there a whole bedroom for storage??

Thank you everyone for your thoughts they have been so helpful.

I know the third bedroom could be a wardrobe/storage space. In my head I'm trying to fit my current house into a new house so I know I've got to get my head around all of that.

It's a process.

Maybe after a heckling declutter you’ll see you don’t have that much stuff that you’ll be taking anyway?

That first house you looked at has all the hallmarks of having been flipped on the cheap so is probably overpriced and worth a swerve for the quality of the fittings, anyhow.

I am similar - am downsizing from a 4 bed / 3 storey / 2 1/2 bathrooms / conservatory to a ground floor 2 bed flat
But it needs renovating and u am planning on changing the one bathroom to two smaller ones!
I also took into account living there as a senior in the future!

@Cotswoldbee

thats great - if you can afford it. The OP said they're downsizing to pay off their mortgage due to health issues & her needing to stop working.

You could buy a shed

Bargain

My parents downsized from a 5 bed detached to a 1 bed flat! (A planned temporary move - lasted 6 years).

They are now in a lovely 2 bedroom flat, 1 ensuite plus second bathroom. Not much storage space but they love it.

Being a flat they don't have to take care of a garden (was getting hard in previous house) or general upkeep of the building (management company does that).

Bit crowded when we stay over but we've managed several weeks with me and DS2 sharing a bed and then 11 year old on blankets on the floor...

They obviously decluttered loads from the 5 bed to the 1 bed. Then decluttered some more when moving to the 2 bed so they could buy new furniture to fit the flat better. My mum was so happy to be getting new furniture!!! She'd always kept stuff for decades/used 2nd hand furniture before.

Small detached properties are getting increasingly hard to find as they usually get extended. It would be the only way for me and my family to get a bigger detached place- buy a small detached bungalow and then save to extend it. It’s happening really frequently in my area as elderly people pass away but does mean there is a big shortage of places to downsize to.

As op’s have said you really do need to have a massive declutter. If you are giving up work then all work related stuff (clothes/equipment) just straight out. That big corner sofa is likely to need to go. Do a category at a time rather than a room, like the kondo method. It is so easy to accumulate stuff, we used to move regularly in our 20’s from rental to rental and it meant we often went through our belongings when packing up. We’ve been in our house 5 years and it’s mad how much stuff we keep now- just in case. I’m trying to get stricter but it is hard.

Do you have particular problem categories or is it just general? Do you have sentimental things stored- like from children’s childhood? My in-laws have practically every toy/clothes from my husbands childhood but so much of it is unusable now which is sad, it should have been passed on when someone could make use of it.

There is room for a shed in garden, room for cover (carport style) down side & the 3rd bedroom could be storage space.

I had to downsize when buying a house after divorce. I needed three bedrooms (boy and girls teens).

Storage in the majority of houses I looked at was an issue. No where to put the ironing board or hover. I mentioned it in one property and the owner got out a small table top ironing board from the kitchen cupboard!!

I appreciate you are losing space when downsizing, but these are not things I'd want stored in my bedroom as some suggested.

*hoover

@AluckyEllie no I'm not sentimental at all and don't hoard things.its just 'stuff' isn't it, it seems to accumulate.

I have a lot of work related stuff, in case I teach Reception/Y2 again etc (which I never will now), photo albums, kitchen stuff, spiralizer, toastie maker (not used them for years) 100 mugs, recipe books when we look recipes up online now.

Half term is going to be a declutter week.