How to get spouse onboard for downsizing?

[Hisgirl]

My spouse is about to retire and we're hoping to move to a 3/2 in a 55+ community. The house will be smaller by about 500 sq ft. I have been 'brutal' in my getting rid of things that I've held onto all these years. Things that mattered, were valuable, still in excellent use. But we have so many multiples!

My spouse is a hunter and was a horseback rider/owner, dive master, works with tools. A entire two car garage is PACKED to the gills. We HAVE to get rid of the stuff we're not actively using.

We have two garage frigs/freezers. One is 1/3 full of last year's deer meat. Yall. I don't eat venison. And he's about to start hunting again. There are people who could use the meat and he did start out saying he would donate anything he shot, but he brought it home instead.

He grew up really really poor and I think there's some kind of poverty mentality going on. He gets defensive when I try to 'poke the bear' in regards to getting rid of stuff.I have no doubt he's proud of the success he has achieved in his life and his 'things' reflect that.

Has anyone else been down this path? Can you please give me advice?I'm out of ideas on how to move forward.

 

[Kitty 34]

I just got my DH to clear off a 3 tier little plastic shelf in his "mancave" this morning. He's on his way to Goodwill as I write. Good luck!

 

[Hisgirl]

I just got my DH to clear off a 3 tier little plastic shelf in his "mancave" this morning. He's on his way to Goodwill as I write. Good luck!

Haha, well...that's a start!! Congrats!

 

[neverlandsky]

What I did to bring DH onboard my minimalist path, I started with myself first, then the house, and finally asked him, Hey, can we go through some stuff that you don't wear or use anymore. He said ok. So I started small with him. Now years later and yes it took years, he's onboard. It won't be an overnight change, yet it will change if you're embracing the lifestyle of less is more.

I recently got Halloween and Chrismtas down to one tote each. Picked up our new 4.5 ft Christmas tree.

 

[Hisgirl]

Oh that's great!! Yes, I've been thinking my actions would catch his eye. I've been going through room by room....ignoring 'his' items, The old book collection he read as a kid that he hasn't touched in 20 years.... I was hoping he would say 'let's sell that' but nope. So far everything has been my stuff.

We're moving upstairs and about to get into his clothes. Racks and racks of hunting jackets and suits. He hasn't worn a suit in 20 years except to funerals. I have no doubt at some point this is going to overwhelm me when I spend all this time and effort and the house is still full of crap.

 

[VandVsmama]

My spouse is about to retire and we're hoping to move to a 3/2 in a 55+ community. The house will be smaller by about 500 sq ft. I have been 'brutal' in my getting rid of things that I've held onto all these years. Things that mattered, were valuable, still in excellent use. But we have so many multiples!

My spouse is a hunter and was a horseback rider/owner, dive master, works with tools. A entire two car garage is PACKED to the gills. We HAVE to get rid of the stuff we're not actively using.

We have two garage frigs/freezers. One is 1/3 full of last year's deer meat. Yall. I don't eat venison. And he's about to start hunting again. There are people who could use the meat and he did start out saying he would donate anything he shot, but he brought it home instead.

He grew up really really poor and I think there's some kind of poverty mentality going on. He gets defensive when I try to 'poke the bear' in regards to getting rid of stuff.I have no doubt he's proud of the success he has achieved in his life and his 'things' reflect that.

Has anyone else been down this path? Can you please give me advice?I'm out of ideas on how to move forward.

I have the same challenges with my spouse. When he was growing up, his parents were really bad with making financial decisions, so they were always struggling. As a result, my DH feels safer/more secure when he has more 'stuff.'

4 years ago, we moved. We'd lived in our prior house for 13 years and it was full of a lot of stuff that DH had amassed over those 13 years. For example, 5 blenders and 4 different crock pots. Why 4 crock pots? "So we have a backup in case one breaks." That's the sort of mentality I'm dealing with here.

After selling the previous house, we lived in an apartment for 9 months before moving into our current home. The apartment was HALF the size of our previous house. HALF! And no garage storage. It took me about 6 months, but I finally got DH to whittle down the pile. Here's what I did:

• Month 1 - I got DH to sort through his mountain of computer stuff (he's a computer guy) in his office area in the house. We also sorted through another mountain of old computer stuff in the garage. And by old computer stuff, I'm talking about things like computer games on floppy disks. LOL. We didn't even OWN a floppy disk anymore! DH had a big pile of "keep," a smallish pile of "toss," and a medium-large pile of "maybe, but I want to think about it and decide later." For the "toss" items, I immediately removed them from the house. They didn't go into the garage either.
• Month 2 - I went through my stuff and the kids' stuff.
• Month 3 - Picked the right time when DH was in the right 'frame of mind' (aka, not stressed out from work) and proposed we pick up where we left off. I was surprised, but he put a heck of a lot more stuff in the "toss" pile and a lot of his stuff in the "garage sale" pile. I threw the "toss" pile out and everything for the garage sale went in the garage.
• Month 4 - Continuation of Month 3, but focusing instead on all of his clothes, board games (we had an entire coat closet full of them, many had never been played or even opened), and an enormous wall full of DVDs. Same routine as before only now we added a "donate" category. Any items he said ok to donate, I donated them that same week.
• Month 5 - We had a huge garage sale. DH was depressed about it, so he didn't even come outside during the garage sale. DH & I had an agreement beforehand that anything not sold in the garage sale was NOT going to be moved with us...that we were getting rid of it someway or somehow. We made $300 from the garage sale and all of that went to pay for a junk hauler to haul away the rest of the stuff + a bunch of yard debris that we needed to get rid of.

One of the things we sold in the garage sale was this enormous computer server rack. It lived in our living room for years. It was huge and ugly. I hated the thing. DH still occasionally mourns its departure. He kept this smaller server rack which has lived in his new man cave in our new house for a couple of years now...it's never used at all and drives me bananas.

Re: the venison in your garage freezer - One option to consider would be to find a way to donate it to a needy family, some family that is struggling like your DH's family did when he was a kid.

Re: your DH's desire to have multiples of everything - see if you can get him to agree to keep 2 of everything. So he'd be limited to his primary "thing" and 1 backup. Especially for things like tools, appliances, etc. One exception to this would be a freezer/fridge. 1 freezer/fridge in the kitchen and 1 freezer/fridge in the garage. No multiple freezers or fridges in the garage. Or outside the house either.

 

[Forevermarypoppins]

Oh that's great!! Yes, I've been thinking my actions would catch his eye. I've been going through room by room....ignoring 'his' items, The old book collection he read as a kid that he hasn't touched in 20 years.... I was hoping he would say 'let's sell that' but nope. So far everything has been my stuff.

We're moving upstairs and about to get into his clothes. Racks and racks of hunting jackets and suits. He hasn't worn a suit in 20 years except to funerals. I have no doubt at some point this is going to overwhelm me when I spend all this time and effort and the house is still full of crap.

I'm there with you except I don't have the incentive of downsizing- YET.
Sometimes the "how I grew up " mentality is hard to change. My husband's entire family (MOM and 6 kids) all have the "I can NOT get rid of that". His parents were divorced and my FIL wasn't like that, LOL. As stated before, try starting small. He may say NO quite a few times before he says yeah, ok. Good Luck.

 

[luvnwdwgal]

My husband is retiring next year. We also have a huge garage (big enough for about 5 vehicles). There’s no way he would get rid of anything now. Not when he’s going to have more time. We would never move into a community anyway. We like our privacy. Good luck!!

 

[SmallWorld71]

When we were downsizing my mom to move, we started by making 3 piles: keep, donate, trash. I took the donations with me to donate so she wouldn't have to do that step.
Maybe you could try something like taking pictures of things that are nostalgic and making a collage or a photo book? That way he can hold onto them in a way without having to literally keep everything.
Is there a cause(s) that he could get behind that would make him feel like he is doing good? For example, I know some areas have programs that collect suits for veterans. Maybe if he felt that his items were being repurposed, he would be better about letting them go?

 

[easyas123]

My spouse is a hunter and was a horseback rider/owner, dive master, works with tools. A entire two car garage is PACKED to the gills. We HAVE to get rid of the stuff we're not actively using.

We have two garage frigs/freezers. One is 1/3 full of last year's deer meat. Yall. I don't eat venison. And he's about to start hunting again. There are people who could use the meat and he did start out saying he would donate anything he shot, but he brought it home instead.

Finally - I question I relate to!!!

I can't help you with everything but can maybe assist with the above. My husband has a basement full of hunting stuff and a four barn stalls full of crab traps, duck decoys, fishing poles, and the fourth with tree stands. Plus a room in the basement with more waders, boots, coats and whatnot.... We had that freezer at one time, too. I do eat venison (but not bear which is taking up a whole shelf). After our kids left home we realized we had just a ton of deer leftover every August. It took a year or two buy I finally convinced him to just donate the deer vs. bringing them home, keeping only what we needed for the year. It was a gradual process, but after the first one it was easier. I also gave away the old freezer & garage fridge to one of the boys and bought myself a new freezer, slightly smaller. No need for all that for 2 adults. After a year in which he didn't use the trot lines, we discussed it and he ended up getting rid of them. I can't pry the crab traps out of his hands though. My eldest son is the one who is guilty of having his dive boxes in my garage, but they are moving out when he goes to settlement next month on his new place. I hope he takes all of HIS hunting & fishing crap, too. Now, it has been a bit easier for me since we aren't moving anytime soon and he's gradually starting to see the benefit in 'less is more'.

What is your moving timeframe? 3 months? 6 months? Do you already own the place in the community? I'm assuming you've had the conversation that it all can't go/fit...perhaps a compromise of a storage unit? Maybe after a year of paying to rent a storage unit and never going to it because he didn't really need what was in there would help him part with some of the stuff? Do you have your place up for sale yet? Perhaps the need to clear out your current place so it can go up for sale will spur him into action? Maybe have a real estate agent come out - they'll for sure suggest emptying the place out of all the extra stuff/clutter/odds & ends.

Or you could go tough-love. Tell him you've thinned out the main household, you are happy to help him sort and get rid of a lot of his stuff now, and you'll be ready come moving day, but if he's not then it's up to him to figure it out.

Good luck!

 

[HeatherC]

Are you sure he actually is on board with moving? That could be part of why he may be resistant to part with things.

 

[barkley]

My spouse is about to retire and we're hoping to move to a 3/2 in a 55+ community. The house will be smaller by about 500 sq ft. I have been 'brutal' in my getting rid of things that I've held onto all these years. Things that mattered, were valuable, still in excellent use. But we have so many multiples!

My spouse is a hunter and was a horseback rider/owner, dive master, works with tools. A entire two car garage is PACKED to the gills. We HAVE to get rid of the stuff we're not actively using.

We have two garage frigs/freezers. One is 1/3 full of last year's deer meat. Yall. I don't eat venison. And he's about to start hunting again. There are people who could use the meat and he did start out saying he would donate anything he shot, but he brought it home instead.

He grew up really really poor and I think there's some kind of poverty mentality going on. He gets defensive when I try to 'poke the bear' in regards to getting rid of stuff.I have no doubt he's proud of the success he has achieved in his life and his 'things' reflect that.

Has anyone else been down this path? Can you please give me advice?I'm out of ideas on how to move forward.

you say 'we're' so he's really on board with the concept and has seen one of the homes and experienced how much smaller it is than what you have now? if he has'nt physically toured one and seen the size then that might be the trigger to get him to realize how much you need to get rid of. consider also researching on your own just how expensive those storage facilities are b/c too often people will sign on for one to throw all the stuff they can't deal with parting with in preparation for a move-only to have it sit to the tune of thousands and thousands of wasted dollars for the rest of their lives (the growing up poor mentality of hanging on to things may diminish when faced with throwing money away for offsite storage).

you might research specific charities he might have a soft spot for that could benefit from the items he's used and loved-we live in hunting territory and there are volunteer groups that teach hunter safety to kids that accept donations of usable equipment/clothing, vets groups that covet it (and donate to food pantries from their kills), vets groups that adore donations of camping gear and tools, LOTS of horse based charities for disabled kids, ptsd vets...that would love donations of usable equipment. heck who knows-in donating he may find groups he wants to become involved with post retirement.

 

[Kennywood]

Or you could simply allow your husband to hang on to things that he likes. Just because the wife decides to go nuclear in getting rid of things, doesn't mean he has to. If he agrees, fine. But to constantly hound him only creates a tense home experience and causes him to dig in deeper. What may be junk to the wife may have meaning to the husband. And don't you DARE start tossing things of his without consulting him. That is a quick way to really have him explode.

Why can't someone simply enjoy his/her "treasures", whether or not the spouse agrees or understands. Is it only your way or else?

 

[Hisgirl]

Or you could simply allow your husband to hang on to things that he likes. Just because the wife decides to go nuclear in getting rid of things, doesn't mean he has to. If he agrees, fine. But to constantly hound him only creates a tense home experience and causes him to dig in deeper. What may be junk to the wife may have meaning to the husband. And don't you DARE start tossing things of his without consulting him. That is a quick way to really have him explode.

Why can't someone simply enjoy his/her "treasures", whether or not the spouse agrees or understands. Is it only your way or else?

I get it, Kenny, But at some point, it's time to get rid of the multiple saddles when you haven't owned a horse in 11 years, can no longer scuba dive due to back issues, won't be having any yard work at all, never use the kayaks, haven't touched the bikes in 20 years, hate to golf but has clubs....see where I'm going with this?

Other people could enjoy these things! And yes, he is on board with moving as someone else asked. I would never touch his stuff. Im asking for suggestions of how to get the ball rolling. After cleaning out my parents' home, I'm literally traumatized by all the crap and don't want to do that to my kids.

 

[barkley]

After cleaning out my parents' home, I'm literally traumatized by all the crap and don't want to do that to my kids.

honestly-that was what triggered major purging for both my husband and myself. both moms had moved into smaller places but his had held onto allot of stuff (including in storage). we couldn't just toss it b/c we had to go through it in case there was important paperwork. it was horrific and we never want either of our kids to deal with it. we started by organizing and labeling boxes-once you start seeing how many duplicates of items you have it seems easier to pare it down (and with some stuff he came to the realization he would never use it again so he got rid of it). maybe suggest 'organizing' and see where it goes from there?

 

[VandVsmama]

I get it, Kenny, But at some point, it's time to get rid of the multiple saddles when you haven't owned a horse in 11 years, can no longer scuba dive due to back issues, won't be having any yard work at all, never use the kayaks, haven't touched the bikes in 20 years, hate to golf but has clubs....see where I'm going with this?

Other people could enjoy these things! And yes, he is on board with moving as someone else asked. I would never touch his stuff. Im asking for suggestions of how to get the ball rolling. After cleaning out my parents' home, I'm literally traumatized by all the crap and don't want to do that to my kids.

I hear ya. My DH still has his snow skis in the garage. We haven’t gone skiing in 18 years and I have no desire to ever again. He still holds out hope though. He also has a lousy and dusty set of golf clubs in the garage that haven’t been used in 20 years.

 

[tvguy]

Good luck. I just know too many people who downsize and regret it afterwards. It is a very tough life choice you both have to make.

 

[georgina]

I don't know anyone who downsized and regretted it later. Having just moved out of our house of almost 35 years, it is a good thing to clear out some stuff. 3 BR/2bath is not tiny! I have nothing for the OP, my DH was definitely on board with purging, some people do have issues with getting rid of things even if they are unused. Good luck.

 

[1GoldenSun]

We'll still be in our 5-bedroom house even when we're old and gray, mostly because no small house is going to have a three-car garage to hold all my husband's stuff.

 

[peabody58]

2700 sf to 1500 sf. Moved to Georgia. Sold just about everything (saved on shipping), and let the DW buy all new furniture for the new retirement home. Very few things that I miss, or have even needed in almost 7 years. We were both motivated to downsize.

Have your DH view George Carlins 'Stuff' comedy routine on YouTube. Maybe this will help in his thought process.