10 Useful Decluttering Tips for Hoarders to Overcome Their Stuff

Inside: A list of 10 useful decluttering tips for hoarders to get started and make progress with clearing out their home.

Clutter can vary in severity.  It is normal to have excess stuff lying around your home and routine decluttering helps keep it at bay.  However, there can also be more extreme clutter and sometimes this leans toward hoarding.  

If you have hoarding tendencies or live with a hoarder, the clutter can feel crippling and overwhelming.  The decluttering tips for hoarders below are intended to help you get started and make progress towards ridding your home of excessive amounts of stuff.

Before diving into the tips, let’s discuss what hoarding is and some basic causes and consequences of it.

Hoarding vs. hoarding tendencies

Hoarding can be a serious mental health condition and affect not only the hoarder but the people around them.  This article is not intended to offer medical advice or therapy for those with a diagnosed condition; but, is helpful for those who feel they hoard too much stuff in their home and are overwhelmed by the clutter.  If you are seeking self-help and lean more towards “hoarding tendencies,” then these decluttering tips for hoarders are for you.

Why do people hoard?

Most all of us deal with clutter, as it’s nearly impossible to keep items away from our homes (I believe this is largely a result of our consumerist society). These items also keeps our lives moving and functioning; however, it is easy to accumulate too much and too many unnecessary things. Routine decluttering, in small or big ways, is important to manage the things in our home.

But why do people hoard? Why live with so many things that it affects your home, lifestyle and even mental health? Below are basic reasons why people have hoarding tendencies. For a more clinical list, visit this Mayo Clinic article about hoarding disorder.

• You believe everything you own is valuable and/or important, therefore can’t imagine throwing anything away
• You believe you will need your items at some point in the future – regardless if you’ve used them much or at all in recent years or even if they’ve grown past their use
• You don’t want to waste anything – money spent or items you own
• Your stuff comforts you or gives you a sense of security
• You are emotionally attached or sentimental to your things

Benefits to overcoming hoarding

Before diving into the decluttering tips for hoarders, let’s be mindful of the amazing benefits you’ll enjoy after decluttering your home!

• Improving your overall health and quality of life
• Creating a healthier and more sanitary environment inside your home
• Enjoying a more peaceful, enjoyable environment at home
• Less time and money spent on stuff and more time spent on things that matter, allowing you to practice more intentional way of living
• Less clutter to manage and attempt to organize
• More confidence in your home’s appearance so you can entertain, have a neighbor over or enjoy family visits

Decluttering tips for hoarders

1. Establish your mindset

Before you begin decluttering, check in with why you want to do this.  What will be the benefits, what is your endgame?  Write down your end game result and post where you can see it everyday.  Keep your “eye on the prize” for consistent motivation

Possible motivators for a decluttering mindset:

• You want to invite your family over for a get together and need your home cleared out. 
• You are moving and need to downsize everything you own. 
• Your children are embarrassed by the state of your home and you want to make them proud.
• You no longer enjoy resting and relaxing in your own home and want a more comfortable environment.

2. Enlist help

Don’t go it alone.  This is a big project and it’s okay to ask for help.  Reach out to family members, a close friend or if possible a professional – anyone who will help you weed through items and work past your decluttering obstacles. Someone to help can also be there for the physical needs decluttering may require like lifting heavy boxes or loading a truck.

3. Accept it will take time

Acknowledge this will not be done overnight.  It took a long time to accumulate so much clutter, it will take time to remove it.  Don’t pressure yourself to get too much done at once.  Be proud of even small accomplishments like clearing out one room or taking two boxes of stuff to Goodwill.  These small steps are still progress!

4. Conquer decluttering myths

An important decluttering tip for hoarders is overcoming the popular self limiting beliefs and myths we have about decluttering (for example, “wonder if I need that someday” or “I paid good money for that so I don’t want to waste it”).  These are traps that keep you from getting rid of stuff you no longer need.  Clearing your mind of these obstacles will keep your mindset and reasonable thinking in place.

5. Limit or avoid shopping while decluttering

In a combined effort to rid your home of excess stuff, limit what you bring into it.  Put a hold on unnecessary purchases and limit your shopping habits.  Oftentimes hoarding tendencies go hand-in-hand with compulsive shopping.

If you struggle with over-shopping, consider why you do it in the first place; get to the root of why you desire so many things.  Once you’ve determined this you can address it and (hopefully) improve your resistance to shopping.  If compulsive shopping is not an issue for you, still limit what you buy during a period of time when you are focusing on ridding your home of extreme clutter.

6. Acknowledge you have too much stuff

Again, an important aspect to decluttering for hoarders is your mindset.  Start with better understanding of why you have so many things.  Acknowledge that it is too much and these unnecessary items are taking over your home and even affecting your mental health.  

How do you know if you have too much stuff?

• You can never find anything
• You are embarrassed by the state of your home
• Your home feels dirty or is difficult to clean

7. Follow a plan

Planning your work and working your plan can be key to any goal. A roadmap and checklist will help you breakdown this large task of decluttering your home as a hoarder. The 30 Day Declutter Plan will give you small, daily decluttering tasks. This keeps you on track and focused, reminding you its a marathon not a sprint!

8. Be prepared

Be prepared to declutter with a few simple supplies:  trash bags, boxes and, if possible, a plan for selling / donating / recycling your discarded items. If it’s too overwhelming to think about what you’ll do with everything after you’ve decluttered, don’t worry about it at first.  Just focus on putting things in bags and boxes.  

9. Start small

Even with just one trash bag you can start decluttering.  Go room-to-room with a bag and fill it with items of no use (i.e., birthday party favors, empty shampoo bottles, expired medication, old newspapers and magazines).

Starting small allows you to dive right in and begin making progress…try the “trash bag” approach above to tackle one drawer or one shelf. The feeling of accomplishment to conquering one area of clutter will give you motivation to keep going.

10. Don’t worry about organizing

An important decluttering tip for hoarders is not to worry about organizing at the same time.  This project is about one thing only:  getting rid of excess clutter and unnecessary stuff.  The organization part will come later; for now focus only on letting go, not figuring out what to do with what’s leftover.

Bonus: Take before and after photos

This is optional as you may not want a reminder of what your home looked like with hoarding clutter; or taking before photos will show you how far you’ve come! This accomplishment can feel amazing and do wonders for your self-esteem and confidence. But if you want to capture your decluttering journey, take before photos so as you make progress you can see how far you’ve come.

Recap of decluttering tips for hoarders

You have already made one step in the right direction by simply reading this post. You can overcome hoarding tendencies and rediscover a home you love to be in. By getting started with these decluttering tips for hoarders, you are well on your way!