Organize Your Closet and Make Money

A couple of weeks ago I was channel surfing when I stopped to watch a show on organizing and decluttering. It inspired me to clean out my own closet. It was looking....well down right horrible actually, which you can see from the before pictures. I hadn't cleaned it out in some time and the thought of taking on that task was quite daunting. The after closets on the television show were so fantastic looking I finally had the motivation to jump right in and clean out my own closet. I'm so happy with the results. While my closet doesn't look as good as the ones on tv, it is big, no huge improvement from what it was. And, I am making some money from the clean.

If cleaning out your closet seems like more than you can handle, think again. In just a couple of hours you can declutter and organize. Here is how I did it.

First, you will need the following:

• large bags for trash
• large bags or boxes for items to donate
• large bags or boxes for items to sell (via ebay or yard sale etc..)
• post it notes to label your piles
• extra hangers

Next, empty out your closet and put the items into the following categories:

• donate
• throw away (anything that is broken or has holes)
• sell
• keep (can be split into items to keep hung or items to be folded and put into drawers)

Once you've gone through everything in your closet and each item is in its correct category, you are ready to put everything back in an organized manner. **Note: you should donate, or sell anything that doesn't fit you or that you haven't worn in the past year. If you haven't worn it in a year then you probably never will.

Here is how I organized my clothes back into the closet:

• on the left I organized all tops including jackets by sleevelength...so sleeveless, short sleeve, long sleeve
• on the bottom left I have only jeans
• at the center are dresses
• on the right are skirts and then pants... again by length so that it looks neat. The far right is a small section I leave for my husband :)

**Note: it's important to try and leave some space between the clothes so that they can breathe.

For the shoes:

I wanted to put my shoes in clear bins (one bin per pair of shoes) and set them up in cubes as they did on the show but I didn't want to spend the money on those items. For now my shoes are in boxes if I still have them and if not then are neatly laid out on the floor on the side where my jeans are hung. Once I have some extra spending money I will invest in the bins/cubes. **Note: for boots, put an empty paper towel roll inside to keep it from flopping over.

For the bags:

Eventually I will buy baskets to house my bags. I will get a couple and label each based on the bag (evening bags, totes, etc..). For now the bags are lined up on the top shelf in my closet.

I'm sure by now you've guessed how to make money from your clean. That's right, sell those little jems that you don't use anymore or that don't fit. You have at least two choices...

1. Gather your items for a yard sale. I've already done this and have put them aside with other yard sale items I've gathered. I'm just waiting for better weather to plan my yard sale date. The items I've put aside are things that are in ok to good condition. I plan to sell them for around five dollars but would be ok getting less.

2. Get your camera out and take pictures to sell on ebay. For this pile I chose a few brand name items that I have barely worn. So far I have a bid on two out of the four items I have listed. Yay!

Another way to 'make' money is from those donated items. If you donate to a non profit organization you may be able to deduct the fair market value of the goods you've donated on your taxes. It's a win win. The organization gets the donated goods they need and you get a tax write off.

Now that spring is here, jump on in and get that closet cleaned out!