Hoarding

[bigtiller]

Today I put a 3" long 2x4 in the "just in case" bucket.

But I'm NOT a hoarder.

 

[BravoXray]

Today I put a 3" long 2x4 in the "just in case" bucket.

But I'm NOT a hoarder.

That's a block for use on the drill press, or cribbing if needed.

 

[California]

There's accumulating stuff you might need and then there's accumulating inherited households of 'stuff'. We're still enjoying very heavy traditional wool blankets from a box labelled 'Edna 1988'. Granddad re-married late in life and that widow had inherited enough quality stuff to fill a barn. When she decided to finally give it away, Dad brought home carloads. We're still working though Dad's accumulated stuff here at the ranch, haven't had to buy nearly anything.

Then there's the stuff left over when wife administered her parents estate and wife said she would sort out unwanted Christmas ornaments etc 'some day'. Yea sure. One definition for clutter is 'deferred decisions'.

 

[MossRoad]

In my opinion, a true Hoarder is a person with a mental issue that does not allow them to throw anything away. I've met a lot of guys with a lot of junk, or stuff, or materials that might be needed one day, to the point it looks like Hoarding, but I don't believe that's the correct word for it. They are just being practical and planning ahead.

A true Hoarder isn't able to let it go. They see value in every single thing that they have. If I cut a piece of trim, they want the scrap piece. If I demo a cabinet, they want the pieces, even if I cut them up with a saw, or destroy it with a crow bar. Same with scraps of tile, old faucets, and even lumber full of nails. There is an obsession with keeping it that goes beyond comprehension. In the last 20 years, I've met 3 people like this. All I can do is let them have the junk when I'm making the repairs on their homes. When I do this, they are content. If I put it in my garbage bucket, or the back of my truck, they are stressed out to the point of being borderline angry.

Exactly.

 

[California]

As Mom got older - she lived to 98 - We would go over and fill boxes with things no one wanted to inherit and she wasn't using. Decent stuff that Goodwill could resell, not trash. Mostly treasures she had collected from thrift store searches to obtain things that decades earlier she couldn't afford and now cost very little.

But I had to negotiate the batches I had selected. I made up a value for each batch: "Would you pay $50 to buy this boxfull if you found it at a yard sale?" Always "Well ...no".

By the time a caregiver moved in with her, things were down to stuff actually useful.

Well mostly. Settling her estate, I took three 4x8 trailerloads of books to Friends Of The Library for their annual sale. I had tried to sell them to a bookstore. The guy came over and scanned barcodes or entered ISBN #'s on the old ones, and refused 99% of them. I gave him the few he wanted, as payment for the time he spent appraising them.

 

[scaredychicken]

I agree with EddieWalker

there is a lot of stuff here - a good bunch of it mine, but with purpose
I do dump runs, recycling, thrift runs, even garage sales on occasion, to clear things out
there is a lot of stuff here from other people that I want cleared out, I need my garage and workbench back

 

[Diggin It]

During the last year, I've hauled three 4x8 trailer loads of stuff. Mostly bits of metal and rusted fence wire, some old tools that were broken in one way or another and of no use

The first went to the dump where I had to pay $10 to get rid of it. Then a lightbulb flashed and I checked on scrap metal prices. The next two trailer loads went to recyclers. Between the two, the total was around 1,400 pounds and I got a little over $100

 

[Larry Caldwell]

If you hoard expensive stuff, you can be a collector. A buddy's brother died a couple years ago, and his gun collection brought $438,000. He couldn't actually shoot them - they were too old, too expensive, and many were in never-fired condition. Old newspapers would have done him as much good, and been a lot cheaper.

 

[newbury]

I've come at it from 2 viewpoints, pre-2010 and post 2010 (when we bought our Mississippi place with about 5,000 sq ft of barn/workshop).
Pre-2010 I had been living for about 40 years in suburban DC area. Had a workshop of about 150 sq ft, full to the brim, so saving stuff was problematic. And my work surface was my 50yr old table saw. I had to justify to myself to save scrap wood etc.

But post 2010 I expanded to fill the workshops. It took several years to "fill" up the workshops, but they are approaching full.
But I save almost everything, even 3" pieces of 2x4. And for almost every project I find my self dipping into my backlog of saved or hoarded material.
I've aisles of plumbing, electronics, tractor-stuff, etc. Keeping it sorted is a major undertaking.
I think that if one has the storage capacity AND can find what they have in less time than it takes to drive to town and get it they come out ahead.

Presently I have most of the 5000 sq ft set up with pallet racking along the sides, set up so there is a "work" area at waist height about 100"x42", and several shelves above. And I have 10 or so "units" set up like this.

I greatly prefer my post-2010.

 

[bigtiller]

Today I put a 3" long 2x4 in the "just in case" bucket.
But I'm NOT a hoarder.

New development...

Today I put 2 more 3" long 2x4's in the "just in case" bucket.

Maybe I am a hoarder.