Clear out pays off

It's not worthwhile to transport possessions to your new home that you aren't going to use.

Every Kiwi should know the importance of decluttering to sell their property. Those who do it can boost their house sale price by 10 per cent or more, says Geoff Barnett, national manager of Century 21 New Zealand.

Knowing the theory and executing the declutter are two different things. For older sellers or those whose children have fled the nest, it's often a psychologically and physically very difficult process, which they don't ultimately succeed in. As a result, potential buyers see a whole pile of very dated belongings in the house and it puts them off the potential.

There are services such as Sort Divas and Be Organised, which can come in and declutter.

"I work sensitively with you to help you with your decision making of what to stow and what to throw," says Natalie Jane, who runs Be Organised.

Letting go of belongings sometimes needs a strategy. One such strategy is to photograph the item to create a memory before disposing of it. The other is to give it to someone really in need.

There are two stages of declutter surrounding a house sale. The first is before the house is listed or an open home is staged. The second is often after the sale goes through. It's not worth paying money to move items that aren't going to be used. If you're moving overseas it can be cheaper to sell rather than transport large items.

Families who do decide to sell virtually everything before heading overseas often say in retrospect that the process was cathartic.

When the Garcia Dunnwald family left Auckland to return to Brazil they took a unique approach to selling all of their furniture for the move as well as toys, kitchen equipment and much much more. In their case the furniture and household equipment had been bought relatively cheaply in the first place at Target and The Warehouse because they knew they weren't staying in New Zealand for life.

The family went around the house and put prices on every single thing that they weren't going to ship in boxes to Brazil. They then invited friends and acquaintances to the house and showed them around.

The family sold every single piece of furniture except for the king-sized bed, which was listed on Trade Me. Items they never would have expected to sell went -- such as a marked rug and dented rubbish bin.

Devonport resident Catherine McLean has been clearing her home on a grand scale since putting it on the market before Christmas. There was an initial declutter for the sale. She then decided that it wasn't worth shipping most of her much loved furniture back to Edinburgh. Instead she posted on the Devonport Locals Facebook Page and listed all of the items she had for sale.

"My friends thought I was crazy. I spent so long furnishing our house in Devonport and many of the items were custom-made.

"It has been a really positive experience. Virtually everything has gone to local people."

The initial posting on Facebook linked to the Realestate.co.nz sale listing where people could see the furniture that was to be sold. It was so successful she photographed and added more items to the Facebook posting, such as her son's Thomas the Tank Engine collection.

Small items will be given away. For example McLean plans to give a range of items to a local family whose house burned down recently. She was alerted to the family's plight as a result of a campaign by The Light Devonport Church pastor Steve Gwyn.

Some people will resort to the old-fashioned method of having a garage sale. Trade Me is more effective, but it's hard work photographing, loading auctions, handling questions and being around for the pickup or boxing and sending.

The likes of the Hospice, City Mission, Salvation Army and other charities are geared up to take larger items. There are also council-funded recycling centres such as the Devonport Community Recycling Centre, which opened last Saturday. It follows on the heels of Waiuku Zero Waste and the Helensville Community Resource Recovery Centre.

These recycling centres are replacing the old inorganic collection and in theory can reuse, resell or recycle almost anything. Staff members at Waiuku Zero Waste for example, aim to divert 75 per cent of the "rubbish" coming in to the transfer station to its shop, the "Waiuku Junktion " and a workshop.

Another way to get rid of large, sometimes obscure items is to put them out on your grass verge on fine days and see who takes them. Even scrap metal will often disappear. If it's not taken you can always bring it inside before the next rain and consider your Plan B.