Moving house is always a massive undertaking. For seniors who are downsizing after years in a home they’ve grown to love, the task becomes monumental.
“When you’re 30, you just do this stuff yourself,” says Anna Novak, a downsizing expert based in Arlington. But fast forward a few decades and you’ve got three times the stuff and less energy to figure out what to do with all of it. “It’s emotionally exhausting,” she observes, “because people are entering a phase of life I like to call ‘the back nine.’ Sometimes it’s a joyful thing, but more often it’s not, so the emotions of the transition cause even more complexity.”
Helping seniors through the process of leaving a home where they’ve raised children and made memories is Novak’s specialty. She came up with the idea for her business, Simply Downsized, in 2019 while working as a real estate agent. The lightbulb moment was when she realized the part she liked the best about real estate was helping people get out of their house—not just arranging movers and sorting belongings, but also readying the house for sale and helping clients get set up in their new home. She calls it “project management with compassion.”
After years on the job, Novak says she has connections to resources and services that are time-consuming to research—and difficult to find and manage. “I kind of work like a travel agent,” she explains. “I figure out their budget, where they’re going, what their situation is, all the players, all the needs—and then I figure out a plan for them. And then I make sure that they get on the right flight.”
Novak’s work preparing senior clients for life in a smaller space was featured in a Voice of America documentary. A downsizing move can involve managing up to ten specialized services, including floor refinishers, a photo organizer, an interior designer, short-term storage, a jewelry buyer or metal dealer, and junk removal services. She says downsizing clients typically need to part with as much as 80% of their belongings.
“They have so much stuff and they have emotional ties to their stuff. It’s a job that feels very overwhelming,” she says. “There’s just a ton of logistics and scheduling and managing a lot of different people’s schedules to get it done—and get it done in an order that makes sense.”
As part of that process, Novak organizes the offloading of unwanted belongings—either for sale or donation—and the removal of hazardous materials such as paints and fertilizer. She even crafts emails to family members to facilitate the handing down of heirlooms and household items, giving a deadline for pickup. Then she helps set clients up in their new home, consulting on everything from deciding what furniture to take and decorating their new space, right down to helping organize the silverware drawers.
Here are her top five tips to make downsizing easier.
Focus on the future.
Know where you’re going and then work from there. It’s not just about clearing out your house and getting rid of junk. It’s about preserving your most important belongings and planning for what’s ahead. “It becomes a more optimistic project when the focus is on the future and their favorite things,” she says, “not on ‘what are we going to do with that snow blower?’ ”
Don’t get hung up on how much your stuff is worth.
Start out by concentrating on what’s going with you. Novak says the biggest mistake people make is trying to offload items before they have everything else figured out. This wastes vital time and energy that could be better used elsewhere. “There’s no [monetary] value in their stuff—or not very much at all,” she says. “Selling their house is where the money is. Sometimes people will delay selling their home—for years even—just because they’re so paralyzed by the stuff.”
Also, if you start the discarding and donating process before you know where you’re moving, you could be getting rid of items you may need in your new place. So, wait and see if you still need those couches before giving them to your kids.
Create a floor plan.
This is key. Once you know where you’re going, take room measurements and start plotting out which of your belongings will fit there. This could be as simple as cutting shapes out of grid paper, or you could hire a service that will come in and create a virtual layout. You have to be extremely selective, and that is hard.
“You’re only going to be able to take probably 20% of your things,” she says. “Those things have to fit into the new place, and they have to serve multiple purposes. You have to be really strategic about what you bring with you.”
Secure your vital documents.
Before you even begin to think about furnishings and housewares, locate all the things that can’t be replaced and set them aside for safekeeping. Go through your home office and find the deed to your house, your insurance policies, your birth certificate, passport and diplomas.
Preserve your personal history.
Take the time to dig through photographs, letters and mementos. Any personal items that tell your story are things that should go with you. This will also keep you looking forward and focusing on what is most important, rather than feeling overwhelmed by the divestiture of other belongings.
Once all these steps are completed and your new home is set up, you can turn your attention to selling off or donating items you don’t need. Novak says some of her clients just give her the keys and walk away, entrusting her to take care of the process. She has specialized crews that sort through belongings looking for jewelry, cash, important documents or heirlooms that warrant special attention. She then sells, donates or discards what’s not needed.
“A lot of things can be sold that people don’t think about,” she advises. “We sell more tools than china. We’ll sell the vacuum cleaner, which makes a lot more money than your Hummel figurines.”
Novak’s clients have her services bundled in as part of their real estate deal. (She brings in a Realtor, who then pays her a piece of the commission.)
Seniors can also find free tips on her website, where she offers a bi-weekly email subscription and a free six-month downsizing plan. Novak is also the creator of HomeTransitionPros.com, a national online resource for people facing a downsizing move.
The best part of the job, she says, is seeing the relief in her client’s faces when they see all of their favorite belongings in a new, clean and tidy space. The difficult process is behind them and they have a new life that’s lighter, with only the things that really matter to them.