Organizing and designing your garage can be simple if you approach the job correctly. If not, it can become a nightmare fast. The entire point of having a garage is to have room for your vehicles, workshop, or anything else you had planned. Except for storage, of course, because the garage can be used for better things than a place to shove extra stuff.
If you are like most people, you have let the garage go to the point of not being able to use it for the tasks you had in mind. The best way to regain control of your space is to get to it. So, roll your sleeves up, turn your TV off, put down your mobile devices, and jump right in.
- Clean – First and foremost, you will want to clean. Move everything out onto the lawn, taking an inventory of everything you have (you can do this mentally or write it down if you forget things easily). Dust the cobwebs, throw away anything and everything you do not want, put things away that belong elsewhere, and set aside the items you plan to donate or sell.
- Design – Decide where you want things to be placed when keeping your garage tidy, but keep them together with similar items. If you have tools and a workbench, you can place them along one wall, with the yard and garden supplies and tools on another. For those things that you have to store, such as holiday decorations, you can plan to place them along the third wall. The fourth wall is the door, so if you have more than one, you can put small things in between, such as your garbage can.
- Cabinets – Build some cabinets where they will be the most useful. You do not want to take up every wall with them, but if you can use them to store smaller items, such as extra car parts or chemicals that you do not want others to have access to, put them up or build them.
- Shelves – Building some shelves will also help you organize your garage. They can be built from floor to ceiling in the areas where they benefit you, such as a place to put your lawn ornaments and sprinklers that are not being used. They make the wall that you place them on able to hold 5 times the number of items.
- Peg Board – For any items that need to be hung, such as tools or hoses, you will want to install some pegboard. When you buy the pegs to put into the holes, make sure you have different sizes and styles and include a few big hooks for those items that require them. Organize your hanging tools just like you did your entire garage, placing similar items next to each other to make it easy to see and grab when needed.
- Storage Containers – Anything that can be placed into a storage bin that you do not use regularly should be put into one. An example would be holiday lights. Containers will keep them neat and organized, and they can easily be slid into any open space, such as on one of the shelves or underneath the workbench or cabinets.
Organizing and designing your garage can be as easy as one, two, and three. It will obviously take some time and effort, but it does not need to be a task that makes you pull your hair out and leave the garage for another day. That is, of course, another day that never comes.
The best thing to do is to put a day aside, secure any help you can get, and complete the remodel and reorganization in a day. Plus, when you have some helpers, they can take some of the junk off your hands that you had forgotten that you even had. Thanks to Brookfield Residential for consulting.
