Need help! Inherited belongings of 1 parent + 2 stepparents. Home, garage and storage units are full. Caretaking 1 parent now, no time!

The whole storage unit thing in the USA is a very sad reflection on us, and on our accumulation of stuff that none of us needs. And no one ever goes back for. I would say 8 out of 10 units are full of silly things we are for some reason unable to give up at the time.

Once it becomes overwhelming in terms of amounts of stuff it is almost impossible to deal with.
I recommend a professional organizer. Meanwhile let family know if they want any of this junk they have the next three months to look at it all. Then out it goes. IMHO our living spaces reflect the insides of our minds in terms of detritus that is worthless to us or anyone else, and the amount of useless churning and recycling of it.

One more thing, you can't be sentimental when cleaning out especially if you have no room for it. You have to harden yourself and just DO IT! You will feel so much better when its all done.

So you are not the PoA for the remaining parent? This is too bad. But maybe you should stop asking a person with ALZ to make rational decisions. Dementia robs people of their reason and logic. They also lose all their empathy for others, this is why that parent doesn't seem to care that you are stressing out over it.

Some ideas:
Pick a day or weekend to have this parents' grand and great grand kids come and pick out things they'd like to keep from the storage places and your garage. This goes for your siblings, too. You tell them to come with a large vehicle or trailer. You don't second guess yourself or anything they take. Just let it go. Anything they don't take will either be part of an "open" garage sale and after that, leftovers will be donated to charity.

You just pick a date and if people can't make it, so too bad. If they really want something they'll find a way to get there. The idea is for others to do the decision-making and clearing out of stuff and for you to do as little as possible. If they live far away, oh well. Then make sure to cancel the payments on the storage garages.

We had an "open" garage sale when my MIL went into AL. She had a lot of piddley junk that we didn't want to have to clean, fix or price so we advertised it as a charitable garages sale with all procedes going to MIL's ongoing care (which it did). We told people they could name their prices. Most people were very generous. We didn't even have change, to make it simpler we just had them "buy" more stuff if it was less than $1. It was a huge success for a minimum amount of work.

Any sibling that gives you grief over clearing out your garage and downsizing should be told to come get the stuff themselves right now. They can have it, they just need to get it on your terms, in your timeline. Say it with a smile. Then don't back down.

If they want the stuff in the storage lockers then they need to move it to ones they will lease and pay for. I've discovered that my kids do not want my very nice stuff that I've been hanging on to. So, make money on it now to help with your parent's care.

Also consider that if you're feeling shakey and overwhelmed, maybe you are entering burnout and need to consider a facility for your LO. It's not a moral failure. A failure would be you not recognizing your own needs, and understanding that if you burn out then who will take care of you and your LO? Don't allow yourself to burn out. You don't have to be the care solution.

I wish you success in figure out what's best for you.

As long as you are not paying for the 3 storage units then I guess you can't do anything about that until she gets really bad with it. That could be a while. If she can't afford the storage units payments then they will be auctioned off once payments stop. This may be the best thing for you so you don't have to deal with it.

If there anything you are holding onto from the other deceased parents that you want? If not then just start throwing stuff away. Keep one or two things from each parent and get rid of the rest. That stuff is NOT your parents.

I know that sounds harsh but sometimes we have to do things like this to reclaim our lives. Your home and your garage are not a shrine to your parents stuff, nor is it a storage unit. I don't think any of your parents would have wanted you to just store their possessions indefinitely like this.

What's going to happen when mom dies are you going to keep her 3 storage units full of her stuff in your house and garage too? I don't think you have the room to do that.

Why do you think that it’s illegal to get rid of your mother’s belongings? If that is the only thing stopping you from doing this, ask someone about the laws in your area?

It’s a total waste of money to be storing items that won’t ever be used again. Get rid of all of it. Just think how much better you will feel not dealing with it anymore once it’s gone.

Does your mom ever see any of her stuff? It’s locked away, so how would she even know that you disposed of it. Let her believe that it’s still there.

Does she see any financial evidence of storage fees being paid? If she doesn’t then there shouldn’t be any reason why you can’t allow her to believe that everything is still being stored. Or show her fake receipts if you feel that she will get upset.

My parents also weren't exactly "hoarders", or they were/are "clean hoarders"...everything wasn't at the point where it was toxic or unlivable....YET. Note that there are different levels and types of hoarders from what I learned..."clean" hoarders and "toxic" hoarders, and the second is usually a long-term result of being the first.

But the last stretch of taking care of my mom at our home, it was IMPOSSIBLE for me to clean almost ANYTHING in the year or two before she fell and started the hospital--> long term care pipeline, because everything I did to make way with that was met with harassment and exhausting annoyance. That's when I absolutely knew both of us could not live together anymore. She would definitely be a toxic-type hoarder if I wasn't there for her.

I started cleaning and organizing years before she became totally disabled, knowing that I was going to have to deal with all that myself someday, and I NEVER told her when I did it. Now that I have her staying in long term care, I still NEVER tell her what I'm doing with the house. She and my father absolutely shut me out of practically anything about their lives, and the only way to not get her upset now that she's in a nursing facility, is to return the "favor" and not tell her anything I'm doing. I know that sounds terrible, but honestly it's what worked.

Even with myself, it was HARD to take bags and bags of "stuff" to the donation place and I could feel that psychological "save it!" pulling too. But I've donated bags of stuff before, and I end up not missing any of it, and bonus: if someone got good use of what I donated, I made the world a better place!

You need State long term help with caretaking. Once you get that you can start truly decluttering and being free in your own home. Chances are the rest of the family doesn't even know what's around and won't miss it.

Look for a business that does a contractor’s clean out. They’ll donate what you wish and take some to auction. They’ll take the rest to the dump. There’s probably little value in what you’re keeping.

When it came time to empty my parent's home, I got some wonderful advice [from someone on this forum] is to swap out an item from my parent's home with one of my items.


Example, my parents had some really nice table lamps, and the ones I had had no sentimental value to me. Swapped out. Same with bookends, now when I see the gold flamingos bookends I think of my parents :)

Thank you everyone for your helpful replies! I've read each of them more than once, they're encouraging and informative.

So far in our area I've only been able to find estate sale companies that hold estate sales in homes, they won't go to storage places to hold them and the storage company where my mom's units are won't allow estate sales because the access to the facility is controlled by a security keypad it is a climate controlled facility, all units are interior and have no external access so it cannot remain open for random people to come in and out.

I'm thinking the best bet might be to donate nearly everything. There are only two or three items I am interested in, and my only remaining sibling has zero interest in anything. I like the idea of switching out a few of my own things for the nicer things my parent had, donating my things that have no sentimental value.

Though due to tons of other responsibilities I don't have as much time to focus on it as I'd like in order to be completely and quickly done with it all at once, I've been steadily working on getting rid of what is stored in my garage and home with the help of a professional organizer, definitely don't want to leave this sort of problem for my kids. Most of the personal things and inherited things I had stored in my garage are now gone. I see light at the end of the tunnel.

Anyway, thank you all for your encouragement!

When my MIL dies, I’m renting a garbage thing for the driveway and I’m throwing 90% of it away because it’s trash disguised as stuff. She uses fitted sheets with no elastic and that are thread bare. Etc.

Now when I give her stuff, I give her things I’d like to get back after she dies (like good sheets lol ) because she is never going to use them. It just gets added to the hoard.

Usually when I go over there, I ask her to tell me about these items, and then I make a mental note (goes straight to trash).

The rest will be donated to anyone who wants it. I won’t waste my time with garage sales or eBay— it’s a perfectly good choice for people who want to do that, but it’s not worth my time and the effort.