UNPACKING AND ORGANISING YOUR NEW HOME

After weeks or even months of planning, packing and preparing for an upcoming move, you can only enjoy a moment’s rest before the massive project of unpacking your home begins.

Many people consider unpacking after moving into their new home to be just as overwhelming as the moving out process. But preparing yourself with a moving checklist can make this process streamlined, simple, and stress free.

Here’s a step by step guide for how to unpack and organise your new home, from the first day to the finishing touches. Let’s get started!

1. Place moving boxes and belongings in the correct rooms

During move-in, you’ll make the unpacking process much easier by depositing boxes and furniture items in the specific rooms they’re intended for. Any box labelled “kitchen” should end up in the kitchen, nightstands heading for your master bedroom should be placed in the master bedroom, and so on.

Avoid simply leaving furniture and boxes wherever there’s an empty spot on the floor. This will only create more work and heavy lifting later on. Remember to use clearly marked labels and good communication so that your team of removalists knows what to set down where.

2. Unpack the essentials and prepare for the first night

Once everything’s made it into your new home, track down the boxes containing the most essential items. Ideally, this will include “day 1” boxes or suitcases filled with everything you need to get set up in each space:

• Bedrooms: Pillows, bed linens, pyjamas and a change of clothes.
• Bathrooms: Hand soap, towels, toilet paper, shower curtains, essential toiletries and medications.
• Kitchen: Hand soap, towels, paper towels, cooking utensils, a few pots and pans, one complete set of tableware and nonperishable ingredients for your first meal.
• Utility: Cleaning spray and other supplies for sanitising surfaces whilst unpacking.
• Miscellaneous: Valuables, important documents, pet supplies and any tech you want to have on-hand immediately, such as laptops, phone chargers or TVs.

Having these basic necessities boxed up and clearly labelled will make initiating the unpacking process much easier. You won’t need to peel back metres of tape or dig around dozens of boxes just to find the things you’ll need right away.

3. Move onto stocking up the kitchen

Next up on your unpacking after moving list will be the kitchen. With a fully stocked kitchen you can start prepping your own meals and will save money on dining out.

Clear a space on the counter or table to spread out your items by category — glassware, cutlery or dinnerware, cooking utensils and so on. Once you see what you have, you can choose the right spot. Take some time to clean and sanitise each cabinet and drawer before arranging your items. Set up your countertop with small appliances like your kettle and microwave as well.

4. Finish organising the bedrooms and bathrooms

By making up the beds and setting up the bathrooms with a few essentials, you’ve already got a head start on bedroom and bathroom unpacking after moving. However, there’s plenty more to do, such as organising your medicine cabinet and putting away various toiletries and styling tools. You’ll also need to spend some time finding the right spot for your dresser, fitting clothes into closets, setting up lamps arranging any other furniture items in your bedrooms.

Break these projects into steps. Try tackling one room at a time and, within each room, one project at a time. You might aim to unpack and organise all the clothes in the master bedroom first, before moving onto shoes and then outerwear. If you have children, they can participate too by unpacking in their own rooms.

5. Arrange the furniture in your primary living spaces

This is the part where you really get to organise your new home on a larger scale. Whether you’ve already experimented with a floorplan or you’re just starting to consider layout options, establish a clear plan before assembling or moving any large furniture items.

For instance, decide where the rugs will go and put them in place before bringing in sofas, bookshelves, or tables. Planning your approach will save a lot of effort in the long run.

6. Organise the secondary spaces and utility areas

It’s okay to use extra rooms as catch-alls while getting your primary living spaces set up. But once things are beginning to take shape, turn your attention to rooms like your office, guest bedroom, studio, garage storage, utility, basement and other spaces.

Follow the same basic process of taking one room at a time, and laying out the furniture before filling up shelves and drawers.

7. Tackle miscellaneous boxes and decor at your leisure

After you organise your new home and start getting comfortable with how larger anchor pieces of furniture work together in each room, you can begin the decorating phase. This involves filling bookshelves, hanging up pictures, populating your shelves with your favourite trinkets and more. It’s best to save this step until your rooms are ready and you’re completely satisfied with the layout and use of space.