How to Organize a Messy Garage

Establish A Game Plan to Get Organized

The best place to start is with a game plan. You don’t want to organize your garage alone, so consider buying your friends or family their favorite lunch. You could make tackling the cleaning out and organizing of your garage into a game. There are lots of great ideas to help motivate both you and your team of helpers!

Clean Out The Clutter

Clutter, clutter everywhere! The next step is cleaning out clutter. According to The Spruce, you will want to start with “heavy-duty trash bags, a broom or wet/dry shop vac, and a basket for items you find that need to be organized later.”

As you go through your garage, place gently used items you want to donate into one pile, items you want to keep in another pile, and broken or unusable items into a trash pile. It’s best to put items you want to donate in your car to keep the cleaning process moving.

For items you want to keep, move them to another location so you can organize them more thoroughly later. Take all trash items out. Remember, certain products may need to be disposed of in a place other than the regular trash. Additionally, sweeping, vacuuming, and mopping the floors will ensure you have a clean space to work with.  

Know What to Store and What Not to Store

Certain products and materials should not be stored in your garage for health and safety reasons. This Old House recommends never storing the following items:

• Paint – The temperatures in garages can hurt the integrity of the paint so it’s better to keep it in a well-ventilated, temperature-controlled area. 
• Propane – All it takes is one spark to ignite a disaster! Save yourself a monumental mess and keep your propane tank somewhere outside of your home. Make sure the valve is not connected and the tank remains upright. It’s not ideal to store gasoline in your garage either.
• Paper products – Why? Bugs love paper products. Instead of keeping them in the garage, store them inside a cabinet or closet within your home.
• Refrigerator – It might seem like a great idea, but it will end up increasing your heating and ac bill because garages aren’t typically temperature controlled.
• Pet food – You can bet that rodents and bugs will peruse fido's food if it's not stored securely.

There are many items you can easily and safely store in the garage, such as:

• Holiday decorations
• Sports equipment (fishing rods, golf clubs, surf boards, etc.)
• Tools
• Bicycles
• Workbenches
• Laundry folding tables
• Spare folding chairs or tables
• Gardening equipment

Group Similar Items

Now that you've gotten rid of clutter and cleaned up, focus on grouping similar items into categories. A good way to do this is to think about the space you have and how you envision using it. Categorize your garage based on what you like to do and what you will use it for the most.

For example, you might have a sporting equipment section, a gardening section, a tools section, and a holiday storage section. Be sure to consider the sizes and shapes of the items you will need to store. Keep nails, screws, and other smaller items together as well. 

Maximize Space Effectively

Have you ever noticed how much space you actually have in your garage? Even smaller garages have unused corners. When it comes to organizing, look to your walls and ceiling. You can find overhead organization systems to store infrequently used items, such as holiday decor and camping gear. Both can be bulky and take up a lot of floor space. Mounting overhead storage racks to your ceiling not only gets these items off the floor and out of the way, but also provides a home that can be easily accessed.

For items that are hard to store, such as basketballs, soccer balls, footballs, and other round items, you can use plastic storage bins with lids. Kids’ toys like hula hoops can be stored on hooks. Gardening tools can be kept in rolling carts or bins. The sky's the limit!

Utilize The Walls for Storage

The walls of your garage are perfect for storing a ton of items. Slatwall racks, in particular, are great additions to disorganized spaces. They also allow you to hang a variety of accessories, such as bike racks, tool racks, toolbars, sports equipment racks, hooks, baskets, tilted storage bins, and more.

Using the walls for storage gets clutter off the floor, and it gives you more space to work with. You could add a laundry folding area, a workbench, or even a woodworking area. All of your tools and equipment will be accessible and easy to find. Customize your garage with the colors, materials, and products you like the best.

Most wall storage can handle a range of weights, as well, so it makes it easier to keep heavier items off the floor and neatly stored away.

Install Cabinets

Putting in sturdy cabinets will make storage simple and discreet. Organize your cabinets by categories, such as cleaning supplies, spare towels, extra light bulbs, and miscellaneous items.

You can label bins inside the cabinets for each type of item or product. For example, place all of your laundry detergent, fabric softener, and dryer sheets in a single bin. Thermally-fused laminate cabinets are scratch and stain-resistant, highly durable, stylish, and make excellent storage within a garage. 

Have Good Lighting

It would be really frustrating to have an awesome, customized garage ready to use and not be able to see what you're doing. Having good lighting will make all the difference whether you plan to use your garage for storage, as a workshop, or for mixed-use.

The pros at The Old House note the usefulness of fluorescent fixtures with electronic ballasts. These types of lights won't flicker, cast good quality light, and can handle hot and cold temperatures.

Set Up A Cleaning Routine

Getting organized is only one part of the puzzle. Staying organized is the next part. Some tips on maintaining a consistent cleaning routine are:

• Put away tools, sporting equipment, or other items after use.
• Cleaning up messes as they happen or after you are done working.
• Keeping up with normal sweeping or mopping as needed.
• Make sure window and door seals are tight and secure.
• Only storing certain items in your garage.
• Performing quarterly clutter removal.

Conclusion

You might have been putting off organizing your garage, but the best time to get started is now. Begin thinking of your garage game plan, enlist the help of family and friends, and let your imagination help you get organized. You can always refer back to this article for tips and tricks to make the process smoother. Soon, your garage will be so organized that your friends might ask you for help tidying up theirs, too!

Sources

• https://www.thespruce.com/how-to-easily-organize-a-garage-2648059
• https://www.thisoldhouse.com/garages/21018117/read-this-before-you-organize-your-garage