In this episode of Organize & Cherish, we take a compassionate but clear-eyed look at the true cost of storage. Whether it's a rented unit or boxes in the garage, storage comes with more than a price tag—it requires our space, time, energy, and emotional bandwidth. We explore national statistics on storage usage, how clutter impacts our stress levels, and why postponing decisions might be costing more than we think. This episode offers both insight and a gentle nudge to revisit whether the things we’re storing are still serving us.
In this episode we talk about:
- The financial reality of paid storage and why the industry continues to grow
- The emotional toll and decision fatigue that comes with keeping things “just in case”
- How to evaluate whether your stored items are truly worth the space they take
Mentioned in this Episode:
- The U.S. Self-Storage Industry Stats (2024) and average cost breakdown
- A UCLA study linking clutter to increased cortisol levels
- Other episodes in our storage series
Review full show notes and resources at https://theorganizedflamingo.com/podcast
Review Transcript:
 Welcome back to Organiz and Cherish today. We are continuing the storage series. If you're brand new to the episode, welcome. I'm so glad that you're here. We have this storage series that has been going on for a couple of weeks now here, this is the year of 2025, but this technically could apply to most years, um, as most of our episodes are meant to be long lasting.
Okay, so if you're listening to this past this, don't you worry, it's not super time sensitive. So what we're doing is we've, we've talked about the, the pros, the cons and everything that is involved with storing stuff, whether it's a storage unit that you have purchased or that you're renting, uh, on a monthly basis, yearly basis, whatever, you know, a typical, like a U-Haul, local storage bin type of a unit.
Or it could be a pod that got delivered to you in your driveway. Maybe it's a storage that, um, is in your basement, right? So it's really any type of storage unit, whether you pay for it or not. Today though, we are talking about the actual cost of storing stuff. Um, some of it will be the financial, what you're actually paying, like the money that you pay for every month.
Part of this will also be all the other resources that you're paying into. So that's what we're talking about all today. This episode is a standalone by itself. So if you're not listening to all of the podcast episodes, well first why not? But if you haven't, that's okay. You can always recap and, and listen to those individually as well, so it's not like a follow up to that one.
Okay. What is storage actually costing us? So not just in dollars, but in decisions and time and emotions, and even stress. That's what we're talking about today. So whether you have a rented storage unit, a closet full of just incase boxes or a garage overflowing with things you plan to deal with someday.
This episode is a gentle but honest look at what's adding up, all adding up to and how we can take back some of that time, energy, and peace of mind. So here we go.
Welcome to the Organized and Cherish podcast with the organized Flamingo. I am your host Stephanie, your compassionate and deficient professional organizer. Whether you are part of the sandwich generation helping a loved one declutter, or just trying to simplify life, this is the place for you. Together we will tackle those overwhelming piles of stuff, uncover purpose in what we keep, and let go with dignity and care, because it's not just about throwing everything away, it's about respecting memories and simplifying life.
Sound like a plan? Let's jump in and get organized. Okay, so let's start with the numbers. According to the Self Storage Association and data from neighborhood dot com's 2024, storage trends report one in 11 US households rents a self storage unit. So that's about, give or take, 9% of Americans or roughly 14 million households.
And that space is not cheap. Okay, so the average cost, when we did our asking around, you know, what the costs were, the standard for a 10 by 10 storage unit in the US is around $180 a month. We also cross-checked it with a resource called SpareFoot, and they did their reporting. 2024 climate controlled units often go for higher, so around 250 to $300 depending on location.
So over a year. That's, you know, give or take 2000 to almost 4,000. So, you know, 2000 to $3,600 a year for one 10 by 10 storage unit. So over five years, it's more that many people spend on a used car and often without even realizing it to store stuff. Okay. So do the math of, you know, of that. So let's, let's take a couple examples.
You know, I had a client that I spoke to recently that had been paying around $240 a month for a unit that had mostly furniture from her late father's house. There were pieces she felt too guilty to sell. Also thought that maybe one day they would be worth something, maybe their kids would want it. They, and at the end of the day just was not.
At that time when she rented it, she just was not ready to let go, which we do have an episode about that. Okay, when sometimes having a storage room is a good idea, and this is one of those reasons. At the time, she just was not in that mindset to let it go, and it was just a lot. So she rented the unit.
She also is overwhelmed now at this point, doesn't even know how to use it. So. She's kind of ready to make decisions. She might want to use them, but she's also overwhelmed, so there's just a lot happening here. Okay, so she's just, she's just saying, you know what, let's go ahead and rent it for $240 a month.
So after three years, she has spent over $8,000 in storage fees and still hasn't even opened the boxes. Very common scenario. You are not alone. We are not about to guilt you into anything here, but I want you to hear that number. That's about $8,000. So if you do your own math about the storage unit you're renting and or maybe not paying, you know directly, maybe it's rented space in your own home that could be used for something else of value.
That's a lot of money. And the self storage industry itself, it is booming. I, I don't know about you, but I know here in Colorado, we see it in California, we see it places that we visit in, in road trip a lot. We see these storage units being built left and right. There is this Ibis world and I found this statistic, which was, you know, crazy.
But it's now at a $44 billion industry in the US as of 2024 with over 52,000 facilities more than McDonald's, Starbucks, and Subway or any of those fast food joins Combined. Yes, combined. So the point here isn't to say storage is bad, it's that many of us enter into with the best of intentions. Just for a few months, and then it quietly becomes years of auto pay without a plan.
Now let's move on to the second cost, and this is one of those that we don't see on a billing statement. It's that emotional load. There was a study back in 2009 from UCLA Center on Everyday Lives of Families that found that women's cortisol levels spiked when dealing with clutter. I know it also happens to men as well, and, and just in general people, but that was, you know, their, their study was segmented to them, and it's not just a messy house, it's a psychological stress response.
So what happens when you're not seeing the stuff daily, but you know, it's in storage somewhere, which is a very different type of dynamic with stuff. It's that same, same, but similar, uh, emotion and action when you, you have guests coming over or you really just, you just wanna tie it up, whether for yourself or others, and you shove everything in the storage or in the closet, right?
We've all done that. That's the same, but you know, it's there like, it, it's, it's out of sight, not out of mind. Each box can feel like an unresolved decision. That's what happens. That's why that that cortisol level increases. So a reminder that you haven't figured it out yet is really what is happening here.
It's this like ongoing little nagging noise that you hear about, that there's stuff behind those closed doors that you haven't dealt with, and that is really annoying and frustrating. Hi, cherish friends. Life can get overwhelming, especially when you're juggling caregiving, clutter and everything in between.
That's why I created the Organizing Cherish Weekly email that goes out every Wednesday straight to your inbox. To help you keep the momentum inspiration going with tips and reminders of our upcoming events, all you have to do is head on over to organize and cherish.com and sign up for the email newsletter.
It's free and you can up subscribe whenever you'd like. It's my way of helping you simplify your life and respecting memories along the way. Now, back to our show. So here's. Quick. Another quick story to give you an example of this, but a listener had shared, uh, a few months ago that every time that they visited their mom's storage unit, they felt drained and sad.
So most of it was their grandparents' items. And every visit they reopened that wave of grief, but they also felt stuck, unsure if this was like the. Should I keep it just in case? Like what, what was the plan? Like it was just this overwhelming and symbolism of what was going internally for them. Like what is our next step?
Like what, what do we want? Not just out of this stuff, but out of this grief, out of this situation that just now we are dealing with. So it wasn't just about the things it was about. That they needed this permission to do something about it. In their case, it was about letting go. It really at the end, and it, it was, you know what I, I just needed someone to tell me that it was okay to let go.
So that kind of weight does accumulate and it accumulates quietly, even if the space is off site. You will see it somehow in your billing statement, in your bank account, in your feelings, in the reminders of someone that someone says something. If you're having, if someone else is storing the stuff for you, all of a sudden they need that space back and they'll remind you, right?
So it's there in the end. We're not just paying in in money, in dollars, or whatever your currency is, wherever you are, we're paying with it in guilt and avoidance and decision fatigue. Okay, so let's go beyond money and emotion. Two very important resources, but resources you can't definitely can't see or feel or you don't hear about as often.
So think about what resources we're using to store what we don't actually need, right? So there's the space. So the basement, that could be a home office. Maybe a garage that could house your car and not damage it, and that therefore you don't have to go and fix the car every time a hailstorm comes in, right, because it's in your garage.
Finally, a closet that could bring everyday ease. Then there's a time, the time spent looking for things. Oh my gosh, I have absolutely been guilty of this. Or worse, rebuying them because you forgot you had them buried. So you're spending time, time for some is money. So you can equate that almost to money, but it's invisible, right?
The energy, the mental reminders, like, I need to go through this someday. I know, oh, you know what? If it's worth something, okay, I need to go and catalog everything, uh, before I do anything about it. That kind of background noise clutters our mind too. So lemme give you an example of how this can look for some people.
We have a couple of, uh, clients where what happened was they were, they were keeping everything in their own basement. So, wonderful. Great. Okay. It's in your own basement. You don't have to pay anything, right? So there's no, no harm, no foul. But what was happening was. They, they knew they needed this a home office, and what they did is it ended up renting out one of those coworking spaces that they didn't even use because, well, it was too far, and what they really needed was an office in their house, and the office in their house ended up being the dining room table.
So now not only are we not paying for the coworking space, we said we would use, but now what we, what came out of it is now you're using a home office, which you said you would use in your basement, but you can't use it in your basement because you are using that for storage, storage. Of stuff that you never or have not looked at.
That's what happened in this scenario. Like they just, it was just stuff that they were keeping just because, um, and it was actually everyday stuff. It wasn't even sentimental stuff. I mean, there were sentimental stuff added and mixed in there, but it was just stuff that they kept putting off, put off decisions, procrastinated and so that they were paying for coworking space where they really, what they should have been doing is putting that effort and money into just getting.
That space cleared as much as possible so that office could be used for their work and not have to pay that coworking space. So it doesn't always directly affect what you think it affects, which is the rent money. It can come out off as well. I am actually using other resources like my space, like my time, like my energy.
Okay. Here's a framework that helps quite a bit, um, is that every time you keep. The every item that you do keep, like physical item that you keep requires rent, whether you like it or not, whether, uh, everything that we have that's physical needs a space, right? We always talk about in organizing, every item needs its home.
And that home may not be financial rent or real estate, but it does take up square footage. It takes up mental space and emotional energy. So if you're storing something you don't use, you'd love or feel good about, are you really getting a return on that investment? So if you're like more like that business mindset person, you can use that framework, but it also just works in general to remind you that all of your stuff needs real estate in your physical space, and are you willing to give that up to that item?
No matter how small or how large it is, and we are not antis storage here, okay? Don't forget we have a whole episode where we outline the reasons we think you should be getting a storage unit. But sometimes storage buys us time, and so we don't want to put it all on the storage unit's fault, especially during hard transitions, right?
Uh, death, divorce, downsizing, that's valid, but when storage becomes indefinite. With no intention. You are not a business of reselling. Okay? That's a business expense. That's a different conversation. This is for everyday use. That's where we risk postponing our piece. So the question here is, is this storage serving my life or is it stalling my decisions?
Alright, so if you need a, a little nudge for the week, here is one that I have for you. Based on this episode, choose one storage zone and ask yourselves or one storage unit, if that makes more sense for you. Ask yourself, what's in here? Why did I keep it? Why did I think it was important enough to keep and pay money or space or some resource to keep?
What is it costing me to hold onto this? Could it be more helpful and useful to someone else than what it's serving me? Because letting go doesn't mean letting go of the love or the memory. It just means giving yourself space for today's version of your life. So you are allowed to be sentimental. But you are also allowed and should be setting boundaries, AKA, not storing everything all the time.
So we have some resources over on our resourcePage@theorganizedflamingo.com slash resources that walk you through simple reflection questions. You know, whether you have a storage or a pseudo storage, a big closet that is acting as your long-term storage. Um, hopefully those questions in those decision trees and resources can help you make a decision if the storage is still serving you.
Thanks so much for listening and being part of our community that approaches organizing with compassion, not just pressure. So if this episode gave you something to think about, share it with a friend, and thanks so much for being here. Until next week, happy organizing. Thank you for listening to the Organized and Cherish podcast with the Organized Flamingo.
If you enjoy today's episode, I'd be so grateful if you left a rating and review on your favorite podcast player. It helps others discover our show. For full show notes, resources, and more organizing inspiration, visit www.theorganizedflamingo.com/podcast. Until next time, happy organizing.