I hate moving. Since moving away to college when I was 18, I’ve lived in 12 different places. 12 different moves. When I did the math on that, I had to do it thrice just to be sure I wasn’t crazy. How did I move 12 times? And how did it never get any easier?

Part of why it never felt easier is because I never made the time to purge my place before packing. Moving is overwhelming, and thinking about editing down your possessions while at the same time packing them up and taking them elsewhere is daunting. However, before my latest move, I took a long, hard look at everything in my apartment. Part of this was to be more efficient; part of it was because I had to put my things in storage for eight weeks, and I didn’t want to pay more than I had to. Some may call it cheap; I’m choosing to call it practical. Whatever you call it, it totally changed the way I look at prepping to move.

Normally, like I’m sure most people do when moving, I basically throw everything into boxes (albeit in a very organized fashion), tossing things in the trash here or there, but not really thinking about why I’m putting it in that box, and why more isn’t going to the trash. Never again.

Would that we could all look as fierce as Peggy Olson when movin' out.

Why do a pre-move purge? There are a lot of reasons, but here are those that I think are best:

It means you have less stuff to move! Moving already sucks, so why move more?
It also means you have less stuff to unpack! See above. Why make it suck more?
If you’re putting things into storage, it can end up saving you money. The more you store, the more you pay. Why spend money storing things about which you no longer care?
If you’ve hired movers, it can also save you money. The more stuff they have to move, the longer the move will take. Save yourself the money, honey!
You might be able to consign or donate things you decide to purge. Consignment is cold hard cash; donations are tax write-offs. Get that money, honey!

When I thought about packing and purging in terms of my paycheck, it forced me to get serious. And boy did I. I tackled the purge the same way I tackle a routine closet edit: I started with the why. When I spent the time to stop and think about why I was moving things, it made me realize that I was packing things because it was easier to put them in a box than it was to think about them. That, to me, was a stupid reason to spend money that could be put toward something more worthwhile, such as my student loans, or shoes, or brunch.

Nothing sounded less appealing to me than doing something in addition to packing to move, and then tacking on potentially consigning or donating on top of that. But, I realized the little extra time would be worth it. It would definitely save me money, and also had the potential to help other people via donation, and make me money via consignment. Ultimately most of what I ended up purging didn’t wind up being consigned, but I made a little bit of money, and saved myself a lot. I ended up getting rid of 5 or 6 moving boxes worth of items (both clothing and home goods). That meant 5 or 6 boxes that didn’t have to be stored and moved. That’s how it’s done, bitches.