Find a place for everything

Smart storage is the ultimate home organisation rule. Finding a place for everything means you know where everything belongs and can keep your home tidy. This approach is dependent on having a large amount of storage space available as a starting point. A nice sliding door wardrobe should do the trick…

Use a shoe rack

In many homes, it’s the shoes that are most difficult to keep under control. It’s too tempting to sling them wherever happens to be convenient on your way into the house. Combat this with a dedicated shoe rack. Better still, get one built into the aforementioned fitted wardrobe.

Introduce an important documents box

Passports, birth certificates, paper driving licences, chequebooks: all the stuff you can never find when you need them. Start a box that can house them all. Always keep your important documents in the box and always keep the box in the same place.

Create focus areas for your activities

Once you’ve established a place for everything when it’s tidied away, it makes sense to find a place in your home for things when they are in use. If you can bring kids or less organised members of the household with you, you’ll be able to stop clutter spreading round the house. Areas you might like in your home could include telephone and notes, grooming, cleaning, laundry, reading, entertainment, arts and crafts, and DIY.

Be a bit more ruthless

If you’re not using something, get rid of it. Don’t fall into the trap of telling yourself it might come in handy someday – it probably won’t.

Prioritise your jobs

Organising a home requires a little bit of work, so prioritising tasks effectively ensures that the most important things get done first.

Try to keep a ‘good’ room

If you have enough rooms to make it possible, try to keep a ‘good’ room. This should be a sanctuary of no toys, no food and no clutter that you can retreat to even if the rest of the house is temporarily less organised than you’d like.