A seller called me from her dining room in Shoreview on a Tuesday evening with a question that came with an unmistakable note of resistance in her voice.
She was a reader. Her living room had floor-to-ceiling built-in bookshelves filled with books she had actually read, organized by subject, and she was proud of them. She had a collection of pottery on a display shelf in the dining room that she and her husband had accumulated over twenty years of travel. Their kitchen had a well-organized collection of specialty cooking equipment because they were serious home cooks. And they had four children, which meant the home had a certain amount of life in it in the form of art projects, sports equipment, and the general accumulation of family living.
She was afraid that decluttering meant stripping the home of its personality and turning it into a sterile showroom that would feel cold to buyers.
“I keep reading that I need to declutter completely,” she told me. “But I love our bookshelves. Our pottery is beautiful. I feel like if I take all of that away the house is going to feel empty and sad. Are buyers really expecting a home that looks like nobody lives in it?”
Her concern was both valid and partly based on a misunderstanding of what the decluttering process is actually designed to accomplish. The goal of decluttering is not to create a sterile, personality-free environment. It is something more specific and more achievable than that.
Here is the complete picture of what decluttering before listing actually means and how to do it in a way that improves the showing experience without stripping the home of what makes it appealing.
What Decluttering Is Actually Designed to Accomplish
The purpose of decluttering before listing is not to remove all evidence that human beings live in the home. It is to remove the visual noise that prevents buyers from seeing the home clearly.
When a buyer walks through a home that is fully occupied by a family’s possessions, their attention is fragmented. They are processing the possessions, the furniture arrangement, the decor choices, and the architectural features of the space simultaneously, and the cognitive load of processing all of that simultaneously makes it harder for them to see the home itself.
A buyer who walks through a home where the visual field is simplified and edited is processing less competing information, which makes it easier for them to evaluate the space, the light, the proportions, and the quality of the home’s features. They are better able to project their own life into the space because there is less of someone else’s life occupying their visual field.
This is the functional goal of decluttering. Not a sterile showroom. A visually simplified version of the home that allows buyers to see what they are actually purchasing rather than being distracted by what the current owners have accumulated.
The Difference Between Decluttering and Depersonalizing
Decluttering and depersonalizing are related but different processes that are sometimes conflated in ways that create the kind of resistance the seller in Shoreview was feeling.
Decluttering is about volume. It means reducing the quantity of objects in any given space to a level where the objects that remain can be seen and appreciated without competing with each other for visual attention. A bookshelf that is filled to capacity with books stacked in front of books and objects wedged into every available inch is cluttered. The same bookshelf with two-thirds of the books removed, the remaining books organized with some breathing room between sections, and a few tasteful objects on the shelves is not cluttered. The books are still there. The personality is still there. The volume is reduced to a level where the shelf feels curated rather than overwhelming.
Depersonalizing is about type. It means removing the objects that are specifically personal to the current owners in ways that make it hard for buyers to project themselves into the space. Family photographs on every horizontal surface, children’s artwork covering the refrigerator, personalized items throughout the home that are clearly about this specific family’s identity, and similar items create a sense of being in someone else’s home in a way that makes it harder for buyers to imagine the space as theirs.
The seller’s pottery collection and her husband’s bookshelves are not depersonalizing problems. They are interesting, attractive elements of the home that contribute positively to the environment. The family photos that cover the console table, the refrigerator covered in children’s school papers, and the trophies lined up on the windowsill in the primary bedroom are depersonalizing opportunities.
Understanding this distinction allows sellers to address the actual issues without feeling they need to make the home feel like a hotel room.
What the Research Says About Decluttered Homes
Real estate research and professional stager surveys consistently find that decluttered and edited homes sell faster and for higher prices than comparable homes in their fully occupied state.
The National Association of Realtors surveys on staging and presentation consistently show that buyers’ agents report that a staged and decluttered home makes it easier for their buyers to visualize the property as their future home, increases the dollar value offered relative to comparable unedited homes, and reduces time on market.
The economic logic is straightforward. A home that photographs clearly and shows cleanly attracts more interest and stronger offers than a home where buyers cannot fully evaluate the space because of the visual noise of the current owners’ possessions. The decluttering investment, which costs primarily time and effort and the rental of a temporary storage unit if needed, typically returns multiples of its cost in sale outcome.
The Room-by-Room Decluttering Framework
Rather than approaching decluttering as an overwhelming whole-home project, a room-by-room framework helps sellers focus their effort where it matters most and gives them a sense of progress rather than an endless to-do list.
The kitchen is the highest priority decluttering zone because it is the room buyers scrutinize most carefully and where countertop clutter creates the most negative impression. Kitchen countertops should be cleared of everything except one or two intentional items, such as a quality coffee maker and a beautiful cutting board, that suggest the kitchen is used but not overwhelmed. The knife block, the dish drying rack, the toaster, the collection of vitamins and supplements, the mail pile, the children’s artwork attached to the refrigerator, the collection of coupons and school notices, and every other countertop accumulation should be removed.
Inside cabinets and pantries also need editing because buyers open cabinets. A pantry that is so packed that items fall out when the door opens, or cabinets so full that a buyer cannot see the shelf depth, communicates that the storage is inadequate for a family’s needs. Reducing pantry and cabinet contents to a level where the organization is visible and there is some breathing room changes the buyer’s interpretation from insufficient storage to organized and functional storage.
Living spaces including the living room, family room, and dining room need to have their furniture and decorative object count reduced to a level where the room feels spacious rather than filled. A general guideline is to remove approximately one-third of the decorative objects in any given space and to ensure that furniture arrangement allows clear pathways through the room. Books on shelves should be edited to allow some breathing room and some intentional display space within the bookcase structure.
The primary bedroom should feel like a sanctuary rather than a storage room. The nightstand should have one or two intentional items on it rather than a pile of books, medications, phone chargers, reading glasses, water bottles, and the other accumulation that most occupied nightstands contain. Clothing should be removed from the tops of dressers. The master closet should have approximately one-third of its clothing removed to make the closet appear larger and more organized.
Bathrooms should be cleared to the point where only a few intentional items are visible. The collection of shampoo bottles in the shower, the lineup of daily skincare products on the vanity, the assortment of products under the sink, and the accumulated pharmaceutical items in the medicine cabinet should all be removed or drastically reduced. A beautiful soap dispenser, a clean towel, and perhaps a simple plant are all a buyer’s bathroom needs to see.
Garages and storage areas need to demonstrate that there is adequate storage space for a family, which paradoxically means reducing the clutter to the point where the storage capacity becomes visible. A garage packed floor to ceiling with items on every shelf communicates that the storage is at capacity. A garage where items are organized and there is visible space available communicates that there is room for the buyer’s things.
The basement, if applicable, follows the same logic as the garage. Buyers who see a clean, organized basement with visible floor space have a very different impression than buyers who navigate through a basement that is full of boxes and accumulated items.
How to Handle the Stuff That Has to Go Somewhere
The practical challenge of decluttering for most sellers is that the items they are removing from the home still exist and need to go somewhere.
Temporary storage rental is the most effective solution for most sellers and is typically much less expensive than most people expect. A ten-by-ten storage unit rents for approximately one hundred to one hundred fifty dollars per month in the Twin Cities market. For the one to three months that a home is typically listed and under contract, the storage cost is modest relative to the sale outcome benefit of having a properly decluttered home.
For sellers who would rather not pay for storage, sorting the removed items into three categories, keep and store at a family member’s home, donate, and discard, provides a framework for handling the volume without simply paying for it to sit in a unit.
For sellers with a great deal to remove, scheduling a donation pickup from a charitable organization and a junk removal service on the same day can accomplish the bulk of the removal in a single focused effort.
The Specific Items That Almost Always Need to Go
There are specific categories of items that almost universally need to be removed from a home before listing regardless of the home’s overall organization level.
Collections of any kind, whether figurines, sports memorabilia, movie posters, political items, hunting and fishing trophies, religious items, or any other type of collection, need to be significantly reduced or entirely removed for listing. Collections are highly personal and are among the most polarizing categories of possessions in the showing context. Buyers who share the collector’s passion respond positively to the collection. Buyers who do not share that passion, or who actively dislike the specific collection type, have their showing experience distracted and sometimes negatively affected by encountering a prominent collection.
Exercise equipment in bedrooms or main living spaces needs to be removed before listing. A treadmill in the primary bedroom, a weight bench in the finished basement, or a Peloton in the formal dining room are functional items that look like clutter in the wrong rooms and that suggest the space has been repurposed from its intended use.
Paper and mail of any kind should be completely invisible from buyer view. The pile of mail on the kitchen counter, the stack of magazines on the coffee table, the collection of bills and school papers on the desk, and any other paper-based accumulation should be handled, filed, or removed before showings.
Children’s toys need to be edited to the point where there is a clear, intentional play area rather than toys spread throughout the home. A playroom or children’s bedroom where toys are organized and contained is fine. Toys in the living room, dining room, kitchen, and hallways create a sense of chaotic occupation that buyers react to negatively.
Pet items including food and water bowls, litter boxes, pet beds, kennels, and pet toys should be removed or minimized before showings. Buyers who are not pet owners can find the presence of prominent pet infrastructure off-putting, and buyers who are pet owners are not particularly moved by the sight of another pet’s equipment.
Common Mistakes Sellers Make About Decluttering
Confusing decluttering with depersonalizing and removing too much of the home’s character in an attempt to appeal to all buyers, which can make the home feel cold and uninviting.
Editing the main living areas while leaving closets, cabinets, garages, and storage areas in their fully loaded state, which reveals itself to buyers who open doors and creates a storage space concern.
Removing items from view by moving them to other rooms rather than actually removing them from the home, which simply relocates the clutter.
Not completing the decluttering process before professional photographs are taken, which means the photos show the home in a less favorable state than it will be during showings.
Underestimating how much needs to go. Most sellers who think they have decluttered sufficiently have actually decluttered about sixty percent of what needs to be removed. A second walk-through with fresh eyes, or a conversation with a professional stager, often reveals that more remains to be done.
Practical Tips for Minnesota Sellers
Start the decluttering process at least three to four weeks before the listing date to allow time to work through the home systematically without rushing.
Rent a storage unit before beginning so that removed items have somewhere to go immediately rather than creating a pile in the garage.
Walk through the home after completing the decluttering and take phone photos of each room, then evaluate the photos as though you were a buyer seeing them online. This exercise reveals visual noise that is invisible to the eye that has habituated to the space.
Ask your Realtor or a staging professional to walk through the home after you have decluttered and provide specific additional feedback, because an outside eye consistently identifies things the homeowner’s eye misses.
Frequently Asked Questions
Can I leave any personal photos up?
Yes, but in moderation. A few meaningful family photos, a wedding photo, and a family portrait are fine and even add warmth. A collection of forty photos on a single wall, family photos on every horizontal surface, and personal photos in every room is the scenario to avoid.
Does decluttering help during winter showings when the home is enclosed?
Yes, and in some ways winter is when decluttering matters more because the enclosed winter home amplifies the impact of both visual clutter and clutter-associated odors in a way that an aired-out spring home does not.
What about displaying holiday decorations during the listing period?
A tasteful, restrained display of seasonal decoration is generally fine and can add warmth. Overdone holiday decoration that occupies significant visual real estate in multiple rooms should be avoided during the listing period.
Final Thoughts
The seller in Shoreview did not strip her home of its personality.
She and her husband spent three weekends going through the house systematically. Two-thirds of the books came off the shelves and went into storage, with the remaining books arranged with intentional breathing room and a few of the most beautiful pieces of pottery displayed within the shelves rather than only on the display shelf. The pottery collection on the dining room display shelf was edited to the twelve most beautiful pieces, arranged with space between them, and the remaining pieces went into storage.
The result was a home that felt curated, intentional, and personal without feeling overwhelming or cluttered. The bookshelves were still there. The pottery was still there. The home still felt like the home of interesting people with a well-lived life.
The listing photos looked beautiful. The home showed beautifully. She received offers within a week.
Decluttering done right does not take away the home’s personality. It reveals it.
Lesley The Realtor helps Minnesota sellers declutter strategically with honest guidance that improves showing results without making sellers feel they need to live in a showroom while they wait for their home to sell.
Visit https://sell.dreamhomesminnesota.com/ to start the conversation.