7 Surprising Reasons Downsizing Makes Life Better!

We explore seven hidden benefits of downsizing beyond the obvious advantages of saving money, having less yard work, and eliminating clutter. These secret benefits can significantly improve your quality of life and provide additional motivation for making the transition to a smaller home.

• Reduced decision fatigue: Fewer home maintenance decisions means more mental energy for things that matter
• Improved mental clarity: Less chaotic environments reduce low-grade stress and create calmer living spaces
• Better financial discipline: Limited space prevents impulse purchases and promotes mindful spending habits
• Reduced theft risk: Smaller homes in secure communities make you less of a target for theft
• Increased safety: Fewer fall hazards like stairs, transitions, and high cabinets reduce injury risks for older adults
• More opportunities for generosity: Downsizing provides a chance to donate possessions to meaningful causes
• Freedom to choose your ideal community: Select a neighborhood that fits your current lifestyle, not your past needs

Visit our website at www.edgegroupteam.com for our free five-day downsizing class delivered to your email. If you've gone through the downsizing process and would like to share your firsthand experience as a podcast guest, please contact us at [e-mail].

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Episode Transcript

Dennis Day (00:04):
Welcome back.
This is Getting your Edge howto Downsize your Life.
I'm your host, dennis Day, andI'm here with my co-host, judy
Gratton.
How are you today?
I'm good, Dennis, how are youGreat, and we have an excellent
show for you today.
We're going to give you sevenhidden benefits of downsizing.
Now we've talked aboutdownsizing benefits.
You're going to give you sevenhidden benefits of downsizing.

(00:25):
Now.
We've talked about downsizingbenefits.
You're going to save some money, you're going to have less yard
work and you're going to getrid of all that clutter, etc.
But these are things that youmay not have thought about.
They're hidden, there might besecret benefits and, if you do
experience downsizing, thesethings might make your quality

(00:47):
of life even better.

Judy Gratton (00:48):
It might give you more motivation.

Dennis Day (00:49):
It might.
We are the Edge Group team, sowe say less house, more home.
Discover downsizing with us.
Number one reduced decisionfatigue.
Are you experiencing decisionfatigue, judy?

Judy Gratton (01:26):
that needs to be fixed.
I am exhausted at the end ofthe day with all of the things
that go through my brain, and Ijust cannot handle them all
anymore, and so the idea ofbeing able to just not have to
think about those anymore wouldbe worth so much to me.

Dennis Day (01:42):
You're reducing the amount of decision making you
have to make With the big house.
You're constantly doing can Iafford to do this?
Do I have time to do this?
I haven't done this for so long.
I really need to do this, but Ihave to do this.
It just is endless and you'reconstantly making compromises.

Judy Gratton (02:00):
It's like how did that happen and I'll say that to
my husband how did that happen?
I don't know.
How did that gouge in the wallhappen?
So now it has to be patched andthen painted, otherwise you end
up with a big mess.
So maintenance at some pointwill have to be addressed.

Dennis Day (02:21):
So you'll be making fewer decisions will save your
mental energy and you'll havemore time.
Number two improved mentalclarity.
This is really related.
Improved mental clarityWouldn't that be lovely?
It would be.
Having fewer things, fewerdecisions to make, big life

(02:45):
changing decisions made, you'regoing to feel a lot more mental
clarity, you're at where you'resupposed to be and you don't
have to worry about all thosedecisions in the past.
Plus, you've got a declutteredspace.

Judy Gratton (03:03):
Clean, hopefully calming.

Dennis Day (03:05):
Having a chaotic environment adds to a low-grade
stress, and it's really not goodor healthy.
When your space is clean anddecluttered, you have room to
breathe and you don't feelcompelled to do a million
different things to keep up thisgiant house, it can make you
healthier and happier.

Judy Gratton (03:27):
I agree completely .

Dennis Day (03:29):
Number three improved financial discipline.
Number three improved financialdiscipline.
You don't have space for allthat stuff.
You can't go to Costco and buythe paddleboard anymore because
you don't have a place to storeit.
You have to be disciplined andthis is going to help with your
mental clarity.

(03:49):
But financially you won't haveroom to impulsive buy things
anymore.

Judy Gratton (03:55):
True, your utilities, if you actually do
move into something smaller willprobably be less, Just the
maintenance will probably beless.
All of that will help to saveyou money.
But yeah, in terms of going outand buying if you have no place
to put it, you're going to endup saving money.

Dennis Day (04:15):
Absolutely.
You'll end up with mindfulspending habits.
Really think about do I need it, I'd really like to do it, or
oh, won't that be fun?
And then three months laterit's in a back closet.
So less debt, more freedom andimproved financial stability and
discipline.

(04:36):
Number four reduced risk oftheft.
Number four reduced theft risk.
Now tell me why you think thatwould be the case, judy.

Judy Gratton (04:48):
I was surprised by this one.
I didn't really think about it,but in fact, yes, your bigger,
larger home with all the thingsin it and around it that people
see, it just attracts attention.
And once you've moved into asecure community where there are
gates and people aren't comingand going, or you're in a

(05:10):
building that is secure, peoplearen't looking at you as an easy
mark.
So, besides the fact that theyactually looked at your place,
hopefully it's going to be moresimplistic and won't look like
such a good use of their time interms of the rate of return on

(05:31):
the things they might be able tosteal.
So, yes, it does definitelyreduce your theft risk.

Dennis Day (05:38):
Theft is a crime of opportunity, and if your home
doesn't scream jewelry,valuables, cameras, bikes, then
you're not a good mark, as yousaid.
So fewer valuables, less stressthat somebody's going to
attempt to come into your home.
Number five increased safety,Increased safety.

(06:01):
Now you move to that smallerhome, you're going to have less
stuff.
Hopefully, this place is betterdesigned for a person of your
age and you'll be living in asafer home, especially for older
adults like us.

Judy Gratton (06:19):
One of the big issues for older people is
whether you fall more often ornot.
When you fall, the chances ofhaving that become a major issue
a broken hip or a broken wristor something along those lines
becomes much greater.
And my doctor had said to me aspeople get older they don't
lift their feet as high whenthey step, so there's more

(06:43):
opportunity to trip.
The idea of increased safetyfrom the standpoint of falls is
great If you can get away fromthe stairs.
Be more conservative with theuse of rugs.
Whether we like it or not, aswe get older, the risk is higher
for really serious injury in afall.

Dennis Day (07:02):
Some of these senior places are designed with the
elderly in mind.
So you've got walk-in tubs andshowers.
You've got electrical outletsthat are placed so you're not
bending down trying to plugsomething in.
That is a dangerous fall risk.
There's fewer or no stairs is adangerous fall risk.

(07:23):
There's fewer or no stairs, sothere's not transitions like the
old houses where one partsettled and then you added on
another one.
It's just an inch or two, butit's a big risk.

Judy Gratton (07:30):
My house has a sunken living room.
When we first bought it yearsago my mother walked in.
The first thing she did wasfall.
She didn't see the steptransition into the living room.
Sunken living rooms, multiplelevels, rugs.
Another thing is the height ofcabinets.
Hopefully, if you're able to,you can get into a place.

(07:51):
In my house I have to use astepstool to get to the top of
the cabinets and I have thingsto store in the top of the
cabinets.
Stepstools are risky no matterwhat, but as you get older, the
risk of falling, the risk ofinjury from that, is greater.

Dennis Day (08:07):
Three million CUs end up in emergency rooms a year
, according to AARP per year,and one million of those end up
hospitalized.
Number six more opportunitiesfor generosity.
We're moving along.
More opportunity for generosity.
You have all this stuff and youhave to get rid of it because

(08:28):
you don't have space for it inyour next home.
It's a tremendous opportunityto be generous.

Judy Gratton (08:34):
Yes, and the cool thing is that you can choose
where you want to donate thesethings.
My sister-in-law mymother-in-law passed away a
couple of months ago in Boiseand my sister-in-law has been.
She's the executor and she'sgoing through this condominium
they had, even though theyquasi-downsized.

(08:55):
It's a lot.
There is so much stuff in thereand in reality, even though
it's very nice stuff, it's stuffthat people are not going to
buy.
A good example of this is thesebeautiful leather couches and
chair and they're that real softleather and they were hardly

(09:16):
used.
However, when they were used,they were stained.
Those stains will never comeout, so nobody is going to buy
that.
So they have chosen to donate itto the Veterans Homeless
Association and I think theyhave facilities for vets that
need a place to live.
And the cool thing is herhusband is a veteran.

(09:38):
He worked with veterans as partof his career.
It makes me feel great to knowthat we're supporting our
veterans.
So you get to choose whereyou're going to send these
things and be creative and lookinto if you're really into
animals.
Is there someplace you candonate this stuff for the
supportive animal sanctuary?

(09:58):
But you get to choose and to methat is kind of a gift of this.

Dennis Day (10:05):
And with the opportunity of not having the
big home, hopefully, financiallyyou're in a better place.
You're not expending money onthings like a new roof, so
financially you're in a betterspot.
You have more money to donateto your favorite charity your
church Also, without having tokeep up that yard work in that

(10:28):
big house.
You might have more time andyou can spend that time
volunteering.
And it's been my experience thatwhen I am worried about a
situation that I'm in, when I amworried about a situation that

(10:52):
I'm in, if I go out and helpsomeone else, I immediately feel
better.
The worry about me goes away.
It's like a gift that you getfrom helping others.
Downsizing becomes less aboutwhat you're losing, what you're
missing, and more about whatyou're passing on, what you're
giving to others.
And number seven you get tochoose the community you want.
Last one, number seven and thisis huge for me is when most

(11:17):
people move into their bigfamily home.
They pick the neighborhoodbecause it had good schools,
good park, it just fit, it wasconvenient to work or whatever.
You chose that community forreasons and now you get to do
that again.

Judy Gratton (11:38):
You've changed, the community's changed.
If it was a good place forchildren and you had children,
that's great.
But if you don't have children,maybe it's not anymore, maybe
it's noisy, or maybe thedemographics have changed and
you don't feel comfortable thereanymore.

Dennis Day (11:54):
Neighborhoods change .
Perhaps it's become filled withmultifamily homes yes, with the
new zoning laws, that happens alot more crowded, there's more

(12:15):
traffic and more people.
So that nice, quiet area youwere living in maybe it's become
super noisy and busy.
It's surrounded by bigmultifamily apartments.
Maybe it hasn't become as safeas it used to be.
Things change and your needschange.
So this is a huge, hugeopportunity.

(12:36):
You chose the original home fora reason and now you get to do
the same thing.
People need to grasp this, grabit and say I'm going to find
the place I fit and it fits formy lifestyle.

Judy Gratton (12:54):
The important thing to remember is, as we all
get older, there will come atime where that isn't going to
be something that you canactually choose.
That's why we've gotteninvolved in downsizing to help
give people choices while theystill have them, before someone
else gets to make thosedecisions for you.

Dennis Day (13:31):
If you're incapacitated, somebody else Now
you can't make decisions.
They have to make the decisionfor you.
They have to clear out yourstuff.
Really, if you love your kids,get started thinking about this,
planning, preparing, because itwill be a gift to your children
.
They may not realize it, but ittruly can make a huge

(13:55):
difference in the quality ofyour children's lives.

Judy Gratton (14:00):
Anything else.
I'm very excited that we have afive-day class on downsizing.
It is free to download from ourwebsite, wwwedgegroupteamcom.
If you would like to go througha five-day class.
You get an email a day thatgives you things to do.

(14:20):
It's free and I would love tosee people take advantage of it.

Dennis Day (14:26):
Is there a test at the end?
No, test.
See Free.
Free Delivered to your email andno test at the end.
We've given you seven greatbenefits of downsizing that
maybe you didn't know about,like reducing your decision

(14:46):
fatigue, improved mental clarity, improved financial discipline,
reduced risk of theft,increased safety, opportunities
to be generous and you get tochoose the community that fits
your lifestyle and needs.
That's it, thanks for watching.

(15:08):
Getting your Edge how toDensize your Home and Life.
We have lots of other episodes.
We'd love to have you watchthose.
If you'd like to reach out to us, we would love to hear from you
at info at edgegroupteamcom, gofor the free course at
wwwedgegroupteamcom, and if youare interested in being a guest

(15:30):
on our podcast, we would love tohear from you, especially if
you have gone through thedownsizing podcast.
Especially if you have gonethrough the downsizing podcast,
there is nothing better thanhaving a firsthand experience of
somebody giving you informationabout going through the process
, rather than other peopletelling you what you're going to
experience.
We would love to have you onour podcast, so reach out to us

(15:53):
if you're interested.
And that's it.
Thanks for watching andlistening.
Thank you so much and that's it.
Thanks for watching andlistening.
Have a good day.