With home organizing comes plenty of rules to follow, but the truth is that some of these have more merit than others.
While it can be helpful to live by a couple of key guidelines—for example, remembering that decluttering is an ongoing process, not a project that can be completed in a single weekend—there are other commonly shared pieces of advice that pro organizers don’t necessarily agree with in their own work.
Below, you’ll learn about seven common organizing rules that experts actually encourage you to break, so don’t feel guilty about tossing them to the wayside.
Rule 1: You must buy plastic bins to organize your belongings
For many, taking on a home organization project is synonymous with bin and basket shopping, but this certainly doesn’t have to be the case.
“Clear plastic has become shorthand for ‘put together,’ but it’s a trend, not a requirement—and it's a lot of single-use-feeling plastic,” says organizing expert Shira Gill, who says you shouldn't be afraid to shop your home for vessels of all different sizes.
“A woven basket, a repurposed tin, or mason jar or even just corralling items loosely in a drawer can be just as functional.”
Marisa Smith, the founder of MACMOM Organizing, feels similarly. “You can use Tupperware to sort and store food, office supplies, and health care items,” she says. “Ziploc bags are great for storing small items such as chargers, cords, and plastic utensils.”
Rule 2: 'When in doubt, throw it out'
Kayleen Kelly takes issue with the aforementioned phrase, which is commonly imparted upon those decluttering their spaces.
“It can be incredibly unhelpful for people who already struggle with making decisions—the exact people most likely to be seeking decluttering advice in the first place,” explains the founder of Kayleen Kelly Home Organizing.
Then, Kelly adds, this creates a difficult cycle. “When someone is told they should get rid of something even when they can’t confidently say yes or no, they’re more likely to make a decision they later regret,” she says. “That creates a negative experience with decluttering and can make them even more hesitant to tackle clutter in the future.”
Instead, Kelly likes to share with others her own method for those determining whether to keep, toss, or donate items. which she calls the three-second decluttering rule. “Try to make that decision within three seconds, trusting your initial instinct rather than overthinking it,” she says. “If you can’t decide within three seconds, it’s an automatic keep.”
Rule 3: Store like with like
Storing like with like isn’t always an effective approach within the home, according to Lauren Saltman.
“Sometimes point of use is more important than keeping an entire category together,” says the founder of Living Simplified. Take cleaning supplies, for example, which come in handy in the kitchen and bathroom alike. “These items can live in two places in your home.”
Rule 4: Store items where you use them
While a rule like this one is easier to implement in larger homes, smaller spaces often call for their own organizational systems, explains Amelia Nicholas, the founder of Urban Cottage NYC.
“You may have to get creative,” she says. “It is more important to have items contained, labeled and ordered than worry about creating zones you don’t have.”
For example, Nicholas keeps items including paperwork and lightbulbs in her closet out of necessity. “The uniformity of the drawers coupled with the labels on each drawer are a good enough solution,” she states.
Rule 5: Keep only what you use
While it’s impossible to be able to hold onto everything that enters your home, Saltman isn’t a proponent of abiding by the concept of keeping only what one uses often.
“We own things for many reasons beyond everyday usefulness,” she says. “Something might be used only occasionally, have sentimental value, be important to a hobby, be needed for entertaining, or simply make us happy.”
In these instances, she notes, it’s ok to ask oneself, “Does this item earn the space it takes up in my home?”
Gill agrees, noting that people are commonly advised to get rid of things they haven’t used within the past year, but abiding by this adage can be limiting. “Sustainable organizing isn't about hitting an arbitrary usage quota; it’s about knowing why something's in your home and whether that reason still holds,” she comments.
Rule 6: 'Touch every piece of paper only once'
This rule is meant to streamline the process of organizing papers throughout the home, Lisa Zaslow explains, but she doesn’t find it to be effective in practice.
“Sure, sometimes you can make a quick decision and immediately toss, file, or hand something off to someone else,” says the founder of Gotham Organizers. Generally, though, the process isn’t so impulsive.
“If you have a lot of papers to deal with, I recommend doing a first pass where you quickly handle the things that don’t require much thought and set aside the papers that need more consideration to revisit later,” Zaslow says. “This gives you a quick win that boosts your motivation so you have more energy to tackle the harder decisions next.”
Rule 7: Label everything
While labeling can be useful to a degree, especially when guiding children who are beginning to clean up after themselves, there’s no need to go overboard with this process.
“If you over-label items in your home, it makes it hard to see the future possibility for those labeled containers when the need arises,” says Hayley Anderson, the founder of Meraki Home Organization. “You also run the risk of your home feeling like a kindergarten classroom, creating more visual clutter.”
