It has been my experience that many of us Americans seem to treasure our possessions until there is a real true awakening of conscious and collective thought of finally having the will to let go.
Perhaps some of the reasons we find it so hard to part ways with our stuff is because money doesn’t grow on trees, the Tooth Fairy stopped leaving money under our pillow a long time ago and stubborn old Santa Clause refuses to hand out cash to adults. For most of us, a dollar is hard earned and hard to come by these days. It’s not easy to throw away that ten-year-old couch which cost $1,400 brand new and still looks great, but now would only fetch $50 at a yard sale.
Other reasons may be sentimental ones: little Johnny’s kindergarten stick-figured painting complete with flaming red hair of his dear old mommy and Mary Sue’s first pair of eye glasses (which went missing from Fido’s Kibbles and Bits bowl but were miraculously recovered days later in the back yard) would qualify as illustrations.
And then there is every other reason in the book. for example, all those nice designer clothes that were purchased at the finest stores and are now occupying 80% of our closet space even though we haven’t worn any of them since about 100 pounds ago and yet we hold onto them because we just know that someday, somehow, we’ll be back to that smaller size in the very near future- just as soon as we finish this double pounder with fries and a large diet coke. So when does it all make sense?
Self-storage is, and always has been, a personal decision for most Americans faced with the choice. It makes sense for returning college students to store their goods in a storage unit space over the summer, or for a family that is in the process of purchasing a home and having to wait a few months for closing, or for the small business owner in need of a little more room to keep an overflow of inventory.
It also makes sense for a family that absolutely needs more storage space to rent it, rather than turn their garage into one while parking their car out on the driveway just waiting to be pounded by the next hail storm.
Where it starts to get a bit blurry is whether to let go of Billy’s guitar lessons or Peggy’s dance class in order to rent space for reasons you find necessary. If the sacrifice is eating less at Burger King and more at home, then renting a household storage space is probably still worth it. But if mom keeps running into walls because she needs the cataracts surgically removed from her eyeballs, or dad’s face becomes dark purple and swollen like a cantaloupe because he has postponed indefinitely a trip to the dentist to have 2 root canals taken care of and a wisdom tooth pulled, then maybe it’s time to reevaluate how important it really is to have that extra space.
You see, maybe the question shouldn’t be whether you “need” more space or not, but rather if you can afford to rent the extra storage space you know you need.
There are only a small handful of customers who are looking for storage but not really in need of it- more of a choice of convenience rather than necessity. But for most, when customers come into our office interested in household storage units, the reasons they give for needing one are solid and logical. Countless reasons exist for people seeking personal storage space and mine is not to question why. But here is what I hope customers do question: Can they afford it? You see, as a manager of Alameda Mini Storage, it doesn’t matter to me whether or not someone should be storing their stuff as opposed to selling it in a garage sale. That decision is a personal one. However, as a manager, I do concern myself as to whether or not a customer can afford the storage they want. Why? Because as much as we dislike the process, a storage unit that is filled with a tenant’s goods but is delinquent in payments for more than 30 days, is subject to being placed in lien and ultimately , the contents of the unit sold at a public auction. And that, my friend, is no good for us or our tenants.
Alameda Mini Storage has storage units of all sizes. We serve those looking for self-storage units in Aurora, Denver, and many surrounding areas. See our Contact Us page for a listing of zip codes within a 5-mile radius. We will be glad to help you select a store inventory storage unit, a household storage unit, or even a vehicle storage unit that meets your needs.
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