35 home organising tips from the pros

Whether it’s in the rafters of your garage, between joists in the ceiling of your garage, inside a cabinet, etc., maximise your home’s storage space by thinking outside of the box! For example, reader David Ojala uses gutters as storage shelves on the side of kitchen cabinets for one of the most clever home organisation hacks we’ve seen:

Vinyl rain gutters are fairly inexpensive and great for storing small items. They come in 10-ft.-long sections, so you can cut them up with a power miter saw or hacksaw and make several shelves out of them. I just snap an end cap on each end, drill a couple of holes and attach them to my cabinets with wood screws and finish washers. For heavier stuff, I attach them with fascia gutter brackets, which you’ll find at the home centre right next to the gutters. — David Ojala

An empty rectangular tissue box makes a convenient holder for small garbage bags, plastic grocery bags and small rags. Simply thumbtack it to the inside of a cabinet door. It’s one of our favourite kitchen storage ideas.

Hang spray bottles from a rod to keep them upright. It can be hard to keep spray bottles from falling over and making a mess under your bathroom and kitchen sink. To keep them upright, hang them from a short tension rod (about $12 at discount stores) in your cabinet.

An old rod can come in handy in a number of spots in the house.

Short on wardrobe space? Use a lightweight piece of chain to stagger hanging clothing in tall closets to maximise space. Just loop the first link of the chain over the first hanger, and hang subsequent hangers on every other links after. Hang up to six shirts for the rod space of one.

Want to get into a wardrobe project? Build your own melamine wardrobe storage system here.

Store your appliance and tool manuals in three-ring binders so you can find them when you need them. Insert labelled dividers to organise them for quick reference instead of having them scattered in different places.

This sturdy ball corral holds a herd of balls and lets kids easily grab the balls at the bottom without unloading all the ones on top. It’s built from 3/4-in. plywood and 2x2s. We made our ball corral 24 in. wide x 33 in. high x 12 in. deep.

The hooks on Bungee cords can be a safety hazard for kids and adults alike. So cut the hooks off the cords (or use elastic cord available at camping, sporting goods and hardware stores). Thread the cord through predrilled holes and secure with knots. Drill the holes slightly larger than the cords to make threading them easier.

We added plumbing hooks and short gutter troughs on the outside of the corral to make it easy for kids to stash smaller balls, helmets and bats.

Once you’ve gone through your wardrobe and weeded out the unused items, turn all hanging clothes with the hanger facing outwards. After wearing an item, return it to the hanging rod with the hanger facing the back of the wardrobe. After one year, all articles of clothing still facing outwards were not worn, and you can consider getting rid of them.

Salvage the hidden space at the recessed ends of your wardrobes by adding a set of wire shelves. Wire shelves are available in a variety of widths. Measure the width and depth of the space. Then choose the correct shelving and ask the salesperson to cut the shelves to length for you. Buy a pair of end mounting brackets and a pair of plastic clips for each shelf.

What’s hiding under your kitchen sink? If the space under your sink is anything like ours, it’s an overcrowded jumble of cleaning supplies, sponges and plastic bags. Here’s a great way to store these items right on the door of the sink cabinet. Cut a plastic storage tub in half with a utility knife and screw it to the inside of the cabinet door through the plastic lip at the top of the tub. Just make sure you position it so you can shut the cabinet door when all your bags and other supplies are in the bin.

Hangers seem to just spontaneously spawn in the wardrobe. Don’t let them choke out your wardrobe. Find a place to store extra hangers.