Effectively Using Storage During a Move

Here are some tips to follow if you ever decide to share a storage unit with a pal.

Put labels on the items that belong to you

Before you both take your possessions to the storage unit, you should label the items that belong to you (and encourage your friend to do the same with their things). The reason. If the two of you own some similar items that you both want to put in this unit, and if lots of the items are going to be left in it for a long time, then at some point, you could take things out of the unit that belong to your friend (or vice versa).

This could result in, for example, you taking a certain shirt or jacket out of the unit because you think it's yours and your friend not being able to find it when they come to the unit in search of it on another occasion. Furthermore, if in a few years, the two of you decide to empty the unit and nothing inside it has been labelled, you might find yourselves squabbling over which of you owns certain objects. The best way to prevent these confusing scenarios and silly fights is to label your possessions so that it's immediately obvious who they belong to when you look at them.

Make an aisle, and keep your items on one side of the unit and theirs on the other

If the unit is not that big, it may not be possible to keep your things completely separate from your friend's possessions. However, you should still do your best to keep your items on one side of the unit and theirs on the other and should try to leave enough room for a little aisle between the two collections of objects.

If both of your possessions are mixed up and there are no aisles that you can walk along when you need to look for certain items, two problems may occur. Firstly, the chances of you knocking over one of your friend's or relative's items and breaking it will be higher. Whilst you might not get that upset about breaking your possessions, you'd probably feel awful about damaging your friend's things (particularly if they're expensive). By keeping your items separate and ensuring you both have some walking space in the unit, this will be less likely to happen.

Secondly, if you don't separate your belongings and you end up occasionally going to the unit together when you both need to pick things up, the two of you will have to wade through one single pile of objects together, and one of you might get in the other one's way when trying to move objects around and locate the things you need.  The separation of your things will allow both of you to find what you need faster and ensure the process of locating your items doesn't result in any bickering.