Have you heard of Swedish Death Cleaning?

I think it's a wonderful idea - I can't see my (Irish-American) mum ever embracing it. She comes from a long line of women who have left hoards of clutter for their heirs to deal with (I know this because she still owns her mum's, aunt's, and grandmum's stuff as well as her own).

[and it says something that my older two children have been said that they hope I outlive DH because then I'll be stuck dealing with his stuff not them]

I think its a great idea, and my parents did something similar awhile back. They picked the furniture/art they wanted in their home and then all the rest that had been in storage was given to the kid that wanted it. If no one wanted it, then it was donated. My parents both said it was freeing to them not to be swamped with stuff that meant something to us kids but they had no connection with.

I am meticulous about cleaning out and not keeping crap to just to have stuff. My parents dealing with their stuff made it so much easier when my mom passed and my dad downsized his home.

My MIL did this starting in her 70s. At the end she had just the things that meant a lot to her, and things to pass on, not a lot of junk. I hope to do the same for my children. It gave her a lot of peace of mind.

It is a great idea. The amount of hideous crap that we had to get rid of when my MIL died was mind boggling and extremely time consuming. I vowed not to burden my children with a similar task.

It’s something I started thinking about when I entered my 40’s (not that that’s super close to death, i hope).
I’m not decluttering like a madwoman on a regular basis yet, but i am more aware of the possessions I’m bringing into my life. I absolutely don’t want to burden my family with a bunch of things when I go.

I wish my dad would relent and finally be ok with my mom doing a massive purge of their garage. We try to do it every spring and he freaks out and digs things out of the trash. My parents have a two car garage that can only fit one car. Bless my mom for trying, we’ve started going for the smaller approach and only tossing one or two things at a time.

My sweet mom passed away last month. The other week my brother, sister and myself went through her house and took what we wanted. We each took only a few items because there really wasn't much to take. She started clearing out her house when she was in her late 70s. Just a little at a time and never brought anything new into the house. She and dad had lived in the house for 55 years and she was 87 when she passed.

A friend told me that I would find all kinds of treasures in the house like my old "art" projects/papers, cards, notes, etc. Nope. She had cleared everything! The few things that were left were some items that belonged to my dad that she couldn't part with (bridge books/magazines, his computer, two jars of his quince jam ).

Most of what is in the house are everyday things (paper napkins, pens, paper, medicines, that sort of stuff), clothing and furniture. We donated the clothing and we are going to hire a company that will come and take all of the furniture and anything else that is left. They will sell it and give us a (small) percentage.

I have to say that it was a great gift that she gave us. To have a clutter free house to deal with has made it very simple.

Along the same lines but in a financial way - my dad consolidated all of his accounts about three years before he passed. All insurance was with one company, savings/checking was with one company and brokerage accounts (IRA, Individual) were at one company. All of the financial information was easy to find and deal with.

As much as I love that Swedish plan, I believe MIL is determined to stuff her house so full that her children will spend the rest of their lives sorting through it all.

I like the idea and guess I've already made a start! I don't have kids and only have one niece - certainly don't want to leave her or my friends with the burden of having to sort everything out.

I’m so sorry for your loss pridemom Hugs— 

we just listed a home that the owner had died. he was 50. he was a bit of a hoarder, luckily just clothing, shoes, boxes and papers, his kitchen was pretty much empty other than bottle after bottle of supplements and vitamins.

the next-of-kin is in the states and just wanted us to keep an eye out for a family bible, other than that, they wanted nothing. odd, we never found any photos or albums, i was keeping an eye for them as we would have put them aside as well. 

it was a tiny house that took us days and days to clear out. lots went to value village, tons of recycling and we took a couple of things (housewares mostly, laundry detergent, garbage bags, etc) and still two 16 yard dumpsters were disposed of.

it was very sad and i didn't know this man. most days when i got home, i was pretty quiet. i can imagine it would be 1000x harder if its your memories and family items.

i like the idea as i wouldn't want my kids to have to go thru that while still grieving.

No I haven't heard of this but I think this lady is my spirit animal. I hated having to sort through all my parents things and decide what to keep, give away, sell. It tore at me and was hard to part with anything. 

I always have an eye towards what something will do to my kids one day. For example, someone mentioned having their ashes made into a pottery bowl. My thought - what happens after the people who know you die and your ashes are lying around in some bowl somewhere. Who has to have the thought of throwing great great gramma out. Or who keeps the stack of bowls of their ancestors? But I diverge...

I purge often and give away things to family members that are meaningful to me now, so I'm sure they get them. When I'm gone, they can take what they want from what's left and dump the rest.

I could have written your last line. I have tons of rooms I need to declutter. I think we have 3 chaffing dishes. Do we need the sterling chip and dip bowl? Where will I put all the crystal? Can I get rid of the everyday china and just keep the good stuff? What about all the baskets? Maybe they are gone? I am gradually trying to get rid of things and am hoping that when I inherit everything there won't be tons of stuff left. At the moment there is a ton of stuff that needs to be sorted. I need to get better at this, too!