The Thirwood Difference: 5 Ways Downsizing can Improve Your Life

Is it Time to Downsize?

Downsizing can be complicated. At Thirwood Place our mission is to create a moving process and living environment that allows our residents to relax into a new lifestyle. Going through your entire home can be a cumbersome task. We are here to show you all the reasons downsizing can improve your state of mind and living. Decluttering your living space helps to declutter your mind and allows you to enjoy your time for yourself. Here are some of the major benefits of downsizing.

No Maintenance

Let’s start with one of the most obvious reasons. The maintenance-free lifestyle Thirwood Place provides. This may seem like small simple things like taking out the trash each week or mowing your lawn. These are weekly tasks you might put on your schedule and are part of your routine. But they can be draining, expensive, require extra help and cause a huge headache that you don’t need.

At Thirwood Place we have a team of maintenance professionals to do those things, so you don’t have to. Need an appliance fixed? Maybe some art hung up around the home? When you live at Thirwood Place you just have to put in a maintenance request, and we can make it happen. Remember all those cold winter mornings after a snowstorm? Shoveling and icing your walkway and driveway is always the least fun aspect of winter weather. Our maintenance team takes care of that too. They are on-call whenever there’s inclement weather to ensure our parking lot is plowed and salted so everyone is safe.

What about landscaping? Are you someone who mows your lawn every week? Well, we can do that for you too. Do you personally hate dealing with your cable provider? Waiting on hold for hours just for them to confirm what you already know and send a worker out a week later? We talk to your internet provider, so you don’t have to. We pride ourselves on the maintenance-free lifestyle we provide for our residents.

Safety and Security

In addition to maintenance, for some of you there’s nothing more important than keeping your home safe. When you live at Thirwood Place there is security staff available 24/7. Forget about those expensive home security systems that go off for no reason half the time. They can be expensive and quite frankly annoying to maintain. When you live at Thirwood Place we take all the headache of homeownership away from you.

Not only does our security team always monitor the entire property, but we also have a system for wellness checks. Each morning our residents are required to push a button before 10am. That way the staff knows the resident is up and about and well. If the resident this button by 10am we have a staff member perform a wellness check to ensure everything is okay.

Additionally, we also provide each of our residents with a pendant. They can wear it around their neck or on their wrist. These pendants are necessary because in the event of a fall or any type of emergency, all the resident has to do is push their pendant and our team will jump into action. 

Dining and Activities

When you think about downsizing you may not realize that daily meals and socializing also play a role. It can be extremely time-consuming to decide what you need from the grocery store on a weekly or even daily basis and then additional time to cook three meals each day. At Thirwood Place we have an amazing chef and two different meal plans that allow our residents to choose to cook if they want to. If cooking is something you consider a hobby you can cook for yourself every day. It’s nice to have the option not to though.

We also offer different options, so our residents don’t feel like they’re eating the same things all the time. We regularly update our menus and if you have a meal plan we also offer the option of delivering your meal right to your front door so you can eat in your apartment. Aside from our dining room we also have Mr. D’s Bistro. The Bistro is open Wednesday through Saturday. Our Bistro offers more of a pub style meal with a casual atmosphere. We understand the importance of having options and that’s why we’ve created multiple ways to dine at Thirwood Place.

Similarly to the amount of mental space it takes to plan dinner, it also takes a lot of mental energy to plan social time with friends. We have an incredible activities calendar at with a wide range of options. Thirwood offers everything from games like Bingo and Mah Jongg, to various fitness classes like yoga and aqua aerobics. We also have guest speakers and musical entertainment. Arts and crafts as well!

We find that our residents who attend activities that they enjoy are more likely to meet and bond with other likeminded residents. Sometimes at Thirwood Place you make friends without realizing just because you decide to attend a dance class. Our activities coordinators pay attention to which events our residents enjoy the most and plan new ones accordingly.

Out with the old in with the new

Do you ever find yourself thinking… “wow I have way too much stuff.”

If this sounds like you, it might be time to think about downsizing. In many instances, downsizing can seem scary. If you’re someone who considers your possessions personal treasures, you may not want to give your stuff away. After taking the time to go through all your belongings, you might find that there are in fact items you just don’t use or need any longer.

Possessions are special and hold sentimental value but not all of them. Decluttering things that aren’t useful or you’re not connected to anymore only makes life easier and more organized. When you enter your home after a long day you don’t want to worry about organizing and cleaning. Once you downsize and declutter your life and home, you’ll have the ability to sit back and relax…. Which brings us to our next point.

Your Time is now all Your own

Once the process of downsizing is complete you might not even realize how much time you’ll have for yourself. When you take maintenance and planning out of your daily equation you realize the world is your oyster. You can start new hobbies or revisit old ones. You have more time to see loved ones and do all the things you didn’t have time to do when you were managing your own home. Downsizing can be an empowering process.

Tips From the Experts

At Thirwood Place we have been incredibly lucky to work with Julie Brooks and the team from Peaceful Place Home Organizers. They serve the Cape, South Shore, South Coast and Metro South. Julie was kind enough to chat with the Thirwood team about some downsizing tips. Julie expressed that one of the main factors that can delay a move are boxes in the basement. A little time spent organizing and prioritizing what you need can allow you to effectively begin your next chapter.

According to Julie, many times you ask yourself the wrong question when thinking about downsizing. Which is, “what am I going to do with this?”

Julie said that “that question has a thousand different answers.”

The RIGHT question to ask yourself when downsizing is, ‘do I want to bring this with me or not?’ If the answer is no, then the item either goes to donation or the trash if it can’t be used again.

Another wonderful tip Julie provided is that it’s easier and more fun for you to downsize if you pretend everything in your home is in a store and you’re deciding if the items are something you’d want to bring with you to your new home or not. The greatest part of this according to Julie is that “everything is free!”

If something catches your eye the way it would in a store and you love it, as long as it fits you should bring it. If you’re ambivalent then it’s probably time to donate.

In Julie’s words “if you don’t like it in your home now, you won’t like it in the new space.

The Peaceful Place organizers are “dedicated to providing compassionate and efficient downsizing and move management services for our clients in all stages of life. Every client deserves a peaceful and stress-free experience. We aim to be the trusted partner that families can rely on during the challenging process of downsizing and relocating.”

At Thirwood Place we also understand how important compassion is when it comes to downsizing. That’s why we are grateful Julie, and her team have been able to help a number of our residents reach optimal comfort within their new living spaces.

Click here to learn more about Peaceful Place Home Organizers.