Tips For Adult Children Moving Parents Into An Assisted Living Apartments
If you are an adult child who is tasked with downsizing and moving your ailing parent into an assisted living facility, then these tips will help you get started:
Tip: You and Your Siblings Should Remove the Items in Your Parent's Home that Belong to You
If you and your siblings have items stored in your parent's house or garage, now is the time to retrieve them. Items you still want should be stored in your own home or storage unit, and those things you no longer want should be donated, sold, or thrown away.
Tip: Spend a Day Processing All of the Paperwork in Your Parent's House
Most older people have a lot of paperwork in their homes. Not only are you likely to find years worth of old bills and tax forms, so too you may find stacks or boxes of junk mail, magazines, or newspapers.
The best way to process all of the paperwork is to get a high-quality paper shredder and then sit with your parent and go through all of the paperwork you find. Magazines and newspapers can be taken to the local recycling center, and all past bills and tax forms should be shredded. You can then use all of the shredded paper as packing material for boxes used to move your parent's breakable items.
Tip: Spend a Day Sorting All of the Books in Your Parent's Home
Since moving to an assisted living apartment requires serious downsizing and decluttering for most seniors, this will likely include many shelves full of books. Ask your parent to identify the titles they want to move to their new space, and then donate or sell the remaining books to get them out of the house.
If there is a used bookstore in your town, you can often make arrangements to take them a whole load of boxes all at one time and have them send you a check for those they choose to purchase. They will often accept the other books as a donation for their shelves or "free" areas.
Tip: Buy Some Photo Albums and Consolidate Family Photos
Finally, if your parent has a large collection of family photos on their walls, then you should purchase some acid-free photo albums and move the photos into them. Consolidating the photos into albums and out of their frames will save a lot of room and allow your parent to take all of their favorite photos along with them to their new assisted living apartment.