My father lost his wife of 50 years to COVID last year and struggled with depression. He was always a hoarder of "stuff" but my mom was able to manage it. He is now remarried and they decided to move to her home. He lives on a large property and we worried that he would lose that property to the hoard. So, my husband and I bought it from him with the intention to fix it up, give him a year to move his things and make it our home. My father was happy to sell it to us as long as we gave him a year to move his things. Our hope was to encourage him to minimize his "stuff" and not lose his nest egg. He took some of the proceeds from the sale to build a 2k sqft barn at his new house. It has been 4 months and only one room has been cleared from the 2100 sqft home and my husband and I helped the most with that. He was waiting for the barn to finish but in the meantime, he continued buying garage sale stuff and filling what limited space he had at the new place. This is new stuff... not even what is at the old place.
Now, I am getting nervous and wonder if my bank account can handle two house payments for more than a year. When I mean extreme hoard, I mean extreme. He had a small book-selling business on Amazon so he rationalized going to estate sales to buy books. His house has over 20,000 books. Yes, that is correct, and years and years of other collections. A 2100sqft house nearly floor to ceiling packed, a 1700 sqft two-story barn floor to ceiling, a 20x20 shed packed to the roof with books, 2 broken down RV's full of books, a MOVING TRUCK that doesn't move anymore full of books, a few more cars and trucks and the list goes on and on.
I am one of 8 siblings and the only one crazy enough to tackle this. We jumped in now because in 10 years, this beautiful property and home would be destroyed and the hoard 10 times worse. We hoped us owning the home would force him to deal with the stuff. We have had a dumpster on site for a year that is regularly emptied in hopes he will use it. We have offered suggestions for community donations (he's very generous) but he has to hold each tiny item one at a time before making a decision. It's going slow.
On top of this all, Amazon closed his book store. It is a long story but now he can't even sell the books. Yet, he is still buying them. He can sell records on Ebay but not the books as well. He knows he needs to make a decision, but won't. He raised a family of 10 as a salesman so I know he loves the bargain side of buying and selling but, it really is unmanageable. His new wife is so sweet and the same age but I worry about her mobility if he fills up her home.
He is also struggling with memory problems. They are not too bad but getting more frequent. His father had Alzheimer’s so we worry about that. But, he is 75 and physically acts like he's 23. He is in denial about his memory issues. He knows he has "a lot of stuff" but can't part with it without shutting down. It's a "love me or leave me" attitude.
How many memory issues are too many and should be looked into? How do you convince the patient they need that addressed? Would the memory issues be causing the extra hoarding or the recent life changes? How do we address the hoard without offending him? How do we encourage him without him shutting down? How do we keep him from buying more books when he hasn't removed the current stuff from the old house? Gentle but firm? Our family is terrible about the elephant-in-the-room issues and I can be a total push-over.
On the plus side, my husband is the sweetest thing ever and is so kind and patient with my dad. Most people are pretty rude when it comes to his "junk" but my husband recognizes the treasures and is gentle with him. But, come next summer, he will want the property cleared out.
Help!
Now that you own the property, you legally can move his hoard but you should not be the one to pay for any of that, or physically do it. And don't expect him to do it, he won't -- he'll drag his feet like he's doing now. He's too busy adding to his hoard. You can't make him have therapy or clean up or respect your wishes. He's a sick man. You need boundaries first and foremost.
Tackle the first one first. You can manage the house you now own, you can’t manage his new marriage.
It sounds as though your family has a fair bit of money, so there are some options:
1) He gets a storage container and it all gets moved into storage – by hired workers, without supervision. Make the container accessible, so that he can get into it to sort. If he doesn’t sort, it will be a dead issue in three or four years. The justification is so that you can redecorate, move in, whatever.
2) It all gets moved into his new barn. He hires workers to repack what’s in there now, and to move the old stuff in.
3) There is a flood or fire or mould that damages things. They have to go.
4) You and your lovely husband have a planning (plotting?) meeting with your new MIL. She may have new ideas, and she needs to back up whatever you choose to do. She'll be living with the backlash too.
5) You collect some model elephants, and send one to all other family members with a note attached to the tail. Ask them for ideas too. You all need to gang up on Dad!
Normally I wouldn't even suggest touching a person's hoard but going through a similar but smaller book hoard (about 5000 books), I've got a soft spot for books right now. So, with that...
Since your father's hoard is actually a hoard that "doesn't expire or die", how about an out of the box idea: The No-return library. Maybe your dad would appreciate setting up a library for book usage for those that want to enjoy books like he does.
For a free or cheap yearly fee, one can get a domain name on the web.
Take photos of the books.
Put the photos on the site (or a craigslist ad for boxes of books) for a minimum fee plus postage, one can check out a book(s) for as long as they want or indefinitely.
If he agrees to the library idea, he can even help pack the books for shipping.
Win that there are enough books for a library.
Win that they are going to good homes.
Win that the hoard is slowly being dismantled.
Win that your dad gets to help with the books.
Win that they no longer are stored on your property.
And finally, if it really comes down to it, you own them as they are on YOUR purchased property -- not his -- so shipping them a few at a time (or many boxes at once to anyone that wants "free books") on YOUR schedule wouldn't really be so bad ;-)