The Hidden Costs of Clutter: Save Time, Stress, and Money

Is clutter stealing your time and peace of mind?

Discover how tailored home organization can transform your family life by saving time, reducing stress, and creating space for what truly matters.

In this episode, Mark Hansen sits down with home organization expert Meghan Cocchiaro to explore the hidden costs of clutter, the concept of visual noise, and actionable strategies for simplifying your home and reclaiming your time.

You'll learn practical tips to create systems that work for your unique family dynamic, maintain organization long-term, and invest in solutions that pay dividends in peace and productivity.

With relatable anecdotes and holistic insights, this conversation uncovers the parallels between home organization and financial planning, offering a fresh perspective on how intentional systems can enhance your family’s quality of life.

Ready to take the first step towards a clutter-free, stress-free home?

Listen now and check the show notes for resources to connect with Mark or Meghan and start your journey today! 

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Resources:

• eBook: What The Hack Are You Thinking?

Connect with  Meghan Cocchiaro: 

• LinkedIn: Meghan Cocchiaro
• Website: OrganizedbyMeg.com
• Call or text Meghan Cocchiaro: (513) 817-1584
• E-mail: meg@organizedbymeg.com 

About Meghan Cocchiaro: 

Meghan Cocchiaro transitioned from a high-pressure corporate job to a fulfilling career in home organization, driven by a passion to help others reduce stress through organized living. With a hands-on approach, Meghan tailors her strategies to fit the unique dynamics of each family, fostering environments that support both daily tasks and long-term wellness.

Connect with Mark Hansen: 

• LinkedIn: Mark Hansen
• Website: SecondComma.com
• Email: contact@second-comma.com
• Apply to work with Second Comma

About Second Comma
This podcast is hosted by Mark Hansen, founder of Second Comma, a financial planner specializing in helping six-figure single-income families with children. Mark holds the Series 66 – Uniform Combined State Law Exam and the Series 7 – General Securities Representative Exam, demonstrating his commitment to providing informed and reliable financial guidance.

Our Commitment to Trust
At Second Comma, we prioritize transparency, accuracy, and honesty. Every topic discussed in this podcast is grounded in reliable financial principles, with the goal of empowering families to make informed decisions with confidence, free from conflicts of interest.

Disclaimer
This podcast is for informational purposes only and should not be considered financial advice. Each family's financial situation is unique—consult with a qualified financial professional for advice specific to your needs. Topics discussed on this podcast are not a substitute for comprehensive, holistic financial planning.

Learn More
To discover how Second Comma can support your family’s financial goals, visit our website or contact us directly at contact@second-comma.com. We welcome your questions and feedback to help ens

Transcript

ProudMouth (00:02)

Hey there, welcome to the quiet part hosted by Mark Hansen, a financial advisor at second comma. That's me, by the way, this podcast explores our often unspoken priorities and dreams. You know, the things that shape our lives, even if we aren't conscious of how it plays out, the reasons why we sometimes struggle to do what we know we should do and even continue to do the things that we know we shouldn't join me as we go through the everyday gaining a deeper understanding of ourselves, our decisions.

and how we spend our time, our money, and ultimately, our lives.

Wendy (00:38)

Hello and welcome to the Quiet Part podcast hosted by Mark Hansen, where he explores the unspoken stories hidden in the quiet hours we spend at home. I'm Wendy McConnell. Hi Mark, how are you?

Mark (00:51)

I'm doing great, Wendy. The weather is a lot better here around here. Now we have hail. So we talked about it was hot and cold. Now we got hail thrown in the mix. The weather is absolutely nuts. I don't even know what to do about it.

Wendy (01:01)

You sound very optimistic about it. You're like, oh, the weather's great. We're getting to hell.

Mark (01:06)

You know, eventually summer will come and then it'll only be like 107 degrees. And so then it'll just, it'll only be hot. Every day will be hot and I won't have to guess anymore. So that's going to be nice.

Wendy (01:15)

I think maybe you should move, Mark. Hahaha! San Diego! Here we come!

Mark (01:21)

Oh man, don't tempt me.

Wendy (01:23)

They say it's the perfect weather there all the time. But we have very exciting stuff for you today. We have a guest.

Mark (01:31)

Yes, today we have Jordan joining us. And from time to time, we'll have guests join our show. Sometimes it's Peyton, sometimes it's Jordan. Today it's Jordan. And Jordan is a wife. She's a mom, a daughter, a friend. She's a small business owner in her thirties who felt exhausted by the corporate world and decided to do something about it. And now she splits her time between her family and her business where she helps people get organized and

As she says it, she helps transform the homes and lives of busy families so they can have more time for what really matters. So Jordan, welcome to the quiet part.

Meghan Cocchiaro (02:08)

Thank you, Mark. Thank you for having me. That's a really good intro. I am in my 30s, but I will be 40 next month. So I don't know how much longer I can say that. And that just makes me think on the one hand, I wish I had changed my career sooner. But it makes me grateful that I made the change at all, because the corporate world was exhausting.

Mark (02:10)

Absolutely.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah, I think you and I could do an entire conversation about just that. Uh, I don't know if it's, I'm not going to say that I figured it out earlier. I think my bosses were just that bad that I got squeezed out or I gave up that much faster, maybe you're more resilient than I am. I don't know.

Meghan Cocchiaro (02:49)

Yeah, I don't know, I did start a young family or, you know, have a young family. So when I started a family, it just became that much harder to stay. Um, having two working parents, so something had to give and here I am.

Mark (02:58)

Hmm.

Yeah. Okay. Well, I came across you, right? I was scrolling around on LinkedIn and I came across what I would call the greatest picture of a garage I've ever seen.

So this picture of the garage was so awesome that I reached out to a complete stranger and sent a message to you on LinkedIn telling you how amazing this picture was and that's how we're sitting here right now doing this podcast, a picture of a garage and the reason that picture stuck out to me was because I had just had a conversation with a client of mine and we had a few meetings, we'd knocked out some things, right? Progress, progress. We're now partnering with an outside company to handle estate planning or

Yeah, I thought we were. And what was happening was the meeting didn't get scheduled and it didn't get scheduled and it didn't get scheduled. So I reached out to my client and I said, Hey, what's, what's going on? And they said, um, well, we, we know that this is really important. The task needs to be completed, yada, yada. And then the next message they sent me said, we can't get the car in the garage. And I had no idea what that meant. I was like, we're trying to do a state planning. You can't get your car in the garage. What are we talking about? And long story short, this is a family.

They had two kids. They had a third on the way. Estate planning was of high importance for them because they didn't have it taken care of yet, but they had also just moved into a house. And the cars were stuck in the driveway because the boxes were still in the garage and hail season was starting up and they needed to get the cars into the garage, so that means they needed to get the boxes unpacked into the house. And there wasn't just an easy six step process for them to get it done. And so they locked up and they actually stopped making progress in other things.

that had nothing to do with the boxes or the garages or anything like that. And that's why your garage picture struck me was because I thought, now there's a garage that can fit a car in it. And it seemed to solve so many problems that I was thinking. And it all reminded me of a movie. Have you seen the movie, um, up in the air?

Meghan Cocchiaro (04:54)

I think I did, yeah.

Mark (04:56)

Okay. Maybe if you haven't seen it, I'll explain it. No problem. But it's, um, there's a scene where Natalie walks into the airport and she's dragging this squeaky wheeled suitcase. And Ryan, the main character, he says, do you know how much time you lose checking that luggage? And then he starts running through the math and he says, every time you check a piece of luggage, it's 35 minutes per flight. And he says he travels 270 days a year, which equates out to 157 hours, which is about seven days of time. Okay. And so he asks her the question.

Are you willing to throw away an entire week on your squeaky wheeled suitcase? And when I hear something like that, I start running through all the little tasks that are repeated in my home. Everything that ranges from mowing the lawn to doing the dishes, to cleaning the dust buildup off of the fan blades, right down to picking up the toys and putting them away so we can reclaim the floor of our house. But what I loved reading about your company was as you say, you transform the homes and lives of busy families. So they have more time for what really matters.

And so in light of that, I want to ask you, what do you think home organization is?

Meghan Cocchiaro (06:01)

So home organization, basically at the heart of it is that everything in your home has a home. So every category of stuff in your life has a place that it belongs. If you wanna go deeper than that, everything that's in your home is something that you need or use. And if it's not, you want it because you love it. So lastly, it's finding what you need when you need it easily.

So the big picture is having this logical flow to your home, having the things that you need and want, easy to access when you need to access them. That's the heart.

Mark (06:42)

see that, and that's what you communicated to me when we were talking on LinkedIn was, it was about, and that's where I got the suitcase story from is that there, there's a real cost to, if I'm trying to even just play with my son or my daughter and I can't find the toy that they want to play with, there's a time cost. And I think we all, anyone who has young children understands you've got to get, when that attention spans there, you've got to get to it ready. You got to be ready to go. And so when you're running around your house, looking for things, and I think, are you getting at the point of.

When you're trying to find something that is important to you by sorting through a bunch of stuff that isn't important to you, is that kind of what you're talking about?

Meghan Cocchiaro (07:18)

Yes, you can't get to what you need because you have all of this useless stuff crowding your space. So I save busy families time, money and stress. That's what I sell them upfront, right? There's an upfront cost to getting organized, but the payoff is this time, whether it's with your family or it's with your hobbies or your passions, it's money because you are gonna be buying less duplicates.

Food is gonna be going bad less often, and you're going to reduce stress because you're not wasting time and getting frustrated looking for things that you need, sorting through stuff that you don't in order to get to the stuff that you do. So it's really threefold.

Mark (08:04)

Hmm. Yeah. I think I talk to people about that all the time where even when somebody says, okay, we're going to buckle down and from a budget perspective, we're going to start cooking at home, but then the pantry isn't organized. And so they, they build up all this. Courage is maybe too strong of a word, but they build up the courage to finally cook a meal at home. And then they go to the pantry and find half the food's expired. And then it's when you, when you get, I guess, when you get frustrated in a new venture that quickly.

It's so easy to just give up and continue going out to eat. And then you just habituating something that you're trying to stop. Yeah. So it's, it's like, there's multiple layers. And like you said, the initial upfront costs talk a little bit about like retraining your brain to then maintain. Maybe this is where we get into the psychology of being organized because you have a really cool name for disorganization. You call it visual noise. And maybe in there, there's like multiple layers to visual noise, but what is visual noise?

Meghan Cocchiaro (09:01)

Visual noise is really clutter and things that you can see that are bothering you. So clutter doesn't mean the same thing to everyone. What's clutter to you might not be clutter to me. These books behind me might be clutter to you. And I'm an aspiring minimalist. So do I need this stuff here on the bookcase? No, most of it I don't. Some of the books I've read, some I haven't. But this is bringing me peace and joy because it's

decor for my office, right? But it's not getting in my way of anything. If it was scattered along the floor or I needed that space for something useful, it would be cluttered to me. So visual noise is really anything that's in your home, it's in your way and it's affecting you, it's making you stressed out. It can be the clutter on your kitchen countertop, which is really a big one that people just cannot seem to conquer. So anything like.

Mark (09:56)

That's my wife's biggest one. Do you know who it is? Do you know who it is that sneaks into our house and put stuff on the countertop? Cause I can't figure out who it is. We lock the doors at night, but they sneak in every night.

Meghan Cocchiaro (10:02)

Yeah. It's all your...

It's all your children. It's my kids with your kids. Yeah, and it's really just, it's anything that's affecting you and you don't want it to be there. So I consider that visual noise. Some people are not bothered by it, but these are people that are not gonna be bothered by being disorganized.

Mark (10:24)

think that is that kind of blows my mind. I'm sure that they exist and I don't want to discount them at all but it would it blows my mind that somebody wouldn't be bothered by disorganization but maybe that's just me and my wife maybe that's just how we are so let me ask you a question to make sure I'm really understanding there's a bookshelf behind you for anybody who's listening there's a bookshelf that's sitting in the background there's a plant and some books and some decorative items that I don't know the names of but I think the point is if you were looking for something you would immediately know

Yes, no, it is, or isn't on that shelf because you have intentionally put those items there. Is that kind of what you're getting at?

Meghan Cocchiaro (11:00)

Absolutely. I know where everything is in my house, whether it's by category or its specific item. My husband doesn't, but...

Mark (11:10)

That's why he has you, right?

Meghan Cocchiaro (11:11)

He has me, he says I'm always moving things, but I don't know. I guess that's just part of the trade.

Wendy (11:16)

You're moving them to the place where they belong, right, Megan?

Mark (11:17)

OOF

Meghan Cocchiaro (11:20)

Yeah, sometimes I change my mind. I said, doesn't belong there anymore. We need to move it from here to there. Or I move something once and he'll say, he'll talk about it for the next five years. The time you move that and he'll go to the old cabinet. But yeah, I know where everything is. Everything has a place. And 90% of my house, probably everything has a purpose.

Mark (11:23)

Hey.

Wendy (11:40)

Quick question, you had mentioned that, you know, people who don't mind clutter are just disorganized and okay with that. I have to disagree. I have clutter everywhere. But I hate being disorganized because it's just convenient. Like I have notebooks and journals and books that I'm reading in a newspaper and like it's

Mark (11:40)

Okay.

Meghan Cocchiaro (11:52)

Yeah.

Yeah. But then that's not clutter to you, Wendy. So I don't mean that anybody who has this clutter is disorganized. If it's okay for you, then it's your way of being organized. My mom is the same way. She has way more stuff than I would be comfortable with, but it all makes sense to her. And if it makes sense to you, that's all that matters.

Wendy (12:05)

Okay.

Mark (12:17)

you

Wendy (12:22)

Okay, great.

Mark (12:22)

Okay. See now, now we're getting into, when I was talking to you about, uh, so my wife, big, big Pinterest person loves Pinterest and we have, we have the Pinterest pantry. Okay. And when I say that, I know I don't even need to describe what I'm talking about. You already know what it looks like in your mind. Like even the listeners know what a Pinterest pantry is and it's making a lot more sense.

Because you were saying maybe that works for us, but it doesn't work for everybody. Cause I was telling you a story that we had somebody over. My wife had just accomplished this reorganization of the pantry. Everything was in glass jars. It was very well organized and it was more of a helping us with our diet and stuff like that. But we opened the pantry. We showed somebody who was a guest at our house and their response was laughter. And their only response was good luck maintaining that. Which was like, I think you're saying it didn't fit their system of organ of organization. Is that.

Meghan Cocchiaro (13:07)

Yeah.

Mark (13:16)

Is that what you think is happening there?

Meghan Cocchiaro (13:17)

100%. So I also have a Pinterest pantry. Yes, I do this for a living, but it brings me joy. And yeah, it is beautiful. It is Pinterest worthy or Instagram worthy, but at the heart of it, it has a system that works for me and my family. And I have to be able to maintain it. So there are definitely different components of each system, including a pantry, that are going to be, some are going to be higher maintenance than others.

And so when I customize systems for my clients, we go through these, this checklist. And I have questions where I get to know them and their lifestyle. So we're creating systems that are going to work for them. If they're like, I want all of my cereal decanted, which is a fancy word for pouring a box of cereal into a container and they want, you know, 10 of those across the shelf, I say, are you going to pour the box into the container every time? Now we need a bin.

for all of the leftover cereal in a bag because it didn't all quite fit in the containers, no matter what size you get, there's always gonna be a little extra. So you're talking like two, three steps now to the cereal process, and you haven't even eaten the cereal yet. So it has to make sense to that family.

Mark (14:36)

So I think what's interesting is some people are going to hear that and think, Oh my gosh, that's insane. That's way too much. I would never do that. But I hear like, praise God. Thank you for such a simple process because now with our system, right. It's glass jars, everything is labeled. And while some people feel like that sounds very serial killer ish, it's actually like now my wife can say, what do we need?

And I, with my man brain, I can walk to the pantry and I can say, well, this glass jar is empty. We need this. This glass jar is empty. We need that. This basket is supposed to have bars in it. It's like, Hey, we need the bars that go in this basket. And that's where I become a little more helpful because she is so much more organized than I am. And when she creates the organization process or the system, then I get to try to elevate up to her level, which is a much better operating plane. I will be very, I'm very forthcoming about that.

Meghan Cocchiaro (15:28)

sure it is. Yeah, it's, there is a mindset shift that's required in any of these systems as well. So if you're creating a pantry, whether it's low maintenance or high maintenance, you know, we are going to walk the family members through the new system. It's like, this is what belongs here, even if it's labeled, because like mine's labeled and not everything always gets put back in the right place, according to me, right? So you just have to learn how to use your new system and then be willing to have like a margin of error there.

Mark (15:41)

Mm-hmm.

Mm.

Yeah.

Meghan Cocchiaro (15:57)

So the other part about like what is home organization and creating these systems is that it doesn't mean that you have a tidy home 24 hours a day. It just means that when it is time to tidy up or it is time to bring groceries in from outside, you can easily and pretty quickly put things where they belong. So if your playroom's a mess or your living room is a mess with toys and someone's coming over or it's visual noise and it's driving you crazy, it is...

Mark (16:18)

Hmm.

Meghan Cocchiaro (16:27)

easy to clean up when you decide it's time to clean up. It doesn't mean you're living in this pristine home that doesn't look lived in. It just means that there are systems in place in your home so that it's easy to put things away.

Mark (16:41)

Oh, that's a really good clarification. And that's what we bump up against a lot. So we have three kids right now, the oldest is five. And when I heard you talking about visual noise, I think our kids, specifically our kids, I don't know about everybody's kids, but our kids are susceptible to visual noise, but I had never called it that. But when it starts to make sense to me is, we're at home and we're playing all day on Saturday, we're having a great time, but by the end of the day,

Everybody's in a puddle of tears, but all we did was stay home and have fun. And what I realized was that there's like a theoretical limit on the number of things that even our kids can, can take that they can visually bear. And if we don't clean up along the way, I think it actually like overwhelms them because they have, is that making sense? Is that, is there anything there?

Meghan Cocchiaro (17:33)

Yeah, I find kids get overwhelmed with playrooms and toys in general. So the more that the kids have and we give them a lot, right? They get gifts from family, from friends and from their parents. They actually lose some creativity there because they have so many things to choose from that they almost stall and they don't know what to do. So a toy rotation is one answer for that. But some of the clients that I work with, if there is really a large volume of toys.

we will actually rotate toy categories in and out. So put them away in a storage closet a month or two later, bring those back out, and it's like a whole new toy all over again. And same thing for when gifts are coming into the house. Often, you don't have to put everything out to play with right away. You can put it away for a rainy day. You can regift it too. Like you don't have to play with everything and give them everything.

Mark (18:25)

Mm-hmm. Yeah. That's a, we do the, we do, so, we don't have a super sophisticated system, but when we get certain toys, we will put stuff up at the top of the closet because our kids are way less inclined to look, you know, all the way up at the top of the closet. But then about two months later, they will just kind of be wandering around the room and they'll discover something at the top of the closet. And yeah, when we get it down, it is the coolest, best toy they've ever seen.

Even though it's their toy, they've already owned it. It's always been in the home. They had just had time to forget about it. So yeah, toy rotation is, is a big thing of what we do at our house. Now, something else that you say is that organization is an investment or organizing. I guess the act of organizing, that's an investment. And I typically don't like it when someone takes the word investment and sticks it on stuff, but that's because like when I go get my car repaired and as they're sliding me the bill and they say, here's the total for your investment, I'm thinking, just tell me.

how bad the news is. I don't need you to call it an investment to try like soften the blow, right? But after reading your website and your organization guide and reading your blog posts, I think you make a really strong case. So tell us why organ organizing is an investment from your perspective.

Meghan Cocchiaro (19:33)

organizing is an investment in either whether it's you using your own time or you're going to pay money to hire someone else to do it, whether you want to declutter and get organized at home or you want to unpack from a move. And we generally are helping people who are busy so they don't have the time and a lot of them don't have the energy or the know how of where to get started. It's very overwhelming for them. So

Mark (19:57)

Mm-hmm.

Meghan Cocchiaro (19:58)

While the cost can be, you can have a little sticker shock from outsourcing it. If you also don't have the time, you know, something has to give there. So the investment is definitely an upfront cost, but the payoff is later. So like I mentioned before, you're going to save time, money, and stress. If you take the time and money now to put these systems in place, to start with a clean slate, declutter, get organized.

Learn these new systems and use them in your life going forward.

Mark (20:30)

Okay. Yeah. So the now, now there's a lot of overlap between what you do and what I do where, you know, at a certain point for certain people, it seems like there is a necessity to outsource some of our things for you, it would be home organization. For me, it is financial advising, financial planning. Those are things that people can conceive of for maybe lack the skills to implement. Um, now when somebody goes, okay, fine. I'm ready to go. Uh, I'm ready to hire a professional.

Are there any quick criteria around, like, are you just, hey, I need to find somebody that has a system that you appreciate or someone you enjoy talking to. Is there like a quick way to go about hiring a professional and finding the right person?

Meghan Cocchiaro (21:12)

Yeah, so home organizing can be very personal. While my particular clients are very busy and I often, 90% of the time, I'm actually not working with them. They're either working from home and they're extremely busy or they're working outside of the home. There's still a relationship that is going on and there's communication with them during the whole process. So you wanna make sure it's someone that you vibe with. You're not gonna do business with someone you don't know, like or trust anyway.

So you need to be able to picture this person in your home, trust them in your home, but trust their vision. So understand that each organizer has a different process for how they are going to go about tackling your organizing projects, the same way that you would hire a home contractor to do a renovation or build you something. So you wanna make sure that you like them, you trust them, get a sense for how they work on projects.

And then costs are going to vary. So each per each organizer is going to have different ways that they sell their hours or their services. And some of them are going to be all inclusive. Others are going to have fees added onto them. So you just want to get a good comprehensive view of what is included in the service, how many spaces are you going to be tackling in your home? And on top of that, there are organizers that have different specialties. So.

My company, we will organize any space in your home, your residential home, but we tend to focus on busy women, professional women, and families. Most have two working parents. Like, people are just busy and overwhelmed. So there's going to be different niches from different organizers. You can find someone who specializes in digital organizing. You can find someone who specializes in downsizing. So seniors who are downsizing, maybe.

Hoarding is a specialty in and of itself. So it's one of the most common questions I get as an organizer, like, Oh, do you work with hoarders? There it's so much more than that. And I want to say like hoarding is a, is a specialty. It's a mental disability. Like there's a lot more things going into a project like that. And so being a professional, I have access to a network of professionals. So I, if I'm not a good fit for the job, I can find someone who is. And so.

you want to find an organizer who would do that as well. If I'm out of somebody's budget or outside, I just don't think we're a good fit, then I will help them or offer to help them find someone who is.

Mark (23:43)

Okay. But maybe the first step before somebody picks up a phone or sends an email is at least like walk around your house and every time you see something and you're like, Oh, write that down, like make a list of all the things that exasperate you about your existing situation. Is that like a, is that a good way to go about it?

Meghan Cocchiaro (23:59)

Yeah, definitely identifying your pain points is a great place to start, whether you're doing it yourself or you're gonna hire a professional.

But part of hiring a professional, when I talk you through the consultation process, like you might tell me the problem is ABC, and when I hear what you're saying, the problem is really X, Y, Z. So it's like, I know how to pull those things out and find out what the real problem is. Like...

You might say it's the pantry and it's not the pantry, it's the garage because that's where the overflow from the pantry is, you know? So it's, I look at it from a whole home perspective, always.

Mark (24:38)

Okay, so yeah, there's even more overlap than I thought in what we do because a lot of times, there's two sides of my coin where it's, I hear you, right, and we can take all the information, we can put it in the calculator, and I can give you the answer down to the fifth decimal point. But then there's another, the other side of the coin is we're gonna close the laptop, and we're gonna talk like real people, and we're gonna talk about the things that bother you, and the limitations you have about implementing the solutions. There's a lot more overlap between.

what you do and what I do than I thought there was. Even you use the word holistic, I guess the word I use all the time, like holistic financial planning. So that's super cool. As we start to wind down here, what are a few easy wins that somebody could use to get started? If somebody wanted to listen to this podcast and then just see is getting organized even something I'm interested in, what is just a quick win? One or two things that somebody could try to do to improve their current situation and figure out if this is a bigger journey they're ready to start.

Meghan Cocchiaro (25:29)

So a few quick things that you can ask yourself if you are wanting to get organized and you're not sure if you can do it yourself or hire someone, right? That's what you were asking. First, you have to be real with yourself. Do you have the time to do it? And do you have the time to do it to the level that you want it done?

Mark (25:40)

Yes.

Meghan Cocchiaro (25:52)

And if the answer is no, then you kind of have to suck it up and hire someone. Um, if these are tasks that you're like, yeah, I could do that. It, can you put it on a calendar? Can you say, okay, I'm going to tackle the, you know, the garage in April and I'm going to tackle the basement in May. Like, are these realistic smart goals that you know, are actually attainable for you and you can kind of go from there. If there are things that you can do at home yourself, I mean, really quick wins, like declutter the junk drawer.

Everybody has one or a few. Or the hallway closet. If it's connected to the mudroom, like once you declutter the closet, often we get the motivation to move on to the next space because it feels so good. So always starting small and sticking to one category at a time as well. If you're gonna do books, do books. Don't do books in the middle of doing all your memorabilia, right?

memorabilia, cards, mementos, these things, I always say for last, they take the most time. So it's a lot of micro organizing and you wanna tackle the bigger stuff. And then once you have that under your belt, you feel good. Then you can handle the smaller nitty gritty things.

Mark (27:07)

Okay. That's really good. I wouldn't have thought of any of that, but that's, that's really, you make a really good argument there if that's a good way to go about it. And I think you did just tell me. I need to just finally hire somebody to fix my sprinklers because I've been on a multi-year journey of trying to get the sprinklers fixed around my house. Um, but it's not on my calendar and I'm not making progress. It sounds like by those criteria, what you said, I need to hire that out. So, uh, I guess I'll quit Chasing sprinklers around the yard.

Meghan Cocchiaro (27:33)

Home organizing is a new industry, but it's not so new anymore. So a lot of people are still learning about it. And some have, you know, just misconceptions or preconceived notions about what it is. And so I'd love to just talk about it as much as I can and educate people because you can outsource home organizing the same way you would hire a landscaper or someone to come clean your home. I have someone come clean my home. I'm a great organizer and I like to be tidy and I like to declutter.

Mark (27:54)

Mm-hmm.

Meghan Cocchiaro (28:03)

and I hate to clean. And so we can't do everything. And I outsource the things that I don't wanna do. Yeah.

Mark (28:07)

Okay, that is interesting.

Man, I like that clear cut line. All right. Well, as we close up, listeners of our show will probably have guessed that your name isn't actually Jordan. Okay. Your name, your name is Megan and your name is Megan. Kokiaro. You're in a company called organized by Meg. You provide home organization services to people, I think maybe in the, in the, in the mountain region, but I think you also work with people virtually. Can you tell us more about that service? And then let us know if somebody thinks, wow, I need Megan's help. How do people get hold of you?

Meghan Cocchiaro (28:40)

Sure. Yeah, I do in-home services in the Denver metropolitan area, but I do virtual consultations or DIY consultations. And they're usually about an hour at a time. So I can help walk you through your home and come up with a DIY plan, and just learn your overall goals and see how I can help you take on some of the work yourself. Also, if you are looking for an in-home organizer in your area, I would be happy to give you the resources.

of kind of where to start with that because that can be overwhelming too. You know, if you just go to Google and you might find a hundred. So I'm happy to help in any way I can, whether it's virtually or in home. And the best way to find me is on my website. That's www.

Mark (29:28)

Okay. Awesome. Well, thank you for your time today, Megan. And listeners, if you're ready to take action on getting organized, Megan's contact info is going to be in the show notes. If you're ready to take action on your finances, then there's going to be my contact info in the show notes and always feel free to reach out. I've got resources. I'm trying to spread a little financial literacy around with the podcast, but we look forward to it. And Wendy, I think that about wraps us up here.

Wendy (29:53)

All right, fascinating episode. Thank you, Megan. Thank you, Mark. A lot of great information, and thank you for listening today. Please like, follow, and share this podcast with your friends. Until next time, I'm Wendy McConnell.

ProudMouth (30:09)

Thank you for joining us on The Quiet Part. If you found value in our journey today, please subscribe and stay updated on future episodes. Check the links in the show notes to learn more about Second Comma or discuss working together. Remember, The Quiet Part is more than a podcast. It's a journey towards understanding the deeper aspects of our lives. It's about saying the quiet part out loud. Click the follow button and be part of the conversation about uncovering the unspoken. Lastly, here's some important information for our listening audience to know.

The opinions voiced in this episode are for general information only and are not intended to provide specific advice or recommendations to any individual or entity. Any depictions made in this podcast are hypothetical only. For a comprehensive review of your personal situation consult with your financial or tax advisor before investing. Cetera does not provide any tax or legal advice. Securities and advisory services are offered through Cetera Advisor Networks LLC, member FINRA SIPC, a broker dealer and registered investment advisor.

Cetera is under separate ownership from any other named entity. Neither the co -host nor its guests are affiliated with Cetera Advisor Networks LLC. Any information they provide is unrelated to Satara Advisor Networks LLC or its registered representative. Mark Hansen, Financial Planner, 275 Wood, Teakwood Lane, Plano, Texas, 75075.