Mary Novaria

We  have too much stuff. I’m not saying YOU do--although it appears that Americans, in general, have too much stuff. Most of us can just look in our basements, garages or attics (please don’t look in my closet!) to see that it’s true. Yuuup! He's King of the Castle Did you know there’s actually a trade association for operators of self-storage facilities? You know, those one-story concrete buildings dotting the landscape with acres of bright blue or orange garage doors confined behind chain link fences and razor wire?  There are now roughly 50,000 of these places in the United States, which the Self Storage Association says generated nearly $22.5 billion in gross revenues last year. The association reports that one in 10 US households rents a unit in a self-storage facility—a 65 percent increase over the last 15 years! Yuuup!* We recently rented a nifty 10-by-10 space so we wouldn’t look like hoarders when our house went on the market. This adventure also included re...