You know exactly what you want to wear to the Bears game on Sunday: that favorite winter sweater, which you neatly stored away in the closet seven months ago. So why isn’t it where you put it? It didn’t disappear; it’s just buried under all the odds and ends that got thrown on top of the neatly stored winter clothes over the summer.
Living in an apartment, it sometimes seems easier to shove books and mementos into the closet than to figure out where they’ll fit in the living room. But things tend to accumulate quickly and, before you know it, there’s not an empty shelf or drawer in your place.
Where else can you put it all?
Storage is a continuing challenge for most apartment dwellers, who have to squeeze most of their belongings into the limited closet space provided by loft, studio, one- or two-bedroom apartments.
Where can you find the space to stash things, so the apartment isn’t so cluttered? The answer for some renters is a locker inside their building and, today, many are seeking self-storage.
“People always ask if the building has storage,” says Peter Lazzari, president of Visual Properties, a Chicago-based rental service. “It’s not at the top of their criteria when choosing an apartment, but when push comes to shove, it’s a key factor in the decision-making process.”
Storage lockers are available in most Chicago-area apartment buildings, with each unit assigned a space, typically for free, except the renter buys the padlock. Vintage buildings tend to have makeshift wooden or wire cages in the basement; modern buildings, such as mid- and high-rises, offer residents wooden or wire cages or closet-like storage in various locations throughout the building.
Lockers usually range in size from 4-by-4-feet to 6-by-6-feet, allowing residents a place to store bulky or nonessential items they don’t want in the apartment.
“Over 90 percent of renters use the storage locker provided by the building,” says Ray Fleischer, property manager of Parliament Enterprises Ltd., which manages 30 vintage apartment properties in the Chicago area. “They’re storing things they don’t necessarily want to keep in their closets.”
For Drew Thiel, who moved to a Lincoln Park midrise in September, a storage locker was a big factor in choosing the apartment he leased.
“I have snow tires that I don’t want to keep in my apartment,” says Thiel. “So, I had to live in a building where I could put them in storage.”
Common things squirreled away in storage lockers are items people tend to pull out on occasion, such as suitcases, seasonal clothes, holiday decorations or tools. Also found stockpiled in storage are nostalgic memorabilia, such as old magazines, vinyl records and books.
Building managers say people in their 20s who are renting their first apartment don’t always move in with many possessions. Soon, though, the apartment fills up, as people settle in and amass more knickknacks. When closets and provided storage lockers become crammed with boxes and unused kitchen gadgets, more and more apartment dwellers are finding self-storage the answer to alleviating their space problems.
“Thirty-four percent of apartment renters use self-storage,” says Robert L. Brown, executive director of the Self Storage Association, a Cincinnati-based industry trade association. “People are storing items they no longer had room for, such as seasonal clothes and furniture.”
Ten years ago, the image of self-storage was a dark and dirty warehouse located in the middle of nowhere. Today, self-storage has grown into a booming industry with sophisticated storing and security systems and locations as convenient as fast-food restaurants.
“The Chicago area is a hot storage market,” says Patti Parrish, marketing manager of Shurgard Storage Centers Inc., a Seattle-based real estate investment trust that owns 11 storage centers in the Chicago area. “The demand for facilities parallels the growth in apartment buildings throughout the area and the demand for convenience.”
Costs for self-storage vary, depending on the size of the space and location of the facility. Like apartment renting, storage renting requires signing ta lease and paying monthly rent. Sizes range from small enough to fit some boxes of papers to large enough to fit a boat or car.
Generally, monthly prices range from $25 to $59 for a 5-by-5-foot unit, to $60 to $90 for a 5-by-10-foot unit, to more than $125 for a large-sized unit. Though it’s an additional cost to one’s apartment budget, prices are minimal compared to the alternative.
“It’s cheaper to rent a one-bedroom apartment and outside storage than it is to rent a two-bedroom apartment, using the extra bedroom to store everything,” notes Drew Whitney, editorial director of Inside Self-Storage, a Phoenix-based trade publication that follows trends in the self-storage industry. “Apartment renters use the storage unit as the garage, attic or basement they don’t have.”
Dennis Ambrose, who has lived in his one-bedroom, three-closet Chicago apartment for 9 years, is famous among his friends and neighbors for his December holiday parties. He uses a nearby self-storage facility as his attic to store hundreds of ornaments, decorations and 10,702 colored lights for his annual fete.
“As the years went by, I accumulated so much stuff in my closets that I didn’t have any more room,” says Ambrose, who pays $36 a month for his storage unit. “Since I only use the party goods once a year, it made sense to put that stuff in self-storage and save my closet space for the things I need every day.”
Ambrose and other self-storage renters say they feel their personal property is safe in storage because the customers provide their own locks, and the facilities enforce security measures to protect their possessions, usually with cameras, alarms and locked fences.
“It’s not just an empty space,” says Brian Ruthsatz, regional manager of Public Storage Inc., which has 19 self-storage facilities in Chicago and 46 in the suburbs. “It’s a cost-effective way to keep your apartment clutter-free and your belongings safe and secure.”
Apartment industry and self-storage experts identify the most frequent users of self-storage facilities as people who moved from a house into an apartment and those who are in transition, including people who rent an apartment before buying a home or while their house is under construction.
“Self-storage is event-driven,” says Tracy Sells, director of administration of Storage USA Inc., a Memphis-based real estate investment trust of self-storage facilities. “Some life-changing event caused the need for storage, such as moving from a house to an apartment or a job transfer.”
For Roberta Sanford, who moved from a house in Massachusetts to a one-bedroom apartment in Palatine, self-storage was the answer to preserving the things that hold sentimental value to her.
“I couldn’t fit a house full of belongings into my apartment,” says Sanford. “I decided to use self-storage to tuck away special things I didn’t want to get rid of, such as my mother’s dishes.” Sanford pays $31 a month to stash part of her treasures away in a safe place while items for her day-to-day needs remain in her apartment.
“When you have an apartment, you have to decide where to divide your life because your space is so limited,” explains Sanford. So, when people ask her where she puts her life’s worth of possessions, she tells them, “Half my life is in storage.”
