Storage Unit Thugs

Due to our small apartment size, we've been renting a storage unit for several years. We don't have a ton of extra stuff, but being able to keep a little bit offsite greatly reduces my mental load. Since I have ADHD, keeping spaces clearer is a priority for me so I don’t go absolutely batty.

What I've learned is that storage companies run on a mafia-like business model. They advertise low introductory rates, and you do all the work to move your shit into the storage unit. Then, once you’re nicely ensconced, they jack up the rate. Then they jack it up again. The vibe is kinda like the mob: Nice stuff ya got there….be a shame if something happened to it. They know how much of a pain in the ass it is for you to move your stuff, so you stay and eat the cost.

In my case, I used each of these insults as motivation to further declutter. The less I had, the less stuck I felt. So, with my long-suffering spouse’s help, we painfully went through a ton of stuff and gradually winnowed it down to smaller and smaller amounts, until we were able to afford an extremely cheap unit in the hinterlands of the Bay Area (El Sobrante, to be specific).

Now, however, even that storage place is jacking up their prices. They sent me a notice that they’re going to more than double their rate. I pushed back, and now they’re “only” going to increase it by like 75% instead. In the meantime, I tried to appeal to their sense of long-term profits — We hope to move abroad, and we really want a place where we can lock in our rates for a year or two, can you do that?

Not only can they not do that, they are completely uninterested in trying to compete for business that way — because they don’t have to. It looks like there are precisely zero storage companies that offer an annual rate. If one were to break ranks, the others would be forced to compete with that obviously better deal — but instead, all of these companies collude to absolutely screw over the customer.

So, it’s kind of an interesting conundrum. In the short term, my spouse and I have options: we can always switch between us to close one account and open another new one. It does involve some schlepping and fees to open a new unit, but with minimal belongings, it can work out.

But what about if we move overseas? If rates explode once we’re abroad, it could easily become a tricky scenario.

So, while we’re planning everything out, that’s another thing we’re going to be trying to plan around: not only how much we can afford to store — but how much we can afford to store if they decide to jack us around. And while I would love to say that’s an excuse to get rid of everything, I don’t think that’s realistic — even in the best case scenario where we moved permanently, we’d store our things for 6-12 months while we got settled, before shipping them over.

But paring them down to the absolute bare essentials is going to be an absolute must. Because we’re not just storing them, we’re handing over our belongings to the storage mafia.