I love Craigslist. It's such a convenient way to get rid of things that you don't need. Every once in a while I'll go through our stuff and look for things that are unused, outdated, or just altogether not needed. A quick posting on Craigslist or eBay with a few detailed pictures and descriptions are all that is needed to get people emailing you to see if the item is still available.

Things that don't sell on Craigslist usually end up going to Goodwill or the Salvation Army. Sure all of this takes a little more work than just leaving the thing in a closet, or on a shelf, but a nice little benefit is that you also get some extra cash (or at least a nice tax deduction) out of it.

The biggest benefit though for me is that we clear our house of things that would just clutter it up. At the end of the day, you can rest assured that you are not a Hoarder. CNN.com today reported on this phenomenon of people being unable to part with their possessions. Earlier this year, a fire broke out in an El Paso woman's house, but because of the massive amount of stuff in her house she was unable to exit her house, nor were first responders able to get in her house to free her.

Dr. James L. Abelson says that "People who collect papers, newspapers, bills, magazines believe there might be some piece of information that someday might be useful to have." I think like that sometimes, but for me if I haven't used something in a few years, chances are I never will. This was the case with Carolyn's old Kriss Kross CD I recently threw out. I recently sold Carolyn's old Dell laptop on Craigslist for $100. Sure it was still working, but we already have two modern computers in our house, and another slightly older laptop. In the end, the stuff goes to someone else who might need it more than us, our house becomes a bit less cluttered, and we also get a little bit of cash out of it.

*Apologies to Kriss Kross for throwing out their album, "Totally Krossed Out".