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Things are getting to the point where they are kind of ridiculous, so I've
been considering Storage Space rental as an option for managing my miniatures.

If any of you have experience with public storage in general (or public
storage of miniatures specifically) I'm curious as to what the ins and outs
of choosing the right space are.

Thanks in advance.

We had to put our entire household into storage for a deployment a couple years ago. Ultimately, we got one that was "climate controlled" (read, it had a heater function, and a little bit of insulation on the side walls)

No matter what you go with, you'll want something that you can cover your stuff up with. We got back from 15 months in Iraq, and there was this reddish brown dust over EVERYTHING... most of our stuff was good because I bought painters drop cloths to throw over most of it, but there were still a few things that we had to toss.

Obviously, location is a huge deal. Ours was a little out of the way, but in a location where break-ins hadn't happened in 20 years, whereas a storage lot that we looked at, had had break-ins in the last 2 months.

The size of the unit you want will in many cases determine what sort of door you have. Smaller units will have a standard door, while many larger units will have the garage door style. If you are using an entirely indoor storage facility, you may have a double door, instead of the garage style, but the ceiling with be steel cabling, to prevent anyone from climbing over their unit into anothers.

My club has one.

We have 19 boards and terrain for all of them - and we use them all maybe twice a year for our large tourneys (30-50 players).
We use about a bit over half of them for the smaller ones (20-24 players).

The rest of the time, we can't fit them all into our venue, and we don't need more than 6 tables at a regular meet. None of our members have a garage or shed with sufficient space for all of it, so we went with a lockup near the venue for our major tourney (44-50 players 40k) that fits it all in.

We charge a fee every meeting ($5 for juniors (under 18) and $10 for >=18. It costs us $40 to hire our venue per meeting, and excess funds raised go to pay for our lockup or into the club account to underwrite our tournaments or to pay for stuff for the club).

I've had family who have them. If your specially using it for storing minatures, the above posters highlight important stuff

-climate control, just keeps stuff safer

-internal storage. i'll use this as a catch all. consider army cases with drop clothes over top of them. Home Depot sells cheap plastic covers for painting, they'd be perfect. goto ikea or walmart, get some cheap plastic easy to put up / down shelving. avoid clutter / just throwing stuff in

-ease of access. a family member had one at a 24 / 7 access with a key card. it was great. my roommate had one you could only access 9-5 and closed on holidays, that sucked. he was a gamer and kept some stuff there. his storage was cheap and safe, but near unaccessible if he forgot something on a weekend.

I am renting a storeroom in a Big Yellow Storage to keep about 20 packing crates of stuff out of my too small rented flat.

The big downsides are that you have to pay, and the stuff is impossible to get at without a car journey.

At Big Yellow the storage rooms are about 10 feet tall, like walk in closets with no shelves, made of corrugated steel sheet.

You will want to stack the boxes up as high as possible, since the floor area is what determines the monthly fee. You also want to stack boxes with the most efficient packing density, and be able to identify and retrieve stuff easily. If your storeroom is completely filled, you have to get boxes out and put them on your trolley when looking for the box you need. It's like a game of Tetris.

As mentioned above, there are some companies that offer 24/7 access, which is very convenient. At Big Yellow you have to be a member for six months before you get 24/7 access, however you can transfer your access rights to another Big Yellow warehouse if you have to move.

The main advice I would give is;

Pick a reputable company with a facility as near by as possible.
Pack everything you can into standard size cardboard cartons with bubble wrap. I used 14 inch cartons which are easy to fit in a car, etc. If there is something over size you can tape two cartons together.
Label the boxes clearly on several sides.
Keep an accurate record of the contents.
Mix up the contents (books, model kits, DVDs, etc) to avoid any boxes being particularly heavy.

While this is a disadvantage when you want to retrieve stuff out of several boxes, it helps a lot with moving and stacking the boxes.

You will also have to pay for insurance, so you need to decide how accurately you record the contents on the handed in forms.

In the unlikely case of a fire destroying your stuff, you will need accurate and truthful records to make a claim.

As a general question whenever the question of renting storage comes up, I always ask: do you plan to use the stuff in question in the next year? In the next five?

If you have stuff that you use regulalry but just can't fit at home (terrain being a great example if you live in an apartment), than storage is a great bet.

If you just have a ton of stuff and don't want to get rid of it, storage is just enabling your behavior.

This isn't to be judgmental, I just know a lot of people paying to store stuff that they could have sold and rebought three to four years later for cheaper.

If you decide that you really want storage, than things like space size, climate control, and security are more or less set by what you want. The question becomes one of access: how close is the facility, and how often can you get to your space?

As proximity and availability both increase, so does cost (unless you live in the outskirts of a metro area). How bad do you need access? If you're storing stuff that you plan on bringing out once a month for events, you might want to pay for a close by, 24/7 operation. If you plan on using stuff once or twice a year, than you can easily give in on one of the two. If you plan on putting stuff away for a year or more, than just go for the cheapest.

Would I be enabling my behavior?

No question at all

I have a storage unit, primarily for car parts but I kept my terrain boards and some minis in there as well. During the flooding caused by Hurricane Irene this past August, the storage site was utterly inundated.

With the exception of my terrain boards, most of my warhammer stuff was in rubbermaid containers, which quite remarkably kept the water out. The single exception was one container, full of model railroading stuff, that was knocked off it's stack, likely by a toppled whitewall tire. It opened just enough for water to seep in, and when the water receded, the water couldn't drain out of the otherwise watertight rubbermaid. It was ruined by the time I could get out there, about a week later.

Moral of the story: Make sure your valuables are in airtight containers, to keep out dust, bugs, and floodwaters.

A few years ago I had the duty to empty and liquidate my older step brother's storage lockers after he passed away.

First, let me tell you to make sure another family member or responsible person knows where your facility is and where the keys are, both were major hurdles for me.
Next, I'll tell you to pay rent a month or two ahead just in case something happens. I got there a few days before the contents were to be sold, and had to pay the back rent in order to even be told which locker the stuff was in. Turns out there were two, so I paid another months rent for both in order to properly inventory the contents before selling them. Also paid to have the locks removed and new ones installed so I would have access.

The first one, both were 1 car garage sized, was full of general household stuff and lawn tools which went to a huge yard sale.

The second was filled floor to ceiling and wall to wall with old millitary miniature playsets, which he had collected. MARX, Barszo, Ideal, Airfix, and others, some partial, some still unopened. Plus boxes of loose figures and terrain.
It took days to sort it all. A few things I remembered from when we were kids were there as well, as I dug in deeper I found old American Flyer train sets and buildings from Christmas tree trainyards long ago. Memories.
I should mention that all this sorting and counting took place in February in near Zero temperatures. It was not fun.
Eventually I found Two dealers, one who specialised in trains and one who dealt with toy soldiers, who gave me a fair price for the lot and assisted with hauling it away. Many truckloads.
The money all went to his estate, which was quickly vaporized by funeral and hospital expenses. The stuff had been worth some money but it turns out the total worth of it all was about equal to Twenty years worth of storage rent.

The moral of all this is that there is such a thing as having too many toys. Before you go into storage, do some soul searching and see if you can't part with some of your stuff.
Sell or donate the things you can't see yourself touching again within Five years or so. Someone will eventually be glad you did.

I think it's easy when stuff is in storage to consider it "taken care of." Meaning, you don't run into it, it's not in the way, and you're not reminded of it. Combine that with the natural hoarding instinct we all have ("hey, this could totally be useful some day!") and you can spend a lot of money just to own stuff you don't use.

When I was a teenager I used to clear out my room every year and whatever I dug out that I hadn't thought about for six months I would throw away.

Polonius wrote:I think it's easy when stuff is in storage to consider it "taken care of." Meaning, you don't run into it, it's not in the way, and you're not reminded of it. Combine that with the natural hoarding instinct we all have ("hey, this could totally be useful some day!") and you can spend a lot of money just to own stuff you don't use.

I think this is why I haven't moved anything to storage yet(well, that and the cost).

I'm really trying to fight the hoarder mentality and start to let go of the excess GW stuff I don't need and never use. May also do it with my older PotF II Star Wars stuff.

I have hard time letting go of painted models

Not sure where you live Malf, but i'd make sure it has climate control.
In Ok., it gets freakin' hot in the summer. Things can get warped in the heat
here. Personal experience. first i was like , then , then and
finally ended back at .

Platuan4th wrote:I'm really trying to fight the hoarder mentality and start to let go of the excess GW stuff I don't need and never use. May also do it with my older PotF II Star Wars stuff.

It feels good to let go. I've got rid of so much that I thought I needed to cling on to. I'm a terrible hoarder. But I was never going to have time for it. Now it's gone I don't feel a hole where it used to be.


I would say that anyone looking at putting things into storage needs to seriously consider if they really need any of it. Unless there's very good reason, such as temporarily moving abroad, putting things into storage is just a way to hoard and it costs money.

What kind of prices are we looking at?

As an ex GW worker, I went from 2 bins of GW stuff to about 20. I'm currently churning through stuff, getting it painted and then either put on display or stored in a case, but the bins have to go. Almost all of it will be built and used, but right now it's taking up space and I want to get it out....

But I'm also looking at the storage cost vs the get rid of it/buy it again cost

option 3: Make a game table out of Storage Bins

From what I know, you're looking at ~50 USD per month for the smallest size unit (like a 5x5).

I couldn't justify spending an extra 50 per month (up to 100-200 without trouble) on the hobby just to keep things.

I'd say first look into better space-saving storage solutions to keep them in your house and stack in a closet. How many mini's are we really talking here?

I've painted an average of 500 miniatures a year the past three years.

I can see this becoming a problem in the near future.

malfred wrote:I've painted an average of 500 miniatures a year the past three years.

I can see this becoming a problem in the near future.

I can see it now.

Hoarders: The Malfred files!

i'm just picturing one of those storage auction shows getting malfs unit, and then spending the second half of the episode getting it all identied and priced by some "expert"

Yeeaaaap!

(me too! was thinking about that last night in regards to this thread)

Semi off topic: I did briefly consider a storage myself for some of my warhammer stuff. I formerly lived with a fellow gamer which is both awesome and hindering at the same time. Its awesome because likely you'll always have a game, you are around someone who automatically gets what your into. Its hindering because likely it will fuel your gaming spending. I found I love warmachine / hordes, however it was just to easy to make and excuse to buy another army.

Upon getting married / combining households I realized I had way to much warhammer stuff. 40k (necrons, space marines, eldar, guard, chaos space marines, demons, orks) WFB (skaven, dwarves, elves, demons, chaos mortals, orcs), plus Warmachine / Hordes (cygnar, skorne, loads of random models).

One weekend when she was away I pulled out EVERY army in my living room. I realized the 40K armies were all over 4000 pts, each WFB army was over 3000. I had to sit and think if I needed it.. i realized i didn't. It sucked. HORRIBLY. I realized I had to shed weight.

So I sold lots of armies. I'm now down to
40k~ Orks / Gobos. SM Bikes. Chaos SM.
WFB~ Skaven. Dwarves. Demon being re-based. Trying to sell Elves.

Point is: think about what you actually use / need. I had multiple GT calibre armies, but spent have the time lending them out not using them. I sold some, 1 I gave away to the guy who just kept on borrowing it.

I personally have an extra closet in my home dedicated to game stuff, and feel very lucky having it.

I don't know if you live in an apartment or home, but if you have the yard space I would recommend buying a personal storage shed. They aren't that expensive to pay off, about the same price per month as a storage unit, and you own it. Put whatever lock on the door you want and it's within shooting range at night. You can hide whatever you want in it, models, Christmas decorations, bodies. And unless you constantly have people in your back yard no one will notice the smell!

An added benefit if weather is pleasant where you live you can set up a game table in it if you get a bigger one.

I wish a storage shed was an option. My neighborhood
isn't the safest, and i'd worry about security all the tme.
Plus, climate control would be an issue.

I know. I'll buy a second house.

malfred wrote:

I know. I'll buy a second house.

Or go 15mm lands, that will buy you some time before you reach a critical point

Trimming down the fats of my 28mm's is what I have been doing because lets face it, they are not a necessity for me.

Do houses have lofts in the USA?

malfred wrote:I know. I'll buy a second house.

I know you're joking, but last year, someone here in the Springs put an auction on eBay for his Transformers collection.

He'd rented a second 1-bedroom apartment because the collection was too large for his actual apartment(and he was still able to cover every inch along the walls of the entire apartment with overfilled shelving units).

malfred wrote:I have hard time letting go of painted models

Well, normally I agree that painted stuff is the last thing to get rid of.

I'd still ask the question: even painted, are you likely to use those models?

I regret getting rid of my Vietnam stuff, even though it went to a good home. I'm also a bit sad to have got rid of my Judge Dredd models. Both things can be fairly easily replaced, though.

I don't regret getting rid of a large amount of stuff I can't remember because it really was never used. (Role Master for an example.)

Also worth noting that a lot of this stuff is worth something to someone. I got over £700 for all my old wargame and RPG stuff that I sold on eBay.