Garage StuffPeople find many uses for their garage, besides storing their vehicles and working on them. It is not uncommon to see it being used to store miscellaneous things that can’t be stored inside the house, like household tools, gardening equipment, children’s toys, electrical tools, empty cardboard boxes, and the garbage. If you’re having a tough time making space for all of these in your garage, here are a few tips to make your garage an effective workplace and storage area.

Pegboards

When you want your tools to be easily reachable, but you can’t afford the floor space needed to store them, using pegboards is a good option. Peg boards enable walls to be an efficient storage space for your tools. By installing peg boards on your walls with appropriately spaced hooks, to rest your tools on, you can free up floor space for other things like a workbench or perhaps an additional vehicle.

Getting hooks of the right length and strength will allow you to customize the boards to store hand and power tools of all sizes, cables, and ropes, and even your bicycle. You can also attach bins and baskets onto the boards to hold smaller things like nuts, bolts, and tool-bits.

Cabinets

Once you have the pegboards in place, use the remaining upper wall space to install lockable cabinets. Such cabinets are ideal for storing hazardous chemical products such as batteries, engine oil, brake fluid, cleaning solvents, lighter fluid, etc. away from the reach of children and pets. You can use the lower wall area to build cabinets that hold heavier and larger objects, while also offering a counter-like work space on top of the cabinets. You may want to make the cabinets weatherproof so that your supplies are stored in their recommended conditions.

Ceiling storage

When you’re short of both floor and wall space, consider ceiling storage if possible. If your garage has rafters, you can lay wooden boards across them to create a good storage space for objects that need to be used occasionally, such as broken household or vehicle parts waiting to be disposed, spare tires, tubes, rims, step ladders, etc. Make sure to reinforce the rafters if you intend to store heavy objects. Alternatively, if you have attic storage above your garage, you can install a folding staircase which allows easy access and retrieval from the attic compared to using a ladder.

Shelves

As an alternative to installing cabinets, you can put in shelves suited to your needs. Just as cabinets, these can be customized to store a wide range of objects, from tools to household and garden supplies. They are readily available in most home improvement and hardware stores, some specialized for garage use.

Consider modular and mobile shelving. This allows you to expand or shrink storage capacity according to your needs, while also allowing you to move the storage units across the garage to your convenience.