How to make a home inventory list

What a home inventory list is for

A home inventory is a list of what you own, room by room, with photos. It’s worth having:

• For your home insurance, whether you own or rent. After a fire, a theft or a flood, you have to say what was lost when you file a claim, and your insurer may ask for proof of ownership and value. A list made calmly beforehand, with photos, is worth far more than one made from memory afterward.
• For a rental. A record of what the place has, and the condition it’s in, made when you move in and checked when you move out. It protects both sides.
• For a move, to know what you’re taking and what arrives.
• For yourself, so you stop buying what you already have.

What to put on your home inventory list

For each item:

• what it is, with enough detail to tell it apart — for example, “side-by-side fridge-freezer,” not “fridge”;
• the room it’s in;
• a photo — or several for anything of value: the whole thing, the make and model, the serial number;
• its condition, especially for a rental: new, used, scratched or marked;
• the approximate value and the purchase date, for insurance;
• where the receipt or warranty is.

All these columns, with the rooms and the most common household items already written in, are in our free home inventory template. It’s a spreadsheet that opens in Excel, LibreOffice, Numbers and Google Sheets, so you can use it as a home inventory form for insurance or create your own list from it.

How to do a home inventory, room by room

One room at a time, always in the same order: from the door inward, clockwise. Big things first — furniture and appliances — then what’s inside the closets and cabinets.

Take the photos before you write anything. A photo is quick and keeps details a list doesn’t; the descriptions can wait until you’re sitting down.

Don’t forget what isn’t on view: the basement, the garage, the attic, a storage unit, jewelry, sports equipment, tools.

Rental inventory: the move-in checklist

When you rent, the inventory usually takes the form of a move-in checklist — sometimes called a condition report — listing the furniture, appliances and fixtures and the condition of each, ideally signed by both you and the landlord. A few dated photos help a lot at the end of the lease, when the place is checked against the list. Which form to use, and what it should say, is something to confirm with whoever handles the lease.

Where to keep your home inventory list

Away from the home it describes — a list kept in a drawer that burns in a fire is no use to anyone. Keep a digital copy, on your phone or in cloud storage, and if you can, share it with someone else in the household.

And update it when you buy something of value. A list that’s two years old is a list with holes in it.