Clearing a house is a daunting prospect, especially when the person whose house you are clearing has passed away.  From clearing each room to garden clearance, garages or attics, it can be a big project and you need an organised approach to make it easier.  Here are some tips from the experts…

Schedule some time

The fact is, it will take time to complete comprehensive house clearances.  Experts say that it usually takes two people half a day to do each room in the house.  So if there are eight rooms you need to leave at least four days to do the job.  Some rooms will take more work, others less but it is best to leave yourself more time than you need so you don’t add more pressure on yourselves.

Have a system in place

After time, the next more important thing to decide on is a system to categorise everything.  This may need to wait until probate valuation has been conducted and if so, the company handling it may offer to buy items of value that you don’t want to keep yourself.  Once the goods valuations are out of the way you can start to categorise what’s left.

A basic traffic light system can work with each item getting a sticker that dictates where it will go:

• Red – keep
• Amber – donate or sell
• Green – get rid of

The aim is to have as much in the amber category as possible and only use the green where there is no possible use for the item.  And even then, you may be able to recycle lots of stuff rather than sending it to landfill – shredding paper then depositing it in recycling bins is just one example.

Decide how to handle the stuff

Once everything is categories, next you can start to assess how to handle it.  For example, if there is a lot of green stuff that cannot be recycled, it might be worth hiring a skip for a short time to deposit it all and have it taken away.  Or it might work out better to hire a van for a weekend then remove all the rubbish as well as all the donation items.

You can also contact the local council about a bulk waste collection depending on what and how much rubbish you have.  They do charge for this and it might be a couple of weeks before they can collect it, but it could work out cheaper than hiring a van or a skip.

Get some professional help

The final tip is this – you don’t have to do it all yourself.  There are companies out there that handle house clearances and even incorporate probate services.  They can do all of this for you and save you the stress and time needed to properly clear a house.  Charles Winstanley House Clearance is one such company operating in the Brighton area and we are also experts in probate valuation to help you settle the estate smoothly.