Tips for Cleaning Out a Deceased Estate

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While moving house and grieving a loved one are two of the most challenging and stressful scenarios you’ll ever encounter, there’s one that can be even more so. Cleaning out the home of a loved one who has passed can push you to breaking point, especially when you’re grieving while trying to prepare their house for a new owner or tenant. 

It can be difficult to know where to start, especially when their home is exactly how your loved one left it when they passed. While cleaning out a deceased estate will never be easy, these tips below might make it easier:   

Get Charities Involved

Many charities are always looking for donations they can sell to fund various charitable activities. Research local charities in your area to see who would be interested in items from a deceased estate. You might even like to read online reviews, like a Red Cross pickup review, to learn more about who is the best to work with. 

Many charities will visit your home and pick up items that can be useful to them. This can be a weight off your mind, knowing that you don’t need to pack or move an entire house a lot of furniture on your own. 

Don’t Do It Alone

Emptying and cleaning an entire house alone can be a mammoth undertaking. That’s without considering your grief. Make the process a family affair to unite everyone and get the job done much faster. 

You can assign everyone a room to work on and put processes in place for what to do with the possessions that are cleared out. If you don’t have family members to help, consider involving your friends. They’ll likely be more than happy to assist and support you. 

Have a Process

Cleaning out an entire property is no easy task, especially when it contains a life’s worth of possessions. In such a situation, having a process is essential. Organize items into five piles or areas: keep, sell, donate, recycle, and throw away. An organizational system like this one might help speed up the cleaning process. 

Once you have your five respective piles, you can take action with them. You might transport the ‘throw away’ items to a landfill facility, take the recyclables to a recycling center, and request a pickup service for your donatable goods. Anything you plan to sell can go home with you to be listed on various platforms, and you can distribute the ‘keep’ goods among family members. 

Order a Dumpster

Clearing out rubbish can be a time-consuming task that greatly hinders your progress. This can be especially true if there are no landfill facilities nearby. Knowing you’ll have plenty of trash to throw out, consider ordering a dumpster. 

Most dumpster companies will deliver them to your property, leave them for you to fill, and collect them when full. They also accept a broad range of goods, including odds and ends, household rubbish, and yard waste. 

As challenging as cleaning out a deceased estate can be, it might also be easier than you anticipated. Take these actions above, and you might have your loved one’s property empty and clean faster than you thought possible. 

Know Better About The Estate Sales in Stamford!

When someone passes away or shifts from any property, it generally goes into an estate sale. And now, there are ways you can list all the items left behind in an online estate sale in Stamford. This is the best solution for anyone to release the burden of the belongings that are left behind. With the increasing habit of people to purchase through their phones, conducting estate sales and auctions over the Internet has also increased.

What are online estate sales?

When someone passes away or needs to move unexpectedly, often their belongings go through an estate auction. Online estate sales in Stamford and auctions are where people gather to look, buy, sell, and check out the goods. These have gained much popularity because people from anywhere can participate. Online sales have no geographical boundaries or limits to the number of people participating. The estate auction was often accomplished within the home itself before the advent of the Internet. Sometimes it meant that many visitors came to a private residence that was usually still occupied by the owners. Well, now, for the sake of both privacy and comfort, technology has made online property transactions even more desirable.

With the advent of technology, people like to conduct even the smallest of their works on the Internet. They also tend to shop from these estate sales. It benefits both the buyers and sellers. For the person selling, there are chances of getting higher bids due to intensive competition. And for the buyers, they get a wide variety of products without any restrictions. 

You can begin selling at the online platforms immediately. It does not require any extra investment, nor does it require salespersons or distributors. 

During unpredictable times, all business owners have shifted their businesses online. Different online auctioneers also have risen to uncertainty and transported the sales to the online platform. It ensures that even those who lead a busy life can look for interesting items that can be a perfect fit for your place. 

When you enter a platform to shop from estate sales in Stamford, you can view the product's image and read the details. Then you get to bid and buy. It is similar to the on-site auctions and sales, but it is a lot more flexible. It allows access to all kinds of items as are available in typical room sales. 

Read More about Estate sales, What are they and everything you need to know! 

How to shop for estate sales online?

The first and foremost step to shop from estate sales in Stamfordis registering or logging into your account. It is a quick and straightforward process. Some websites ask for a registration fee, and others offer the service for free. You can view images, access legal details, and analyze the item quickly after creating an account. By creating an account, you can bid and purchase the item you like. The buyer must approve the bid.

A few details like an exact email address, phone number, etc., are required to sign up. You can enter in real-time bidding. If you become a successful buyer, the transaction would be processed hassle-free. But to make sure you end up buying an authentic product, you must examine it.  

With the Internet & technology, everything has changed around- the estate auctions also count when we talk about these changes. Some of the better places to find great offers for used furniture, kitchenware, appliances, paintings, antiques, equipment, household products, cars, and even jewelry pieces are present in Stamford estate sales. 

People have so many items, and by giving them to a charity or having a garage sale, they eventually get rid of old belongings to make room new or shift to a new home. But how to get rid of the articles of an entire house at once? Most of us have to do it at some level, usually when a family member dies or leaves the place. Some professionals can help you plan an estate sale and successfully sell all these things.

Regardless of where you live or where you move, there's a fair chance that a real estate auction is taking place somewhere nearby. Stamford Estate sales are almost equivalent to auctions, but they're typically kept after someone dies. But in some cases, because of long-distance travels, divorce, and bankruptcy. The public is welcomed into the house for most estate sales and can go through anything there.

Estate sales may be an excellent way to pay off debt or make money from discarded possessions, regardless of the cause. They're also a great place to find antiques and exciting pieces for the shopper. You can have a smooth and hassle-free process of selling and buying the item. Online sales have helped many people all across the world. So now, whenever you want to get rid of any item in your house, do not forget to list it online; there might be someone else waiting for that item. 

Interview - MaxSold

Over the years we have helped many people downsize or move and they often ask about estate sales. Yard, garage and estate sales can be tricky and sometimes not worth it. However, there are still many options available for those with items to sell. We spoke with TJ of MaxSold about the resources they offer.

For the busy person, what is MaxSold? 

We are an online auction company that specialize in estate and downsizing sales. Think Craigslist meets eBay.

How does the process work if someone wants to sell with you?

Once you decide to hire us, everything goes like clockwork - we just need access to your place twice and our whole process takes only 2 weeks to complete:

• Cataloging: An entire day for us to photograph, describe and measure any and all items you might have to sell.
• Auction: We host the auction catalog online for 7 to 10 days and at the end the winning bidders pay for their items.
• Pick-Up Event: Two to four hours supervision of the removal of items – this typically happens two days after we close the week long online auction.

How does someone know if their items are worth it?

We do not complete appraisals as this is a pure auction-based system. We get fair market value for the items as we drive a bidding environment.

What geographic locations do you cover?

We are in 19 states and two provinces in Canada

(WA, CA, AZ, CO, TX, GA, FL, OH, VA, DC, MD, DE, NJ, PA, CT, MA, NY, RI and NH)

We are in British Columbia and Ontario in Canada

Can you share some of the interesting or cool things you have sold?

• Old Admiralty Longshank Anchor

Measuring 10 ft. Span. 10 ft. long, and weighing in at over 3000 pounds, this anchor required an industrial strength crane for removal.

• Large Chicken Plucker

Found in an unused barn that was part of an estate sale in Maryland, this rusted chicken plucker was truly a unique find.

• 6'5" The Predator Statue Made of Car Parts

Sold as part of a Business Downsizing auction in Kingston, Ontario, this hand-made statue was a truly one-of-a-kind piece. Selling for more than $1800, this is definitely the weirdest things we've sold yet!

• Chuckie's Dad Figurine
• Surrey with Fringe

You can be the cream of 19th Century Society with the Surrey, sold as part of a MaxSold Estate Sale. Note: Horses Not Included.

• CPR Dummies

People definitely collect weird things over the years. But who collects FOUR CPR dummies? Like one, ok fine we can get our heads around, but FOUR? Perhaps a paramedic or a CPR instructor? 

• Antique Coffin

We've sold several coffins at MaxSold, but this one is definitely the creepiest! It kinda looks like there's someone inside it still...

The Downsizing Dilemma

3 sets of china, silver from a grandparent, a dining room table and chairs from the 1940’s, multi-generational photos, antique lamps, these are just a few examples of decisions a homeowner has to make when downsizing. Trying to figure out what to take and what to keep is daunting as many of these items have been passed from generation to generation. What can make this even more stressful is moving at an advanced stage of life. Older adults may feel even more anxious due to the amount of “stuff” they have accumulated as well as the emotional aspect that comes with moving. Many seniors have lived in their homes for over 30 years.

They are used to things being in certain places and in a certain order. Change is difficult and being flexible is not as easy. As professional organizers, one of our most important jobs is to be sensitive and respectful to our client’s needs.

In many situations, children do not live close to their parents. Calling a professional organizer to help make decisions is sometimes the only option that a family has. In addition, seniors do not always have the mobility to move and lift items. Older adults may need assistance with boxing up donates or keepsakes, help to bring stored items down from an attic, or unpacking boxes which may have been stored for years in a basement or garage. This is where an experienced organizer can really make an impact.  A professional organizer will help a homeowner get appraisals on items of value, help determine what is important to bring to the new abode, help box up items for relatives, and help box up donates and plan for their removal.  What a relief for aging men and women to not have to go through the process alone.

Sometimes homeowners are so worried about the move that they have trouble determining what to take with them. To begin with, we may remove the non-sentimental items such as duplicate kitchen utensils, excess clothing, garage items no longer used etc… We may suggest the “one-year” test. For example, if something has not been used in over a year maybe it is time to discard and donate? Photographs should be removed from frames. Relatives can help transfer photos to scrapbooks or other media.

When moving to assisted living, seniors quite often do not have the space they may have had in the home they have lived in. As professional organizers, we can help them choose what furniture they can bring and help determine the best way to remove the remaining furniture. They may be comfortable with the layout they have in their current home so many times we suggest they photograph rooms they wish to recreate. A familiar layout is calming and can alleviate stress. Once in the new surroundings, we can help them unpack and organize, keeping in mind how to bring the comforts of the past to the new space.

Most importantly, when dealing with seniors we must be PATIENT. Listening and understanding to our client’s concerns are key. This is challenging, but an experienced and "professional" Professional Organizer can make the difficult task less stressful. At the end of the day, nothing is more rewarding to us than hearing “I couldn’t have done with without you” and knowing we made a huge difference in helping someone move into the next stage of their life.