What happens after you call?
You are not committing to anything by calling. We ask a few questions on the phone, arrange a time to walk the property, and price what is there. That walkthrough is free and carries no obligation to sell through us — if the answer is that you do not need us, that is a fine answer to get.
After the walkthrough you have a decision to make, and it is the only significant one: an on-site estate sale, an auction, or an outright cash purchase of the contents. From there the sequence is fixed — the contents are sold, whatever is left is cleared so the house is broom-clean, and if the property is being sold we get it listing-ready.
The thing most people want to know first is where the commitment starts. It starts when you accept a figure or agree a sale date, and not before. The call and the walkthrough are how you find out what you are dealing with.
The call
Short, and mostly us asking. We need to know roughly how full the house is, whether anything has to happen by a particular date, whether anything has already been taken or promised, and whether the property is accessible. Those four answers usually decide which route fits before anyone walks through the door.
You do not need to know what anything is worth, and you do not need to have tidied. It is genuinely better if you have not — that is on the page about what doesn't sell, and it is the single most expensive mistake families make before a liquidator sees a house.
Estate sale, auction, or buyout — which fitsThe walkthrough, and why it comes first
We walk the property and price what is there. No charge, and no obligation to sell through us. It comes first because every other decision depends on it: which route makes sense, whether there is enough to justify staging a sale, and what the property will need once it is empty.
It is not a formal appraisal and does not pretend to be one — no signed document, no figure for a court file. If the estate needs that kind of valuation, it has to happen before anything is sold or moved, which is why it is worth asking your attorney early rather than after a sale is booked.
Do I need an appraisal before selling?What you decide, and when
| Point | The decision | Whose it is |
|---|---|---|
| Before the walkthrough | Whether anything must be formally valued first | The estate's attorney, not us |
| Before pricing | What the family is keeping, and who took what | Yours — and write it down at the time |
| After the walkthrough | Sale, auction, or buyout | Yours, with what the walkthrough found |
| At the end of the sale | What happens to the remainder | Already settled — it is cleared either way |
| Once the house is empty | Whether the property needs work before listing | Yours, and only if you are selling it |
Everything above the last two rows happens before you have committed to anything.
Who you deal with
One number to call and one crew scheduling the work. If you would rather we did not contact anyone else — an elderly parent, a family member who is not ready for it, a client of yours — say so on the first call and we will not.
Where a realtor or an attorney refers a property, we call them and not their client unless they ask otherwise.
For realtors, attorneys and executors