Recently, my wife’s mom passed away. She lived in Houston and was 87 at the time of her passing. She was still living alone and had collected a lifetime of stuff. We’ve now gotten through the probate and the transition of the beneficiary funds and are looking at a houseful of stuff to dispose of.
I’ve researched the topic of property liquidation and the general consensus is that because Baby Boomers are downsizing, the market for used stuff is pretty much a buyers market these days.
The major means of disposal are:
- Collect all of the things you know are valuable and want for yourself. (Those in the will) (jewelry, silver, china, etc)
- Let the rest of your extended family pick over anything else. (furniture, clothing and kitchen wares)
- Call in an appraiser to appraise everything you think might be valuable. (paintings, rugs, old tools etc)
One family I read about had a $100,000 painting in the house they didn’t even know about. - eBay or sell on Amazon anything you think might have some value and you want to trouble with selling it yourself. (This is a much more difficult proposition than it sounds initially due to the amount of preparation and shipping involved)
- Call in an estate sale company to sell everything in the house in an estate sale. (The estimate is you will get less than 50% of the value of an item due to commissions and other costs. The items are probably worth a lot less than you think, too)
- Donate everything else. Some companies pick up some don’t. http://donationtown.org/
- Call in a professional clean up company to clean the home for sale.
- Sell the property.
I’ve recently looked around at all of the stuff in my home, too. I realized that I don’t want to make my son have to get rid of all of my stuff when I die. It seems that his generation is a lot more minimalistic, too and don’t really want to have that much stuff anyway. I’m giving serious thought to what I really need in my retirement years and what I want to keep around. Have you looked at how many books you have in your home? I have and I could read one a week and never read them all. I’ve already made a number of trips to Half Price Books with a couple of boxes of books to sell.
Anyone have experience liquidating an estate, getting rid of stuff, or just downsizing?
I’d be interested in any of your experiences. Currently, we’ve made only a few trips to Houston, but my house is already getting overstuffed with too many collectibles, books, pictures, and general household contents not to give serious thought to how I get rid of at least some of it.