House and estate cleanouts.

A cleanout empties a property. Ours starts with a sort: anything that can be resold is set aside, and part of what it is expected to sell for comes off the price. What cannot be sold is donated or recycled where it can be, and the rest is hauled.

How the sort changes the price

Junk removal is usually priced by volume, by how much of a truck the job fills. A Sycamore cleanout is priced on the same work: the volume, the carry to the truck and what disposal costs. That is the standard price.

The difference is what happens before anything is loaded. We go through the contents first. Anything we can resell is set aside, and part of what we expect it to sell for comes off the price.

Two rules keep that honest. We count only what comparable items have actually sold for, never what they are listed at, and only after allowing for the ones that will not sell. And resale never raises the price: a house with nothing worth reselling pays the standard price, which is what the work costs on its own.

You get the price in writing before the work starts.

What a cleanout includes

• A look at the property before it is priced: every room, the garage, the basement and the attic.
• Anything you are keeping set aside first.
• A sort into resale, donation, recycling and disposal.
• Loading, hauling and the trips to wherever each thing is going.
• The property left empty.

Where we work

In California, Oakland and nearby East Bay cities: estate cleanouts in Oakland. There, estate sales and online estate auctions are also an option when the contents are worth selling.

In Illinois, Chicago’s South Side and south suburbs: estate cleanouts on the South Side and in the south suburbs. In Illinois we do cleanouts and junk removal rather than estate sales.

When a sale is the better answer

If a house holds a lot of value, a sale usually returns more than a cleanout credit, because selling is the point of the job rather than a deduction from it. In the East Bay that is estate liquidation.

If you are not sure which a house needs, estate sale or estate cleanout has a test you can run yourself in an afternoon.

Common questions

Is this junk removal?

It is the same job with a sort at the start. If you only need a few things taken away, junk removal explains when we are, and are not, the right call.

Do I need to clear anything out before you come?

No. Tell us what you are keeping and leave the rest. Clearing out first is how the things that sell end up in the trash.

Do I get paid for what you resell?

No. It comes off the price instead, so it is settled in the quote rather than paid out after the work.

What does a cleanout cost?

It depends on volume, access and disposal, which is why the price comes after somebody has seen the property. How much an estate cleanout costs goes through what a quote is made of and what moves it.