House Clearance – best way to do it?

See lots of people selling stuff after a house clearance but what’s the best way to clear a house of all the clutter? Want to have a massive clear out but realise I’m a bit of a hoarder. There are lots of things I’m loathe to throw away but doubt if I’ll ever use again. They aren’t worthless but probably won’t sell on ebay. Also what do people do with instruction books/guides for electrical items – throw away? Have old cd players, dvd players which don’t work but could probably be fixed for a nominal fee – what about those?

Any non-hoarders please give me some advice!!

car boot perhaps?

You’d be surprised at what does sell on ebay, even broken stuff. If you can describe the faults well, who knows. I seem to have done better at times selling faulty stuff than as-new stuff.

I sold a bunch of sodium lights that were surplus to requirements, three that were brand new and boxed and one that I’d opened and played about with, and in the process lost some of the screws and fixings.

People seem to respond to a longer and more detailed description, and as a result the one with bits missing ended up selling for quite a bit more than the brand new ones.

You could maybe take all your faulty electrical stuff and sell it as one job lot.

Instruction manuals I’d be less sure about – does anyone read them these days? I think in most cases you can download info from manufacturers websites these days. But do searches for the manuals on ebay and see if there is any trade going on.

I think the trick for a proper clear out is to set aside a decent amount of time and do it all in a oner. Get everything together, photograph it well, describe it well and get them all up at the same time. Use a pair of scales and make sure you give reasonable postage prices for items, horde boxes and newspapers so you are ready to pack and send stuff. It wasn’t just ‘useful’ stuff I sold when I had my clear out, but odd little bits of ornament and curious, stuff that either hadn’t come out the cupboard for a long time or had been sitting on a shelf for so long that I’d stopped noticing it. Its also exactly the kind of thing you pick up in a junk shop and buy because its pretty or amusing, and ebayers will buy it for the same reason. The odd thing is you can sell that stuff, and the next day you’re not even aware that its gone.

Some stuff won’t sell, some will and one or two things might make a few bob. It doesn’t matter whether individual items sell for a lot, sell a lot of stuff for a few bob adds up to a lot of bobs. But you get all those bobs for one session of listing items and one trip to the post office. Its actually quite good fun, and it can be quite amusing what sells and to who.

Then use all those accumulated bobs in your paypal account to go bargain hunting for something a bit more special. You can be quite frivolous then because whatever you buy you’re effectively getting it for free.

Just leave the front door open and all your stuff will magicly disapear.

skidartist
cheers for the detailed response and all of the tips
think the rest of today is going to be spent sorting and lisiting on ebay
have a few bike items lying around so if you’re after anything let me know and I’ll post to you

project
cheers

Hi hitman,

just been through that process.

I had several piles

freeads/ebay pile – try online freeads (I did amazing well here – http://www.preloved.co.uk/)
freecycle pile (see freecycle website, I planned to use this but it requires a yahoo address)
dump pile
clothes – either charity OR garage wear then rags
if you can rake up a few mates with stuff/van why not wait till summer and try a car boot.

My experience of electrical kit is that it changes very fast and people don’t seem to be interested in oldish stuff (I dumped a perfect basic freeview box)

Sadly the dump pile got bigger and bigger, and today I cracked and threw stuff out – towbar, new pannier rack, lifejacket etc ….. not used in 3 years, can’t find any takers …..