A woman called us about an Ellicott City estate cleanout project she thought would be daunting for us.
It wasn’t. We knew from the first call that we could knock it out.
Kristen Hunter-Cevera’s deceased parents had left her and her brother as heirs to the 10,000-square-foot home and the staggering amount of items in it. Check out a series of one-minute videos about this Ellicott City estate cleanout success story.
View the entire series from YouTube here.
How Orion’s Attic solved the estate liquidation and cleanout challenge
Kristen and her family needed help with a lot of tasks. We got to work and accomplished multiple goals.
- We worked side-by-side with Kristen so that she could see and make decisions on everything in the home. This included multiple rooms with boxes stacked to the ceiling that she couldn’t have pulled down by herself. Orion’s Attic provided the labor; all she had to do was tell us what she wanted to keep.
- We packed a storage pod full of items family members wanted shipped to California. If there’s something in the home with great sentimental value a family is hoping to find, we’ll find it. That’s true for everything from a mother’s wedding dress to a child’s stuffed animal.
- We removed all remaining contents from the home. While there were some items worth selling, we explained that the labor costs involved for us to deliver a small number of items to an auction house wouldn’t pay for itself. We treat clients’ money like our money. Kristen decided to add those items to the bounty of goods we donated to Community Forklift. While charities generally provide blank donation receipts, our service includes giving clients a detailed, typed list of the donations so that they can claim the proper tax deductions.
- We hauled away the small amount of trash that was left over after we gave second lives to almost everything in the home. We broke our vacuums and brooms and left the house broom-clean so that the Realtor could get to work making the big money for the family (selling the house).
The challenges of dealing with parents’ possessions while grieving
Everyone who has dealt with a parent’s death knows that going through their mom’s or dad’s stuff can be an emotionally crippling process. It’s also a process that can lead to bad decisions — like holding on to too many objects out of some misguided belief that the parent would be upset if they let them go.
The advice we give all the time?
One thing we know for sure is that nobody is ever looking down from above upset with you because you’ve decided not to keep everything that they owned. They know you don’t have room for it. They know you don’t want it. Don’t keep things just because you think it’s what they would want. Just keep only the very minimal things that mean the most to you.
What client learned from the estate cleanout process
Most heirs and executors realize there’s going to be a lot of physical work involved in emptying their parents’ home. Kristen quickly found that was only the start.
I think the most unexpected thing for me was really the emotional cost of this journey. We’re clearing out my parents’ house, it’s one of those last tethers to them. So emotionally I was just not prepared for what that takes. Trying to go through it myself at first, that was just a heavy toll and eventually that’s actually what burned me out was just the emotional cost of it. I went through, got the things that meant the most to me and also realized that those memories will always stay with me but I can let the object go. For me that was one of most important parts of this journey.
Fortunately, Kristen — unlike many clients we meet — realized immediately that it wasn’t realistic to think she could get her parents’ house empty by herself or even with help from family and friends. She turned to Orion’s Attic to reduce a three-month-or-longer process into a three-day effort.
I think really, don’t hesitate to ask for help and ask for professional help, and that’s going to be worth every penny because really, you or you and your family cannot do it alone if it’s certainly for something like this size, and just, yeah, don’t wait.
The end results of the home cleanout project for Kristen and her family?
There’s a lot of different emotions going on, but the primary one is relief. Just that the house is clear, objects are on their way. But relief that the house is actually empty and ready for its new family, hopefully.
And did Orion’s Attic meet her expectations for the project?
They did, they did, both in time and professionalism. I’m a very happy customer.
Learn what you need to know about selling your home’s treasures in our Estate Liquidation and Downsizing Guide.
Contact us today and let us know how we can be of help. Check out our new YouTube channel, too.Â
