Estate Sale Cautions!

In an effort to help families who need estate sales here are a few cautions when choosing an estate sale company.

- Do not be intimidated by the company.

- Just because a company started advertising your sale, if you don't have a signed contract you don't have to go with that company if you don't want to.

- A company who offers the lowest commission is not necessarily the best company to conduct your sale. Look at how many sales they have done and most importantly ask others about their reputation.

- Under bidding on commission is unethical.

- Make sure you read the contract! If items will be moved from the home to another venue, what is the commission when that happens? And what are the conditions of the sale then? Aren't you hiring a company to sell the items at the house, afterall that is what an estate sale is.

- If a company wants to buy everything that is left in the house after the sale is a sure sign something is fishy. Often times the prices are inflated so the item doesn't sell and they can keep the item.

- Also if a company includes the cleanout in their commission, often times the prices are inflated so the items don't sell, then they keep them for themselves and put them in their store or into an antique show when they do them. So really that "free" cleanout isn't free.

- Check out Craig's list, do a search for "re: estate" or "re: estate sale" or "re: estate sales" many customers are posting comments about companies on there and many of the comments are good warnings for clients.

- Ask for references and check those references.

- Be sneaky, before you meet the company, go to one of their sales and watch and talk to their customers and find out what their reputation is and see how they do business.

- If a company doesn't want to do your sale because there isn't enough in the house for it to be worth their time but they want to purchase something....don't sell anything to them! More than likely what they want to purchase is THE best thing in the house and they are probably going to give you pennies on the dollar. Tell them NO!