One load and a mattress. That was the whole of a flat clearance in one of the courts on the south side of Whitchurch, SY13. A small place, done in a morning, with the mattress the only thing that had to be kept apart from the rest of the load and booked in separately at the other end. What came out was cupboards, drawers and the backs of wardrobes, which is what most of any house clearance actually is, whatever people picture. The person settling it lived at the far end of the county, down towards the Severn, and never saw the flat empty except in the photographs we sent the same evening.
That is the ordinary shape of a Whitchurch job. Not always, mind.
Two Whitchurches, and we work both
Worth saying plainly, because people ring up and we have to check: there are two Whitchurches on our books. This one is the Shropshire market town on the Cheshire border, SY13, Roman Mediolanum, clockmakers and cheese, run by Shropshire Council out of Shirehall. The other is in Hampshire, RG28, a small town on the Test between Andover and Basingstoke. Both have a railway station, oddly enough. Ours sits on the line from Crewe down to Shrewsbury and on into Wales, with Prees and Wem the next stops south; theirs is on the Basingstoke to Salisbury run.
Around here we cover SY13 and out to SY14 towards Malpas, SY4 down through Wem, Baschurch, Bomere Heath and Prees Heath, CW3 over the Cheshire line at Audlem and Woore, and LL13 across into Wrexham. Ellesmere and Market Drayton are twenty minutes either side of us. Oswestry and Shrewsbury we're in most weeks, and both have pages of their own. house clearance in Shrewsbury and house clearance in Oswestry — so if the property sits nearer to them than to us, start there.
South Shropshire takes longer but we go: Church Stretton, Craven Arms, Ludlow, Bishop's Castle, Bucknell, Lydbury North; Ludlow is on the same run. East of the county — Shifnal, Much Wenlock, Broseley, Bridgnorth — is a different run again, and Llanymynech sits right on the border with one foot in each country. Further into mid Wales we get asked for the smaller towns as well, Llandrindod Wells among them, though house clearance in Llandrindod Wells is a day of its own rather than something tacked onto a Whitchurch morning.
On the Hampshire side it's RG21 through RG24 around Basingstoke, RG26 up at Tadley, RG28 for Whitchurch itself.
The kinds of house clearance we get called out for in Whitchurch
People ask for a house clearance in Whitchurch under half a dozen different names, so here is what the phrase actually covers in practice.
Probate house clearance in Whitchurch
Most of our Whitchurch work is probate work, and it reaches us either through a solicitor's office or through whoever in the family has been landed with the job. It isn't really a different service, it's a different set of nerves: nobody wants to be the one who threw out the thing that mattered. So we work to a written list of what stays, we photograph rooms before and after. Anything that looks like paperwork, jewellery, medals or old photographs is put on a table for the family rather than bagged. Executors living two counties away are the norm here, not the exception. There's more on how estates are handled on our probate house clearance page.
Garage and loft clearance in Whitchurch
The garage and loft is the part people underestimate every single time. The house takes the morning and the loft takes the afternoon, because everything up there has to come down a hatch built for a person, not for the furniture somebody once got up there. Garages are worse: paving slabs stacked two deep along the back wall, edging stones in a pile, tiles left over from work done years ago. Slabs are the slowest thing in this trade — no bulk, all weight, and the van is full long before it looks it. Tell us on the phone whether there's a loft, a garage, a shed or all three, and the day gets planned properly rather than hopefully.
Flats, tenancies and single loads in SY13
Not everything is a full house. Sheltered flats, an end of tenancy where the carpets have to come up, one room, a single wardrobe down a staircase with a turn in it. We do those, and a small job in SY13 isn't treated as an inconvenience. If what you've got is really rubbish rather than furniture, house rubbish removal is the page you want instead.
Two days, three loads, and nobody on site
This one wasn't in Whitchurch, so I'll leave the where out of it, but it's the clearest example I have of how these clearances actually run. A two-bedroom house being given up after the tenant had gone, booked as three loads across two days including carpets. Kitchen and kitchen cupboard, lounge, two bedrooms, bathroom, separate toilet, front porch and stairs, and a shed about four foot by three with garden tools and plant pots in it.
The carpets were the only argument, and it wasn't with us. The housing association wanted white goods, carpets and curtains all out; the person organising it thought that was daft and said so in writing before we booked anything: "I am going to double check with them about the carpets tomorrow as they are pretty new and it seems crazy to take them out." Confirmation came back a day later that the carpets did have to go, so up they came. Before starting we said in writing what we always say on a job that size. That nothing can be judged fully until things start moving, and that if the plan is going to change we tell you before it changes, not after.
Nobody was there on the day. The front door key lived in a key safe and the team put it back in the safe when they'd finished. During the clearance they turned up another set of keys — houses are full of orphaned keys — so those went into an envelope and through the letterbox rather than into the van. Four pieces of medical equipment were still waiting to be collected by whoever supplied them, so they were carried out to the garden exactly where we'd been asked to leave them. The smaller pieces were covered over with black bags to keep the rain off until someone came. Medical aids we never dispose of. They go back to the healthcare provider so that somebody else gets the use of them.
The upright fridge freezer went off to a dedicated processor, because cooling units are legally hazardous waste and can't ride in with the furniture. A bed base, a sofa, an ottoman, three padded stools and a bundle of duvets and cushions were kept separate as well, under the persistent organic pollutant rules. Two mattresses, two televisions, and the shed emptied last.
Parking was sorted before we arrived, which is rare. The verge outside was too soft to put a loaded van on, so the customer spoke to the parish council and to a neighbour and got us the use of a hard driveway instead. Two curtains caused the only grumble afterwards. The bathroom pair the team simply forgot, and we said so — no story about it. The lounge curtains couldn't come down without unbolting the track from the wall, and we don't take fixtures and fittings off walls, because the plaster comes with them often enough that it isn't worth the argument. Photographs of every room went over the same evening.
The access question
Whitchurch is easy in and awkward at the last fifty yards. So we're on a main road within half an hour of Shrewsbury, Chester or the M6. Then it's the town itself — the older streets climbing up to St Alkmund's, the terraces with no frontage, the sheltered courts where the parking bays are all marked for residents. Tell us on the phone if there's a barrier, a resident permit scheme, or a shared bin store in the way, and the team plans around it. Twice in Whitchurch we've simply walked a longer carry rather than block a lane.
What it costs, and what we won't put on the van
On cost this page says one thing only: ring the office on 0800 046 5555 and talk it through, or send photographs through the form on this page. Every room, the loft hatch, the garage, the shed — and you'll get a figure back for your own property. The quote is free and it commits you to nothing. What you won't find here is a number, because a house clearance in Whitchurch is priced on what is actually in the house, and a figure printed on a web page is a figure for somebody else's house.
Who gets the invoice is worth saying plainly, because with an estate it's the question that always comes up. We invoice the solicitor, the executor or the estate direct where that's how things are being handled, payment can come out of the estate, and there is no deposit. The invoice follows the work rather than coming before it.
Some things stay behind, and it's better you hear it now. Tins of paint, aerosols, a half-empty gas bottle from the shed — none of that travels with furniture. Padded seating is handled apart from everything else: sofas, armchairs and stuffed dining chairs fall under the persistent organic pollutant rules, so they're kept separate from the general load and destroyed at a permitted plant. Gripper rods we'll lift off floorboards, but not where they've been pinned over tiles, because they take the tiles up with them.
What we do with what comes out
Furniture that's sound, crockery, unopened bedding, tools — we'd sooner it was used again than tipped, so it goes to shops and reuse projects around the town and out towards Wem and Ellesmere. Metal is separated at the yard. What's genuinely finished is weighed in at a permitted transfer station and the paperwork comes back with the driver; ask and we'll email you the waste transfer note with the invoice. Our carrier registration is CBDU419679, the company is insured for the work and for the property while we're in it, and we've been at this since 2007.
Cluttered and overfilled properties
Some houses in this trade are packed to the doorframes, and if that's yours, it's a normal Tuesday for us — extra loads, maybe an extra day, no remarks from anyone on the team. A hoarder house clearance is slower than an ordinary one because everything has to be looked at rather than lifted: cash in tins, documents in carrier bags, a wedding ring in a jar of buttons. We'll give you an honest number of loads before we start rather than after, and there's a fuller account of hoarder work on our hoarder house clearance page.
Questions we get asked about house clearance in Whitchurch
Is this the Shropshire Whitchurch or the Hampshire one? Both, as it happens. This page is the SY13 market town on the Cheshire border. The RG28 town on the Test is covered as well, and we ask for the postcode on the phone so that nobody sends a van 180 miles the wrong way.
Can you start a probate clearance before the grant comes through? Usually, yes. It's the executor's instruction we work to, and plenty of probate house clearance jobs are done while the paperwork is still sitting with the solicitor. We invoice the solicitor, executor or estate direct, it can be paid from the estate, and there's no deposit to find first.
Can you do it if nobody can be there? Yes, and often nobody is. A key safe, an agent's office, a neighbour holding a key — all fine. Keys go back where you tell us, and photographs of every room come over the same day, so you can see what was done without driving to Whitchurch to look.
Do you take the garage, loft and shed as well as the house? Yes, and it's much better to say so when you book. Garage and loft clearance changes how many of us come and how the day is ordered.
What happens to things that are still usable? They go to reuse — charity shops and local projects where the item is wanted, metal to the yard, and only what's genuinely finished to a permitted transfer station. Waste transfer note on request.
Ring us with the postcode, the number of bedrooms, and whether there's a loft, garage or shed, and we'll quote your house clearance in Whitchurch properly on the call. 0800 046 5555, or send the photographs through the form on this page.
