Clearing out a parent's house is one of the most emotionally and logistically demanding things adult children face. You're sorting through decades of a life while managing grief, sibling dynamics, hard deadlines, and the question of what to actually do with everything. This guide gives you a real process, step by step, option by option, so you can make decisions efficiently instead of getting paralyzed.
Quick answers
- Start by sorting everything into five categories: keep, family, sell, donate, discard, in that order.
- For items of value, get an estate sale company or appraiser involved early. Once something's donated or trashed, that decision is final.
- Donation pickups (Vietnam Veterans, Habitat, Goodwill) handle most household goods for free.
- For what's left, a junk removal company ($300-$600 for a typical load) or an estate cleanout company handles the rest.
- A senior move manager or estate cleanout company can run the whole process if you need help.
Before You Start: Set Expectations
A few things to get clear on before you sort a single item:
How long will this take? For a 2-3 bedroom house with 20+ years of accumulation, budget 4-8 full days of hands-on work with 2-3 people. Smaller homes with less stuff: 2-3 days. Larger homes or homes with significant accumulation: 2-3 weeks. Most families underestimate by a factor of two.
What's the deadline? If the house is being sold, you need it clear before it lists (or at least staged). If it's a rental, you have a lease end date. If there's no external deadline, set one. It's the only way to stay motivated.
Is there anything valuable? Before you start, walk through with a general sense of what might have real value: furniture, art, jewelry, collectibles, vintage items, tools. Don't throw anything away until you've made a deliberate decision. You can easily donate a piece of furniture worth $800 because nobody stopped to look it up first.
Who's involved? If siblings or other family members want to claim items, set a deadline for them to show up and do so. Items that aren't claimed by that deadline move to the next step: sold, donated, or discarded. Don't let vague promises drag the process out indefinitely.
The Five-Category Sort
Goes to the new place
If your parent is moving to assisted living or another home, start by identifying what goes with them. Room-by-room priorities: their favorite chair, meaningful photos, bedside essentials, familiar decor. Let the room dimensions guide what's realistic.
Goes to family
Go through the house and identify items with family significance: furniture, heirlooms, kitchen items people actually want. Assign them to specific people with a specific pickup date (2-3 weeks out). Do a first-pass family walk-through where everyone tags what they want with a Post-it. It goes faster than real-time negotiation.
Worth selling
Items with genuine resale value: quality furniture, art, jewelry, silverware, vintage clothing, collectibles, power tools, musical instruments. These require a deliberate decision about how to sell (estate sale, consignment, Facebook Marketplace). Don't rush past this category. This is where value gets lost.
Worth donating
The bulk of most homes: functional household goods, books, clothing, kitchen items, small furniture. All of this has a second life somewhere. Habitat for Humanity ReStores take furniture. Vietnam Veterans of America does free household pickup. Local shelters and social service organizations take household goods.
Discard
What's actually trash: broken items, outdated electronics, worn clothing, expired food, accumulated paper. This category is often smaller than people expect once they've sorted the others honestly.
How to Handle Items of Value
This is the step most families do too slowly or skip entirely. That's where money gets left on the table.
Estate sale: If the house has a significant volume of sellable items (full rooms of furniture, art, collections, quality household goods), an estate sale company is usually the right call. They price, stage, and sell over 1-2 days, typically taking 30-40% of gross sales as commission. Most estate sale companies want at least $3,000-$5,000 in expected sales before they'll take a job. Get 2-3 quotes.
Consignment shops: Good for quality pieces that don't fit in an estate sale. They take 40-50% but handle storage and sale.
Online: Facebook Marketplace and Craigslist are effective for furniture, appliances, and tools. 25-40% of retail is the realistic range for quality used furniture.
Jewelry and valuables: Have jewelry and potentially significant art or antiques appraised before selling or donating. A single appraiser visit ($150-$300) can identify items worth far more than they appear.
When an Estate Sale Isn't Worth It
If the house is mostly IKEA furniture, mass-market decor, and normal household goods from the last 10 years, an estate sale probably won't cover its own commission. Donate what's usable and junk the rest. See our full comparison: [Estate Sale vs. Estate Cleanout](/articles/estate-sale-vs-estate-cleanout/).
Estate Sale vs. Cleanout vs. Donation: Which Route to Take
Estate Sale
Sell in place, open to the public
- No upfront cost to you
- Reaches motivated buyers quickly
- Handles large volumes of items at once
- Company researches and prices everything
- Company takes 30-40% of gross proceeds
- Minimum value threshold (typically $3,000-$5,000 expected sales)
- You vacate the house for 1-2 days
- Takes 3-6 weeks start to finish
Best for: Homes with quality furniture, antiques, art, jewelry, or collectibles and at least 3 weeks of lead time
Estate Cleanout
Full removal with donation sorting
- Fast -- done in 1-2 days
- Fixed price, no surprises
- No minimum value required
- Works when time is short
- You pay out of pocket instead of receiving proceeds
- Low recovery on any sellable items
- Donation sorting is limited
Best for: Homes where speed matters more than maximizing returns, or where most items have low resale value
What to Do With What's Left
After keep, family, sell, and donate -- what's left is trash and bulk removal.
Junk removal companies (1-800-GOT-JUNK, Junk King, LoadUp, local companies):
They bring a truck, haul everything away. Pricing is by truck volume: a single-item pickup might be $150-$250; a quarter-truck runs $250-$400; a full truck runs $600-$900. Get at least two quotes. Local companies are often 20-30% cheaper than national franchises.
Roll-off dumpster:
If you have a lot of trash and want to do it yourself over several days, renting a dumpster makes sense. A 10-yard dumpster runs $250-$450 for a week.
Estate cleanout company:
If you want one call to handle the entire final stage, an estate cleanout company removes everything that's left. They'll sort and donate/recycle what they can. Costs typically run $500-$2,000 for a full house cleanout.
The Full-Service Option: Senior Move Manager or Estate Cleanout Company
If managing all of this is beyond what you have time or bandwidth for, there are professionals who handle the whole process.
Senior move manager: If a parent is relocating to assisted living, a senior move manager handles the sort, coordinates estate sale and donation logistics, manages the movers, and sets up the new space. They're the right call when your parent is still involved in the decisions and the move itself is the primary task. See: [What Is a Senior Move Manager?](/articles/what-is-a-senior-move-manager/)
Estate cleanout company: If the goal is simply clearing the house (post-move, or after a death), an estate cleanout company handles everything. Cost typically runs $500-$3,000 depending on home size and complexity.
When to Use Professional Help
- You live out of state or can't take significant time off work
- There's significant accumulation and no clear family bandwidth to manage it
- Siblings are in disagreement and you need a neutral third party
- The emotional weight of doing it yourself is genuinely too heavy
This isn't giving up. It's making a smart call about where to spend your energy.
A Realistic Timeline
Here's how a typical house clearout unfolds when it goes well:
Week 1: Walk through with family. Tag items for family members. Identify potentially valuable items for appraisal or estate sale assessment.
Week 2: Family members claim and pick up their items. Estate sale company does their assessment. Donation pickups scheduled.
Weeks 3-4: Estate sale (if applicable), typically over 1-2 days. Donation pickups happen. Remaining items sorted for junk removal.
Week 4-5: Junk removal. Final walk-through. Light cleaning or professional cleanout if prepping for listing.
This assumes a 2-3 bedroom home with moderate accumulation and a reasonably coordinated family. Add 2-4 weeks for larger homes, higher accumulation, or family coordination challenges.
If you want professional help managing the clearout, or coordinating a parent's move to a new home at the same time. Our directory lists senior move managers and estate transition specialists by state. Most offer free initial assessments: Find a Senior Move Specialist Near You.
Frequently Asked Questions
How long does it take to clear out a parent's house?
Budget 2-3 days for a small apartment with minimal accumulation; 4-8 full days for a 2-3 bedroom house with 20+ years of belongings. That assumes 2-3 people working focused hours. Families that do this in scattered weekend visits often stretch it to 2-3 months, which adds to the emotional drag and the carrying costs on the home. If you have a hard deadline, work backward from it and get help early.
What do I do with furniture when clearing out a parent's house?
In order: first offer to family members (with a firm pickup deadline), then assess for resale value (estate sale, consignment, or Facebook Marketplace), then donate what's still functional (Habitat for Humanity ReStore picks up for free, as does Vietnam Veterans of America), then haul the rest. Don't skip the value assessment step. Quality furniture in good condition can sell for $100-$800 a piece and it's easy to donate away things that had real resale value.
Should I have an estate sale when clearing out a parent's house?
An estate sale makes sense when there's a significant volume of sellable goods: quality furniture, collections, art, household goods in good condition, and when the expected gross sales justify the company's 30-40% commission. For a home full of newer IKEA-style furniture and standard household goods, an estate sale often won't generate enough to be worth the coordination. A cleanout company or a combination of online sales and donation is faster in that case.
How do I handle clearing out a parent's house if I live out of state?
This is where professional help pays for itself. A senior move manager or estate clearout company can run the entire process on your behalf. They'll assess the home, coordinate the estate sale or donations, and handle junk removal without you needing to be present. You make decisions over the phone and via photos. Expect to pay $1,500-$4,000 for a full-service clearout for a 2-3 bedroom home. That's often worth it compared to multiple cross-country trips.