Closing out home of loved one after move to assisted living, advice?

The only reason I'd sell a property "as is" is if it's a falling down hoarder's mess that's sitting on a more valuable lot (we did this with an uncle's property).

It depends on your market and who you're trying to appeal to. It would probably be easier to sell empty, or with minimal furniture, unless you're looking to sell to a flipper.

Selling a home 'as is' when it's filled with personal belongings and 'stuff' is never a good idea and will intimidate and turn off a lot of buyers. It's never a recommendation to sell a house in that fashion as you'll likely realize a lot less that way.

EBTH only accepts items to auction off online if you live in Ohio, otherwise, they'll take 'smalls' when you box them up and ship them to their Ohio offices. If you live in Ohio, they'll send a truck to the house and load it up; but they're only looking for certain types of items in very good condition, etc. Check out their website at EBTH.com.

Your best bet is probably to hire a local estate sale company to come into the home and conduct a sale on the premises. Go to Estatesales.net and search out a local company who has good reviews on Yelp or Google, and they can conduct a 3 day sale and get rid of everything; whatever is left over they can hire a clean out company to cart it all away. They normally charge a 40% fee; they take 40% of what comes in, you get 60%. But they will organize, set up and price everything, you will do nothing. You'll also be advised to be out of the house while the sales take place. You will take out what you want to keep before the estate sale people come in, and they'll do the rest. Easy peasy.

Good luck!

You don’t leave a bunch of items and clutter for the new homeowner to get rid of! Are you serious? It’s the responsibility of the homeowner or POA to get the stuff out. My suggestion is after items wanted by his children are claimed, then hire a company to hold an estate sale. What doesn’t sell will be donated. Many estate companies have a relationship with a charity and they will haul it out and clean up. Then hire a realtor and get a contract. Get the home professionally cleaned. You can sell the house as is at this point but that must be spelled out in the contract.

Contact someone from an estate sale company and have them do a sale. They'll go through everything, price it, and conduct the sale for a cut of the proceeds. (Check yelp.com for estate sales in your area.) Donate anything left over, and often the estate sale company will take care of getting that stuff out, too.

There may be a Realtor in the area who specializes in selling estates. (Check Yelp again for that.) This whole process can be much easier than you think.

I sold my dad’s house first and then hired a local estate sale company recommended by the realtor. They come in take pictures and do the sales online and then everyone comes in on one day to take what they bought. Don’t expect to make any money. It’s mainly away to get rid of the stuff without it going to a landfill. Also, they won’t take everything. So expect to spend some time cleaning out the rest of the stuff and either donating it or throwing it away. Or you could hire one of the “junk” hauler companies to take it away. My dad didn’t have a lot of stuff so I left what he had in there while it was up for sale. It sold quickly. Once I had everything out I had the carpet professionally cleaned and cleaned the entire house myself. There were a few larger furniture items that the buyer wanted so that became part of the sale.

I am a Realtor. Please find a reputable estate company by asking your friends, etc. Yelp is not usually the best place to find that company as owners often post their own reviews. Same with a reputable, experienced, local real estate agent - ask around, do your own local research, etc. to find a good fit for you.

Selling a property "As Is" does NOT mean you leave everything in the house for someone else to deal with. "As Is" simply means that any inspections are for informational purposes only and the Seller(s) will not be making any repairs, etc.

You will also need proof that you're legally able to sell the house.

I'm a licensed Realtor in MD.

I hope this information is helpful to you. Good luck!

I agree with the Realtor. I am a referral agent also. I will also add if you can find a SRES, this agent specializes in working with seniors homes and seniors. They typically have estate firms, legal service experts, and they have empathy in these matters .

The house will sell better if all of the personal items are cleared out. You can leave a few pieces of furniture in good condition for staging purposes. Also hire a cleaning service to give it a thorough cleaning.

My husband and I spent a number of months cleaning up my dads house and moving things to mini storage that needed to be gone through later. He never threw away a piece of paper and as his legal conservator, I'm still sorting through all of this to be sure I keep 7 years of tax returns, etc. Once we had everything out and moved to nini storage that myself or siblings could possibly want, we hired an estate sale company to do the rest. Dad had a couple workshops out back that the rats had moved into and they even cleaned those out for me because there was no way we were going to do that. They got top dollar for a lot of things and also sold both of my dads cars at far more than I would have asked.. They took everything out when the sale was done. Yes, they took a large amount of the proceeds from the sale but so worth it. They got far more than I would have. Wonderful people, too. I follow their sales here in town and have been to several. Dads house has been for sale for several months. We've dropped the price once but might do again soon. I had not planned on having it for sale this long. People have commented it needs updating - yes - but all doable while living there. An estate sale company was definitely the way to go for us.

First and foremost, PLEASE honor your loved one by having him/her keep a few treasures and donating much the rest. Yes, it is time consuming but it can be done. You will still need to personally go through all papers for valuable legal documents, & financial info that needs to be safely kept or destroyed, etc. You'd be surprised at the amount of stuff that is wanted and needed and can be donated - just go online. There are many reputable organizations, like Habitat for Humanity that will pick up your furniture for free. 1800GOTJUNK can take care of all the excess. A good realtor can guide you to professionals who handle the disposition of estates but be aware this can come with a hefty price tag. The sale will go more swiftly with a cleaned out home. Best of luck.

Eother way.
I have purchased homes both ways.
Might as well list it right away with just a For Sell Sign by owner, just in case someone in the area is looking to buy.
Then let the Interested Buyer know that it can be done either way. They can Buy As Is or Cleared out.
If you don't want to have to make Repairs, List it as AS IS and CASH Only.
Selling it yourself will save you 6%

We had to do this twice with late MIL and my mother who is now in SN. It was an arduous process. Alot was thrown out but there was also much saved that was desirable or sentimental that was meaningful. We along with my 3 adult children received some of it. In both cases realtors wanted the place mostly cleared out to a degree. Then the house and apartment were generally sold as is as they both needed improvements. They both were in a desirable real estate market so they sold fairly quickly. I think you need to be aware ot the real estate market you are in.

If you have no desire for anything in the residence and an estate sale company wants the business then go that way. I don't think it is advisable to think a new owner should take this on unless you are in a very hot market and or you are selling below current market value. Perhaps you can come back and update us. It is nice if a poster asks for advice and replies generally to all who have given advice. Taking myself out of the equation you have received alot of very strong advice.

As someone else posted As Is means you are not responsible for repairs or upgrades. You will either have to go through and keep what you want, make piles one is keep, one is donate, and one is trash. Or make it all trash. Take pickup loads at a time to the dump. Clean out everything. I was able to sell to a local guy who wanted to flip it. He paid the tax assessed value (which you need to keep as a minimum if your parent may need medicaid). We didnt have to pay any realtor that way.

Here's the reality on estate sales. I've had one for my in-laws home which had more than 50 YEARS worth of accumulation in attics, basements, garages, etc. As people get older, they just can't keep up with maintaining all their "stuff". It gets old, dusty, dirty, brittle, etc. After family members took what they wanted, we hired a local estate company. We had the option (for an additional fee) to have them "take care of" the remaining items. What they do is, they load it up in truck and take it away. After an estate sale, there is literally nothing left of value. That truck will go to a dump. Estate companies do not have the personnel to sift through leftovers to resell or donate.

We chose to deal with the leftovers ourselves. I then washed and cleaned what I donated (please don't donate dirty dusty items to charity) and hired a clean out company who hauled the remaining stuff away. It was a truck and a half of "stuff".

As we age, please consider family members who are left behind. In 2 years, I had to "clean out" 50 years worth of my parents AND my in-laws houses accumulation alone. It was mentally and physically exhausting as I am a VERY sentimental person. All those items brought back memories and there were many days I would drive home after working in their houses all day and sit in my driveway and cry -- for the loss of my parents and in-laws and the fact that we (as a society) accumulate so much "stuff" that our family members do not WANT. What we think is valuable is NOT to our children. Trust me. Do your family a favor, and donate your items NOW before leaving it for family members to deal with. After 40 years of marriage, I pretty much have had that conversation with my 3 children. I know what they want of our "stuff" and it's not much. In fact, hardly anything. I am in my early 60's and my goal is to clean out as much as possible while I'm able to do it. Don't wait hoping your family wants your "stuff". Do it NOW.

My mother and dad were hoarders. Especially of papers and correspondence. My dad lived to 96, my mother (99) is still alive. When we sold their house, it took two 20 yard dumpsters just for their paper trash, leaving 96 boxes or tubs full of "important papers, don't get rid of those!". My cousin had a great idea. We took all of their other stuff out on the lawn, put up a sign that said, "Every item - $.25 cents!" By the end of the day, all of their thousands of useless items were gone!

On another tangent on elders selling thier home, if Medicaid is involved or anticipated to be a part of your elders paying for care in the future, please be mindful that Medicaid has compliance issues for elders assets. And you need to keep any & all receipts and records relating to the sale of the home & the costs to sell to deal w future Medicaid. Especially invoices & receipts for work done by family or friends who do not have a business (that is being paid).

Also if they are any community based Medicaid programs now (like PACE or an inhome service) and they went onto this after age 55, Medicaid is required to attempt a recoup of all costs paid from their estate after death. Done via MERP for however your state runs this. This gets sticky if they sell a home while still alive as that Medicaid “bill” is looming out there but is an after death process unless your state can do a placeholder lien on the property. It’s not a securitized lien like a mortgage, it’s more subterranean lien. If state does Tefra, that lein could arise in title search and change who gets $ at the Act of Sale. If your elder is on Medicaid now, clearly ask your Realtor what their experience is on Medicaid liens for your state.

Also should they need Medicaid down the road from now and apply for LTC Medicaid (care in a facility), that Medicaid application will have a 5 yr lookback on all their financials. The #s have to make sense…..
Say mom sold the house today for 350K & mom gets 1500 a m in SS income and mom ends up applying for Medicaid in Nov 2023 (2 yrs from now). Medicaid will want to know if that was FMV for its price and sold as “arms length sale” and the caseworker can access state databases for all this. To apply for LTC Medicaid you have to be down to 2K in assets in most states & by applying you allow for all access pass to your information, like any state & federal database. Medicaid will want to know in detail & with documentation just where $ 384,000.00 went. If any $ was gifted, Medicaid will place a penalty on the application. It can make sense, like they r paying 16K a mo private pay for care in a facility. 16 x24 = 384. But if living with family with no personal care agreements in place, it looks sketch.

Hello. Ive been wondering the same thing and have decided that once my family picks thru things (while i’ll be looking over their shoulders at my meaningless little scraps of paper) that i’ll call various donation places and let them look and once theyre all done i’ll call the junk haulers, step back, and have them take away the rest.

no garage sales ... im to lazy and will want to keep it all.

im not a “complete” hoarder ... whatever that might be ... but i “cant” get rid if it on my own either.

Homes tend to sell sooner if they have been professionally staged. Usually a realtor will have somebody who can do that. My sister and mom have both sold homes in the last couple of years. From their experiences:

1 - Box up everything that is personal, religious, alcohol-themed, has semi-clothed figures, or profanity.
2 - Box up everything until you have achieved a hotel room level of decoration.
3 - Store all this is a garage or storage unit.
4 - Empty out the pantry, freezer, and refrigerator.
5 - Get a professional cleaner in to do a thorough cleaning, including carpet.
6 - Cut the grass and mulch flower beds.
7 - Get a professional photographer (realtor usually has a good one) to take great pictures of the home.
8 - Once property posts, most homes are sold in less than 1 month.
9 - You can sell contents of home to one of those second hand buyers once the property sells. Sometimes home buyers want to but the furnishings.

I became disabled, no family. To the extent possible, I went through it all and put it into boxes. I also begged for friends to come and help - not an easy thing to accomplish. Finally all was marked in boxes - donations, to (name), etc. I contacted an auctioneer who I thought was the answer to prayer (big mistake). I thought the contents would be brought to the auction and people would bid (I saw it and liked the results). Well the day came and I hired someone to be present and supervise as I was unable to be there. The auctioneer people just came (about 8 of them) and totally ignored everything he said or did. Took everything - they did NOT auction items - instead they put items into "lots" and sold the lots for xxx dollars. I got far less than what he originally told me. I felt violated and scammed - but it was too late. I was by then a misfit cripple - could not walk - in assisted living. Lost my home, my life, EVERYTHING, and then this. I never got over this.

I am in the middle of this situation with my parents house. I found a AL facility much closer to me and my family, which is a great place. Now trying to empty many years of stuff to sell the house. What I am finding is that the estate sales people in the area are too busy or are scheduling sales 3-5 months out. No one in the area is picking up donations, and many places are only accepting limited drop-off donations or none at all. Thank You pandemic. We have taken home more the things than we needed; are taking some to places in my town accepting donations, and will be calling a junk collector to carry out the things I can't manage myself. My parents would not like what we did but we are doing the best we can. Instead of selling it in 3 months, it has now been 8 months. Part of the problem has been me though, as I have been trying to carry-on life at my house and make many 1 to 3 day trips to work on theirs. Not looking for advice here, but sharing the reality of how things have changed in some parts of the country.

Generally houses must be empty to be sold.

Juse finished doing this for my mom in Memory Care. My sister and I , spent many months working a few days each week, sometimes together, sometimes separately. Now we are lucky, Mom and Dad planned ahead, and has savings and LTC insurance, so Medicaid rules or her needing funds did not apply. So knowing mom would want her things to be used by family first, then sold/donated we went to work. Mom saved ALL my and my sister schoolwork! toys, board games, even my old brownie uniform. It was hard to go through, as we kept getting distracted by memories. My mom and dad's correspondence during his wartime service!
So my sister and I took what we wanted, then grandkids, then other close family members and friends. We shredded tons of paper(think tax records dating to the 50s) Go through all purses, and all paper. Keep records dealing with the house like insurance claims and maintenance or loans..
We found more than $3000, in travelers checks and cash tucked away. Part in a dresser( they lived on Gulf coast, was their run from the hurricane money, part among old vacation memorabilia. Over $200 in coins. We boxed up hundred of photos dating to the early 1900, some were my grandparents (young grandad grinning on a motorcycle!) My son took her piano and now my grandchild is learning piano on the same piano I did.
Once family had everything we wanted, and personal papers either shredded or kept and trash had been discarded, we contracted with a local person to do an estate sale. They washed, displayed and priced everything and ran the sale for 3 days. They take a percentage of the profits, what % varies with company. Ours, once complete, let us look over things one more time, and then said they would donate or discard what we didn't want that didn't sell.
Once all that was done, I hired a cleaning service to do a deep clean on everything, and we put it on the market.
The check for the sale will be placed in her retirement accounts along with proceeds from the sale to be used for her care.

I would caution you just not to sell without going through things. Some of my college paperwork was still there,, which had my social security number all over it, and of course all my parents tax records. Which could be an issue with identity theft.

You will get a better price for the house if it is empty and clean and repairs are made.
Technically the house will be sold “as is” since you probably can not complete accurately the disclosure statement. (Unless you have lived there and are fully aware of problems)
If you have the time it would be best for you and family members to go through the house. Most items are probably not worth much if anything at all other than sentimental value.
Companies that do Estate Sales take a hefty % also auction houses take a %.
Donation sites like Purple Hearts, Salvation Army, and others will pick up and most will take furniture. With the exception of mattresses, most will not take a used mattress.
You can contact the waste disposal company and ask if they will bo a special pick up. Or you can buy the “Bagster” a less expensive, smaller version of a dumpster. Unless there is a lot then a dumpster might be a better option.
Make sure you go through ALL pockets, drawers, books and any other place cash or valuables might be hidden.

Gracie, thanks for sharing the good advice on checking before something is discarded.  Medical records with SS numbers, or records with account numbers, could be financial manna in the hands of those w/o scruples.

Everyone has such good points. We were faced with a rush to clean out Mom's stuff this past summer. She was someone who never met a piece of paper she didn't love! She had every greeting card, every email (printed out), every photo that ever touched her hands. She was so good at squirreling things away that we had no clue what a hoarding nightmare we were faced with when it came to moving her, putting her house up for sale, and emptying the place.

We went through all the papers and photos, finding passports and cancelled checks and important documents mixed throughout. We preserved her treasures and she chose the furniture pieces that would go with her to her retirement apartment. We worked our tales off, mostly donating her things. (She had big pieces of oak furniture, hard to move and out of style. We were lucky anyone would take them off our hands.)

Now that she's moved and settled, she is so angry at us! She thinks we just gave her stuff away because we were too lazy to do a proper job of it. She gossips about my husband me behind our backs, but people tell us that she thinks we did her wrong.

If I had it to do over again, I might pay for a mover to pack everything up and move it to storage. Big expense, but then we could say to her, "When you feel better, you can go to the storage unit and sort it all out." I think that day would never come because she can't bring herself to throw away anything. At least then, however, she wouldn't think we did her wrong.

Bottom line: I don't think there's a best way to do this, but the house definitely sold better and faster because we had emptied it of the last shred of paper, the last treasured scrap of "still good" cloth, the last unread book....

Wishing you good outcomes!

I sold to *We buy ugly houses*
The house was a nightmare! Deferred maintenance, sewer problems.
They said anything we didn't want or couldn't move to just leave. They work with charities that come pick up unwanted furniture, kitchen items etc.
We went through everything and removed ALL paperwork, photos.
It was a huge relief to unload it. I got more than I expected given the really bad shape it was in. She and my father were chain smokers. 60 years of nicotine crap covered every surface in a smelly, grimey yellow sludge. I'm a non smoker can you tell?
Of course if the house is in good shape you're better off clearing it out and selling yourself.

My mother was in an "over 55" complex with 2 bedrooms and 2 baths. We moved her to assisted living. We cleaned out all the personal items in her house, then the realtor had an open house and offered any items (furniture, china, dishes, you name it) at a significant discount. Quite a few items sold and we packed up the rest and gave them to Goodwill. I removed all her medical/personal records and have them in a file cabinet in my garage.

Now her apartment in assisted living is much less cluttered and can be cleaned out easily. She is in the last days of hospice now so I will be more interested in seeing if the folks at assisted living have a service that will remove the remaining furniture.

Mom's care facility said we had to sell the house so we got a realtor to take care of it. He came in, looked at it, and told us what it was worth, and put it on the market. It was a fixer upper. We had cleaned out the house and put mom's things in storage. Funny thing was, by the time we paid the elder law attorney and the realtor, the care facility didn't get much money - they were pretty upset!

JLyn69: When I had to live with my late mother out of state in her home (long story short - she wouldn't budge), after she passed away we used a variety of tactics as we had to sell her home and I had to return to my state. Had a realtor with a lock box. Gave mementos to friends and family. Gave 500 baskets to florist shop - yes, my mother had that many. Gave furniture to family. Gave major furniture items to resale shop that picked up. Gave clothing and elder care items to senior center. Gave major food stuffs to family friend, whose DH was also a state trooper who offered to watch the home when we vacated it. Fortunately, after my DH arrived, he took control of the purging out since I was obviously exhausted as I had been living there without relief for an extended period AND I was already an elder myself.
Best of luck.