Ray Barrington Posted October 24, 2023 Share Posted October 24, 2023 Hello, Can anyone advise me of a house clearing business that operates in the Dordogne/Charente area? All replies gratefully received. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lehaut Posted October 25, 2023 Share Posted October 25, 2023 Emmaus may take some stuff. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NormanH Posted October 27, 2023 Share Posted October 27, 2023 (edited) Lehaut is quite right, except in our area Emmaus is now no longer accepting stuff. They are overwhelmed, which seems strange given the rampant poverty. There is also the Secours Populaire but I don't think they collect. https://www.secourspopulaire.fr/le-secours-populaire-recherche?tid=361 Edited October 27, 2023 by NormanH Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DaveLister Posted October 27, 2023 Share Posted October 27, 2023 Our local red cross will take most stuff. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ray Barrington Posted October 28, 2023 Author Share Posted October 28, 2023 Hi, Thanks to all who have responded to my post. In my naivity, I thought I might be able to sell most of my house contents, rather than just have them removed. I have some quality items which could be of value, but perhaps, at my age (82) I am not sure of how I should clear the cottage. Any advise would be gratefully received. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lehaut Posted October 29, 2023 Share Posted October 29, 2023 If you price them to go, Leboncoin served us very when when we left our house in Normandy. If you peruse the sections with similar stuff for sale, you will see the (unrealistic imo) prices the French think they can get, and how long they have been trying. Normal selling is free, as are three photos. If you have interesting stuff, (old oak tables etc) you may get dealers turning up to "take them away for you". We had people coming over 100kms to buy some of our furniture, but we sold it a give away prices as we had no further use for it. When selling a house, some people are happy to take the contents for free too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lori Posted October 29, 2023 Share Posted October 29, 2023 When we sold up in the Vaucluse, we called all the usual suspects Emmaus, Red Cross, local churches, etc. They all said their warehouses were chocker full and they could not take anything. I did find that really odd. And the buyer of our house (at that time) was a cash buyer, so the normally 2 to 3 months time frame to close the sale was shortened to 30 days !! So, we had little to no time to get rid of a truck load of 'stuff.' The buyers wanted certain things. In the end, like Lehaut, Leboncoin did the trick. We mostly gave stuff away. Our neighbors also bought quite a bit of things at give away prices. One person who was preparing two gites for rental took a LOT of items. She found us on Leboncoin. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DaveLister Posted October 29, 2023 Share Posted October 29, 2023 If you want an all in one solution perhaps you could try a 'professionnel du débarras'. I've done a search online and found a couple of websites that might help. https://www.debarras-de-maison.com/ https://www.lescompagnonsdebarrasseurs.com/debarras-maison.html I hasten to say I've no experience of using this kind of service. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
menthe Posted October 29, 2023 Share Posted October 29, 2023 3 hours ago, Lehaut said: If you price them to go, Leboncoin served us very when when we left our house in Normandy. If you peruse the sections with similar stuff for sale, you will see the (unrealistic imo) prices the French think they can get, and how long they have been trying. Normal selling is free, as are three photos. If you have interesting stuff, (old oak tables etc) you may get dealers turning up to "take them away for you". We had people coming over 100kms to buy some of our furniture, but we sold it a give away prices as we had no further use for it. When selling a house, some people are happy to take the contents for free too. Yes, when we left our last house, the notaire priced what we left as worth over 10 000€. We put everything in the contract so there would be no mistakes or arguments. We'd already sold the house on Leboncoin and then I had little appetite for dragging out the process with selling other items as well. Old furniture, unless they are antiques with proper provenance as the dealers would say, are worth very little and could take ages to sell or not sell at all. So a lot depends on your timescale. Just give away as much as you can. Even if you are talking several tens of thousands, in say 5 or 10 years time, that "loss" would mean nothing in your life. I would not fret, I would simply free myself of encumbrances and move on to the next phase. Just my thoughts so please do not feel upset if you don't agree with them. In any case, I wish you all the best. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ray Barrington Posted October 30, 2023 Author Share Posted October 30, 2023 Thanks again to all those who have responded to my post, the information is well appreciated and will use the links wisely. Thanks especially to " Menthe " and " Dave Lister " for good advice. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Loiseau Posted October 30, 2023 Share Posted October 30, 2023 Like many of the above responders, I just gave away loads of stuff when selling my résidence secondaire. The buyers wanted only a few of the choicer, more antique pieces, which they got for a derisory amount. But the cost of their removal to the U.K would have been prohibitive. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NormanH Posted October 31, 2023 Share Posted October 31, 2023 Sometimes people organise a "Vide Grenier" but that takes a lot of organisation and fluency in French: https://vide-greniers.org/24-Dordogne Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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