We have been doing house clearance in Alfreton since 2007, and most of what comes to us in DE55 is a family house that has to be emptied by somebody who no longer lives in it. One August Thursday a couple of years back is a fair picture of what a house clearance in Alfreton actually looks like.
An old school house — took two loads and most of one August Thursday. The person paying for it lived in the Derby suburbs, twenty-odd minutes down the A38, and had run the whole job by phone: photographs one week, a date the next, keys handed over on the morning. That arrangement is common enough round Alfreton and it works, so long as somebody tells us plainly what is staying and what is going.
Two loads came out. The first was gone before dinnertime and the second finished the house the same day. There was a fridge freezer in the kitchen, and that one leaves by its own route. The gas in the back of it has to be drawn off under the regulations before the carcass can be recycled, and it cannot simply be tipped in with the furniture. Everything else was ordinary enough: beds, wardrobes, the kitchen, and the accumulation that builds up in a house somebody has lived in for decades.
The lads were there for nine and did not stand about. Afterwards the customer wrote: "They were on time, got on with the job straight away and completed the job in very quick time. They were lovely people, very friendly and conscientious, did everything I asked and with great care, and kept me fully informed throughout."
Kept informed is the part that counts when you are not stood in the hallway watching. Our team leaders photograph every room as they walk in and again once it is bare, and those pictures go straight to whoever booked the job. If you are in Derby, or on the south coast, or further, it is the only sight of it you will get.
How a house clearance day in DE55 is arranged
You book a team for the day and they stay with it until the house is done, however many pairs of hands that takes. Nobody comes out to stand on your doorstep with a clipboard first. A phone call and a few photographs tell us more than a walk round ever did, and they tell us sooner.
A handful of things have to be dealt with on their own, whatever house they come out of — fridges and freezers, mattresses, televisions and monitors, and upholstered furniture.
That last category catches people out. Since the persistent organic pollutant regulations came in, sofas, armchairs, padded dining chairs and divan bases cannot travel mixed in with general household waste. The foam and the fabric have to go down a separate permitted route and be destroyed there. It is not a rule we invented; every legitimate clearance firm in Derbyshire handles those items the same way.
Give us a rough idea over the phone — how many bedrooms, whether the loft is full, whether there is a garage or an outhouse behind — and you will have an answer before anyone sets off. Photographs help more than any description; one customer sent room-by-room pictures the day before, and the team knew what van and what kit they needed before the key came off the hook. The quote is free and there is nothing to sign at the end of it. Ring 0800 046 5555, or send the pictures through the form on this page.
Around Alfreton and the rest of Amber Valley
Alfreton and Swanwick sit in DE55 along with Somercotes, Riddings, Leabrooks, Ironville, South Normanton, Pinxton, Shirland, Higham, Westhouses and Blackwell. Ripley and Codnor are DE5, the Amber Valley villages above it, and Heanor and Langley Mill are DE75. Alfreton, Ripley and Heanor are all in Amber Valley Borough, with Derbyshire County Council behind them for waste and recycling. Step over towards Blackwell and Tibshelf and you are into Bolsover district, which changes nothing for us but occasionally confuses people about which council collects what.
Alfreton station sits out on its own to the west of the centre, by the A38, and the trains through it run down to Nottingham one way and up through Chesterfield to Sheffield the other. Worth knowing if you are an executor coming in for the day rather than driving. The M1 comes off at junction 28 at South Normanton, five minutes away, and the A38 and A61 cross at the Watchorn roundabout.
The rest of the county is worked out of the same diary. house clearance in Belper over towards the Derwent, house clearance in Ilkeston down in the Erewash valley, house clearance in Chesterfield up the A61 — but Alfreton and its own DE55 villages are what this page is about.
The houses round here
Alfreton is an old coal town and the housing tells you so. Long rows of Victorian and Edwardian terraces built for the pits, many of them still with the original coal shed or brick outhouse in a narrow back yard. Then the interwar semis on the wider roads out towards Somercotes, then the estates put up in the sixties and seventies, and newer closes off the A38 where the land has been reclaimed.
Each of those clears differently. A terrace on one of the steep streets off the High Street means carrying everything down a staircase built when furniture was smaller than it is now, then along the pavement to wherever the van could stop. The newer estate houses are straightforward inside but the parking is often worse, because everybody has two cars and no garage they actually park in.
Outbuildings are where the volume hides. A three-bedroom house with an old brick outhouse attached will often hold more out there than in the second bedroom — tools, tins, garden chairs, a lifetime of things put out of the way and never fetched back. Garage and loft clearance is the part people forget to mention when they first ring. Tell us about the shed, the coal house and the loft when you do. It is far better than the team discovering them at half past two.
Parking, access and the small print of a clearance day
We start at nine as a rule. If nine does not suit — and it often does not, if you are travelling in from another county to meet us. Say so and we will set a later start; ten is no trouble at all when it is asked for in advance. What we do need to know beforehand is where the van goes. Some Alfreton streets have restrictions, some have none at all, and one line on the booking saying the road is quiet and the van can sit outside the house will save an hour on the day.
If you cannot be there, we will collect keys from a neighbour, an estate agent, a managing agent or a key safe, clear the property, lock up and email the photographs. Anything of sentimental value that turns up we will set aside and post on if you ask.
Probate, estates and jobs run from far away
A good share of what we do in Derbyshire is probate work, and much of it is instructed by somebody who does not live anywhere near the house. A son two counties away, a daughter abroad, an executor who has never once seen the place. Probate clearances have their own rhythm. Nothing moves at all until the grant is through, and then everything has to move at once, because by that point a buyer is usually waiting.
Where solicitors, an attorney or the executors are handling matters, we invoice them direct rather than asking a grieving family to put it on a card, and a probate clearance can be settled out of the estate. No deposit is taken and nothing is due until the house is empty and you are satisfied. The detail of how a probate job runs from first phone call to waste transfer note sits on our probate house clearance page.
When a clearance is booked by a managing agent, not a family
Not every job comes from a family. One we did in July 2022 was instructed by a block and estate management company — the people who look after a building rather than live in it. The date came out of their office, the property manager responsible for the block signed it off, and we never spoke to a resident or a relative at any point. Every question and every instruction went through the managing agent.
What that one left behind in our files is not a list of furniture but a chain of emails, and it is a fair picture of how the corporate end of this trade actually works. Invoices go to one mailbox, then on to the relevant property manager for approval, and the property manager may be looking after a dozen buildings. When we asked a question about our own paperwork, the answer came back "I have forwarded your query to my colleague at Supplier Enquiries" — a different desk again, inside the same company. Nothing wrong with any of that. It simply means we now ask, before the van is booked, which desk wants the instruction, which desk wants the paperwork, and who is allowed to say yes.
So if you manage blocks or let property round Alfreton and you need a flat emptied between tenants, an end of tenancy clearance is the same job to us as a house. Keys from your office, photographs back to your office, waste transfer note with the invoice, no chasing you for a decision on the day.
What comes out, and where it actually goes
Furniture still in decent order, crockery, books, tools, bedding that has been kept well — we would far rather see that reused than skipped, so it goes to charity shops and reuse schemes rather than to a tip. Metal, wood, cardboard, electricals and white goods are separated for recycling. What is genuinely finished is taken to a permitted transfer station and weighed in, with a transfer note issued, and we can pass that paperwork on if the estate or a landlord needs proof of proper disposal. We hold waste carrier licence CBDU419679 and we are fully insured for the work. A single room, a garage or a yard full of rubbish does not need a whole clearance team, mind — that is house rubbish removal and we do it the same way.
There are things we cannot put in an ordinary load. Half-used tins of gloss and thinners, gas bottles off a patio heater, asbestos sheeting from an old garage roof, oil drums, medical sharps. Those need their own arrangements, and Derbyshire County Council's household waste sites take some of them from residents free of charge. Medical equipment on loan — hospital beds, hoists, commodes — we leave in place, because the provider wants it back and will collect it.
Flat clearance in DE55, and full houses
A flat clearance is its own sort of day here — a shared stair, no lift in most of the blocks, and a van that has to stand where it does not block residents. Some of what we are called to is not a tidy three-bed with the beds stripped. It is a house where the hall has a path through it and the back bedroom has not been opened in years. We clear those. Nobody on the team pulls a face, nobody makes remarks, and we work through it room by room, checking as we go, because cash, jewellery and paperwork turn up inside the most unlikely things and always get handed straight back. That is hoarder house clearance, and it is slower — two days rather than one, sometimes, and worth allowing for when you book.
Common questions about house clearance in Alfreton
Do you cover the villages as well as Alfreton itself?
Yes. Somercotes, Riddings, Leabrooks, Swanwick, Ironville, South Normanton, Pinxton, Shirland, Higham, Westhouses and Blackwell are all DE55 and all the same morning's drive to us.
Can you invoice a solicitor or executor for a probate house clearance?
Yes. We invoice solicitors, attorneys and executors direct, and a probate clearance can be settled from the estate. There is no deposit, and the invoice follows the work rather than coming before it.
How do I get a quote for a house clearance in Alfreton?
Ring 0800 046 5555 and describe the house, or send photographs through the form on this page. The quote is free and there is no obligation in it.
How long does a house clearance in Alfreton take?
Most three-bedroom houses are a single day. A full loft, a garage and an outhouse behind it can push it into a second day, and a house that has not been cleared out in thirty years usually does. Describe it honestly over the phone and we will tell you which it is before you book.
What can you not take away?
Asbestos, gas bottles, oil drums, half-used paint and solvents, and medical sharps. Those go by separate routes, and we will tell you which one when you ring rather than leaving them in the garage for the next people.
Can you clear the house if I cannot be there?
Yes. Keys come from a neighbour, an estate agent, a managing agent or a key safe, every room is photographed before and after, and the house is locked up behind us.
Booking
Phone the office on 0800 046 5555 and describe the property as it stands — bedrooms, loft, garage, outhouse, whether the electric is still on, when the sale completes. We will tell you what days we have free in the Alfreton area and what we would need before the van sets off. If it is simpler, send photographs through the form on this page and we will work from those.
