We have been clearing houses since 2007, and Newhaven sits on a run we do most weeks rather than somewhere we visit twice a year. If you want a figure for a house clearance in Newhaven, ring 0800 046 5555 or send photographs through the form on this page. The rest of this is how the work actually goes, which is harder to find out than a phone number.
The garage was the part that took longest. A two-bedroom second-floor flat on one of the quayside developments along the coast from us at Shoreham, booked for a Friday morning at nine, and the flat itself was tidy enough. Beds, a sofa, wardrobes, the usual kitchen cupboards. Then the lock-up garage that came with it, which had quietly absorbed fifteen years of things nobody wanted to decide about. The couple were emigrating and had a flight date they could not move. Everything went in one day.
They also asked, half seriously, whether we could run twelve big suitcases up to a hotel near Heathrow for them, because the airline's cargo side had fallen through. We couldn't — that's a removals job, not ours — but it tells you the sort of thing people are juggling when they call. A house clearance is almost never the only thing going on that week.
That job was BN43. Newhaven is BN9, twenty-odd miles east along the same coast road, and we work the whole stretch. Peacehaven and Telscombe Cliffs in BN10, Seaford in BN25, Lewes and the villages up the Ouse valley in BN7 and BN8, plus Denton, South Heighton, Piddinghoe and Bishopstone. The team comes down for a nine o'clock start and works the day. Newhaven Town station sits right by the swing bridge, and Newhaven Harbour is a couple of minutes further on the Seaford branch. Handy if you're an executor coming down from London for the day and want to hand over a key rather than drive.
What a Newhaven day usually looks like
The housing here is mixed in a way that matters to us. There are the Victorian and Edwardian terraces on the streets climbing away from the harbour, narrow-fronted, steep stairs, front doors straight onto the pavement. There's the interwar and postwar stock up Denton and towards Mount Pleasant, semis with garages and long back gardens. And there are the flats and maisonettes closer to the front. Each one changes the day. A terrace with a tight staircase and no off-street parking is slower to empty than a bungalow with a driveway, even if the amount of furniture is identical, because every item is carried further.
Parking is the thing we ask about first on any house clearance in Newhaven. A Luton box van needs a proper run at the kerb and somewhere to sit for several hours without being moved. Suspending a bay is worth checking with East Sussex County Council; on the narrower harbour-side streets we sometimes work with one person shuttling to the van rather than parking outside the door at all. We had a three-day clearance over at Eastbourne where the team couldn't get the van anywhere near the house for most of the first day, and that alone stretched a two-day estimate into three. When that happens we tell you before the extra day starts, not after.
Room by room, and the things that stay
Not every job is empty-the-lot. One Friday in July 2023 we did a partial clearance where the property had been described to us in the customer's own words as "2 bed bungalow with garages underneath" — two bedrooms above, garages below, and only part of the contents to come out. The person instructing us wasn't going to be there. A next-door neighbour held the key and met the crew at the door for nine, and we had a mobile number for both of them so nothing needed guessing at on the day.
Before the Friday there was a fortnight of email, and it was the ordinary sort. We won't put a date in the diary until we have a set of answers in writing. The full postal address of the property, whether there is or has been any COVID at the property and whether anyone attending is isolating, the date you want the work done, the size of the property and the outside areas included, a contact name and telephone number for the team on the day, who will be present to let the crew in and instruct them, whether there is anything hazardous or verminous inside, and any special requirement. A stairlift to come off the wall, say. His reply began: "Here is the information you require in order to conduct the partial clearance on the 14th July." Then he answered every line of it, in order. A few days beforehand he wrote once more, just to make sure nothing had slipped between us.
That is the whole trick to a partial job. You do not have to write it out that thoroughly, but a short "these go, these stay" note stuck to the fridge is worth more than a long phone call, and it saves the crew standing about with a wardrobe half-lifted while somebody rings you. Garages underneath a property are exactly the sort of thing that needs saying out loud. They tend to be where the overflow lives, and whether they are in the job or out of it changes the shape of the day entirely. Partial clearances come up on a house clearance in Newhaven as often as anywhere else — a flat sold part-furnished, a landlord keeping the white goods, a family keeping one room back until the will is settled.
Bags of clothing set aside for a charity shop get dropped where the family asks. Anything still fit for use we would rather see back in circulation — a charity shop on the High Street, a furniture reuse project, someone's first flat — than crushed into the back of a van. The rest is weighed in at a permitted site, and the waste transfer note comes back to you, usually within a fortnight.
What we can't put in with the furniture
Some things aren't allowed to travel in an ordinary mixed load. Tins of paint, thinners, gas cylinders, car batteries and anything similar go separately under the hazardous rules, so tell us if they're lurking in the shed. Fridges and freezers are classed as hazardous too, because of the gas in the circuit, and they're degassed at a licensed facility. Sofas, armchairs and footstools fall under the POPs rules. Persistent organic pollutants, the flame retardants in the foam. So since 2023 they have had to go to permitted incineration rather than the ordinary shredding line, and they cannot be tipped in with the rest of the load.
None of that stops a house clearance in Newhaven going ahead; it just means we want to know what's there before the van is loaded rather than after. We're insured for the work, and registered with the Environment Agency as an upper-tier waste carrier, CBDU419679. If you ever want the number checked, it's on the public register.
Kinds of house clearance we take on in Newhaven
End of tenancy clearance in Newhaven
Landlords and managing agents call us between tenancies, usually with a date already fixed by the next let. An end of tenancy clearance is normally a single day: what the outgoing tenant left, the shed, the loft hatch nobody has opened, and a brush through afterwards so the place can be photographed. If the property is furnished and only the tenant's own things are to go, say so in writing and we'll work to the list.
Flat clearance in Newhaven, BN9
A flat clearance around the harbour and the seafront is nearly always about the stairs and the kerb rather than the contents. Second and third floors with no lift, a communal door that has to stay shut, a bin store the neighbours quite reasonably want left alone. We carry down; we don't drop things over balconies. If there's a lock-up or a garage attached to the flat, tell us at the quote stage — see above for why.
Garage and loft clearance in Newhaven
Plenty of people don't want the house touched at all. A garage and loft clearance on its own is a normal booking for us. The lofts up Denton and Mount Pleasant, the interwar garages that were built for a smaller car and have been a store ever since. Ladders, boarding and lighting all get asked about first, because a loft you can stand up in empties in an hour and one you crawl in takes half a day.
Hoarder house clearance in Newhaven
Rooms so full you can't get the door past them don't faze the crew; they've walked into worse and got on with it without comment. This work is slower, it is sorted rather than shovelled, and it often runs to more than one day. If that's what you're facing, our hoarder house clearance page explains how we approach it.
What a day costs
Photographs are enough for a sensible figure on most houses. Send us a shot of each room, the loft hatch, the garage and whatever is behind the shed, and we'll tell you how many loads and how many days. The estimate costs nothing and commits you to nothing, and there's nothing to pay before the work is done — the invoice follows once you've seen the rooms empty.
Occasionally the crew opens a cupboard or a loft and finds another load's worth. It happened on a bungalow near Eastbourne with a shed, a garage and a good deal more in the outbuildings than anyone expected — and we ring you mid-morning with the options before touching any of it.
Probate, executors and clearances run from a distance
A lot of what we do around Newhaven, Seaford and Peacehaven is probate work, and a fair share of it is instructed by someone who lives nowhere near East Sussex. We've cleared houses on this coast for people in Oxfordshire, in Essex, on the Isle of Man and once from Colombia. It works perfectly well: an agent, a neighbour or a solicitor's clerk lets the team in, we photograph the finished rooms and email them the same evening, and the keys go back wherever you tell us. A probate house clearance in Newhaven is often the last thing standing between an estate and a sale, so we'd rather be told the deadline than guess at it.
Invoicing can go to the executor, to the solicitor handling the estate, or to the property company managing the sale — whichever suits the paperwork, and it can be paid from the estate. We've been asked to hold off, to split it, and to send receipts on to a third party, and none of that is a problem. There's more on the process on our probate house clearance page.
Not every clearance is a bereavement, either. Downsizing from a four-bed to a flat by the front, a relative going into care, a property coming back to its owner with more furniture than tenancy agreement — all normal weeks for us.
We also cover the towns either side, and each has its own page. house clearance in Seaford is the next stop east along the coast road, house clearance in Eastbourne is the bigger town beyond it, and house clearance in Peacehaven is ten minutes west in BN10. Same crew, same van, same day rate wherever the job lands in that stretch.
Getting a figure
Ring 0800 046 5555 and describe the rooms, or send photographs through the form on this page — either works. We'll tell you plainly if we think it's a two-day job rather than one. If you want us to look at the loft and the garage before committing, say so and we'll allow for it.
Common questions about house clearance in Newhaven
How soon can you come? Usually within a week or two, and sooner if a completion date is pressing. Tell us the date you're working to when you first ring, because it changes which crew we put on it.
Do I have to be there on the day? No. On a good many of our jobs the person instructing us is hundreds of miles away and a neighbour, agent or solicitor's clerk lets the crew in — that's exactly how the partial clearance above ran. We just need a name and a mobile number for whoever will be at the door, and someone we can ring if a question comes up.
Can you invoice the solicitor on a probate clearance, or does it have to be me? Either. We invoice the executor, the solicitor or the managing agent — whoever the estate's paperwork points at — and payment can come from the estate. Nothing is due before the work is done.
Can you clear part of the house and leave the rest? Yes, and it's a common booking. Write down what stays as well as what goes, stick it to the fridge, and email us a copy so the crew and the office are working from the same list.
Will you take fridges, freezers and mattresses? Yes. Fridges and freezers are degassed at a licensed facility, mattresses and upholstered furniture go down the permitted route rather than into a mixed load, and paints, gas bottles and car batteries are handled separately again. Just tell us they're there so the van goes out set up for them.
What happens to everything you take away? Anything still usable goes to reuse — charity shops, furniture projects, someone setting up a first home. The remainder is weighed in at a permitted transfer station and your waste transfer note follows by email, normally inside a fortnight.
Newhaven, Denton, South Heighton, Peacehaven, Telscombe Cliffs, Seaford, Bishopstone, Piddinghoe, Rodmell and Lewes — all inside the same run, all BN.
