House clearance in Camberwell is rarely a house with a driveway. It is a one-bed above a shop, a converted Victorian with a shared stair, a tall Georgian terrace with a basement kitchen, or a post-war block with a lift that has to be booked. We have been doing this work since 2007, we are a licensed waste carrier, and most of the Camberwell jobs we take come from a family or an executor who is trying to hand keys back by a fixed date.
July 2022, a one-bedroom flat clearance in SE5, close in to Camberwell Green. It was a family clearing their mother's flat, and it came to a single load, with a fridge freezer and a mattress going off separately because both have to. The clearing itself went the way it should. The clean afterwards did not, and it belongs on this page rather than buried somewhere, because it changed how we book cleaning across the whole of our Camberwell house clearance work.
We had sent a cleaner in after the load went out. He was there ten minutes. He had not brought a machine with him, so he asked to use the one in the flat — which the family had already told us was broken. "the cleaner did not bring a vaccum cleaner, and used our mother's, which we told him did not work, he did not do the shower, vaccum the bathroom," they wrote. And: "He did not clean switches and skirting boards. He was there 10 mins." They were right, and we put it right rather than argue. They also wrote, of the clearing itself, "Can we add the clearence was excellent".
Since then the clearance and the clean are booked as two separate jobs, we say up front that a post-clearance clean is a hoover and a wipe-down and nothing grander, and the cleaner turns up with his own machine. If you want the flat properly scrubbed for a handover, say so on the phone — that is a different job with a different crew, and it is better settled before the day than by email a week later.
What left that flat, and where it went
A one-bed in SE5 does not sound like much until you open the cupboards, and this one made a full load on its own. The team worked it down a communal stair with no lift, which is the ordinary arrangement in the converted houses off Denmark Hill and around Camberwell Grove. Carrying a two-seater down a half-landing takes two people and a certain amount of patience.
The fridge freezer could not simply be tipped with the rest. The gas in the circuit means it goes down a regulated route and is logged as its own item. The mattress is the same story for a different reason: a mattress cannot be compacted, so it is handled and recorded separately rather than swallowed into the load. Upholstered furniture with POPs in the foam has had its own separate route since 2023, and we treat it that way whether anybody asks or not.
Furniture and clothing still worth having, we would sooner see reach a charity shop or a reuse project on this side of the river than crushed. What is left goes to a licensed transfer station and comes back with a transfer note, so if an executor or a buyer's solicitor asks where the contents went, there is an answer on paper. Our waste carrier registration is CBDU419679, and we are insured for the work and for the property while we are in it.
A probate house clearance in SW11, run entirely by email
Late 2024, a five-to-six bedroom house with a garden over in SW11. The owner had died, the instructions to book came from a managing agent, and a relative was going to meet the crew at the door to point at things. White goods were going. The garden furniture was going too. There was no off-street parking — a residential street, so the van sat where it could and the crew barrowed the far end of it.
The interesting part of that job was the list. After the clearance was booked, a further set of items came through by email that were not to be touched, and the agent was straight about it: "The items not to remove are in addition to what I stated on the clearance". So we stopped, checked in writing whose instruction we were taking on the day — the agent's or the relative's standing in the hall — and got that answered before anyone lifted anything. On a probate house clearance that question is worth thirty seconds and saves a fortnight of apologies. A thing carried out of the wrong room cannot be carried back in.
That shape of job is common across Camberwell and the districts around it. Property sold or going on the market, family living elsewhere, everything running through a solicitor or a managing agent. As long as somebody can hand over a key and tell us what stays, nobody needs to stand in the hallway for six hours.
Getting a truck to the door in Camberwell
Camberwell has not had a railway station of its own since 1916, which still catches people out. Denmark Hill is the one you want — Thameslink, Southeastern and Overground trains through it — with Loughborough Junction, Peckham Rye and Herne Hill a short way out, and Oval, Kennington and Brixton on the Underground for anyone coming in by tube. None of that matters to a Luton van, but it tells you the shape of the place: dense, terraced, and built long before anyone parked a truck.
Camberwell Grove and the Georgian terraces off it are tall and narrow, three storeys plus a basement, staircases that turn twice with no room to swing a wardrobe. Wardrobes come apart on the landing. Camberwell New Road and Camberwell Church Street are red routes for much of their length, so we cannot sit on them — for anything on those stretches we work off a side street and barrow it, or the owner suspends a bay a few working days ahead. On the red route itself it is TfL you need, not the council. In the post-war blocks between here and Walworth there is usually a lift and sometimes a chute, and a booked lift saves an hour on a big flat. Tell us the floor, the lift and the parking when you ring.
Worth saying: Camberwell itself sits in Southwark, but most of the postcode districts around it — SW2, SW4, SW8, SW9, SE11, SE24, SE27 — are Lambeth, and the two councils do not run their parking or their bulky-waste rules identically. We deal with both weekly, so if you are not sure which side of the line you are on, we usually are.
What cannot go in the van, and why
Half-tins of paint, patio gas bottles, old solvents, car batteries and paraffin heaters cannot travel in a general load at all. Those go through the council's hazardous route or a specialist, and we would far rather say that on the phone than turn up, refuse them on the doorstep and leave you with a cupboard still full. Tyres and plasterboard are separate streams again. Fridges, freezers, mattresses and upholstered furniture all travel with us but down their own regulated routes, as above. If you are unsure what is in the shed, photograph it and send it in through the form on this page.
The kinds of house clearance Camberwell asks for
Flat clearance in SE5 and around Camberwell Green
Most of our Camberwell work is flat clearance: a converted first floor with a shared stair, a maisonette over a shopfront, a single flat in a block. The job stands or falls on access, not on volume, so the questions we ask are floor, lift, stair width and where the van can legally stand.
Garage and loft clearance in Camberwell
Lock-ups behind the terraces, loft hatches with a ladder that has not been down in years, and the strip of garden nobody has walked to the end of. Garage and loft clearance is slower per item than a room clearance and we price the day accordingly — tell us it is up there when you ring, because a loft with no boarding needs two people and a plank, not one bloke and optimism.
End of tenancy clearance and rubbish removal
Landlords and managing agents in SE5, SE11, SW9 and SW2 use us between tenancies: furniture out, house rubbish removal on the same visit, place left broom-clean for the check-out report.
Hoarder house clearance in Camberwell
Flats packed to the ceiling are ordinary work for us. Nobody on the crew comments and nobody takes photographs. We have done enough hoarder house clearance not to need warning first, though a heads-up helps us bring the right protection and enough hands.
Probate house clearance in Camberwell, and who gets the invoice
A good share of our Camberwell house clearance comes from someone sorting out a flat from another county, often against an exchange date. We can clear on an estate's instruction, and we invoice the solicitor, the executor or the estate directly — payment can come out of the estate, and there is no deposit. The quote is free and there is nothing to sign to get one. More on how probate house clearance works is on its own page.
If cash or paperwork is tucked into a book or a coat pocket, it goes on the kitchen counter for whoever is dealing with the estate, and we photograph anything we are unsure about before it moves.
The districts we work
Beyond Camberwell and Denmark Hill we are regularly in house clearance in Kennington and Vauxhall (SE11, SW8), house clearance in Brixton and Stockwell (SW2, SW9), Clapham and Balham (SW4, SW12), house clearance in Battersea (SW11), Herne Hill and Tulse Hill (SE24), West Norwood (SE27), Dulwich (SE21), Streatham (SW16), Barnes (SW13) and the Southwark end of SE1, plus Peckham, Walworth, Loughborough Junction and Oval in between. Mostly Southwark and Lambeth, with Battersea, Balham and Barnes over the line in Wandsworth.
Common questions about house clearance in Camberwell
Can you invoice the solicitor or the estate? Yes. We invoice the solicitor, the executor or the estate directly, payment can come from the estate, and there is no deposit.
Do we need to be there on the day? No. Plenty of our Camberwell clearances run on a key from an agent or a neighbour, with instructions by email. Tell us what stays and we will send confirmation when the keys go back.
How do I find out what it will cost? Ring the office on 0800 046 5555 or send photographs through the form on this page, and you will get a figure back. We do not quote off a room count alone.
Can you take the fridge and the mattress? Yes — both come with us, but each goes down its own regulated route and is recorded separately. Same for upholstered sofas and armchairs.
Do you clear only part of a property? Yes. A single room, a garage and loft, a garden of furniture, or one item. Say what you want gone and what is staying put.
Which councils do you deal with round here? Southwark and Lambeth mainly, Wandsworth for the SW11, SW12 and SW13 end. For parking on a red route it is TfL, not the borough.
Ring 0800 046 5555 with the postcode district, the floor and roughly what is in there — a room, a flat, a house with the loft still full — or send photographs through the form on this page.
