House clearance in Sevenoaks is ordinary work for us rather than a trip out — the town itself, the villages either side of it, and the TN13, TN14 and TN15 postcode districts. We have been clearing houses since 2007. What follows is two real jobs of ours, and then the dull practical half: access and parking, what we cannot legally put on the van, and who the invoice goes to when it is an estate paying.
A three-bedroom house clearance in TN13, December 2022
The booking note came in by email a few days ahead, and it was one of the tidiest we've had. A three-bedroom detached house in TN13, to be cleared on Tuesday 6th December 2022. Two sheds at the back. Some garden furniture. Carpets to stay down, curtains to come out. One fridge and one freezer. Nothing hazardous in the house, nothing verminous, no illness to work around. Parking on the front drive, and if a second vehicle needed a permit, he had permits. He'd be there himself at nine to open up and point at things.
That is about as clear a brief as a clearance ever gets. It still took the whole day.
Houses of that type around Sevenoaks are usually post-war, three bed, loft hatch on the landing, and a garage or a couple of sheds quietly doing the job an attic does somewhere else. The inside went at a fair pace — bedrooms first, then the airing cupboard and the landing, then down through the living room to the kitchen. The sheds were the slow half. They generally are. Two sheds hold an enormous amount of the sort of thing nobody throws away because throwing it away feels wasteful: plant pots stacked eight deep, garden tools with the handles gone soft, coils of hose, a mower, offcuts of timber kept for a job that never came. The garden furniture had sat out through a couple of winters and was past saving. The fridge and the freezer left the property on their own, kept apart from the rest — the coolant gas puts them under different rules and they cannot go in with a mixed load.
A flat clearance, and an email with no question in it
The other one I want to tell you about was a flat, and the person who instructed it did not live in it. The address on the paperwork was one place and the flat was another, a good drive apart. That is half the reason this page bothers to explain how the paperwork works, because it is the normal case, not the odd one.
The whole flat went out in one load. Two mattresses came out of it, and mattresses are never just mattresses any more — there is a section further down on why. The team were in and finished the same day, and that should have been the end of it.
Then an email landed at the office, and the note that went round about it read:
"The subj is “question about the invoice” But there’s no actual question"
So somebody rang her, which is quicker than writing back. She had no question at all. She wanted to pay by card and needed the link sending over, and she had used the subject line nearest to hand.
I keep that one in mind because it is the true shape of this work. Somebody is dealing with a property from a distance, working through a list of things they have never had to do before, and the email they send at nine at night is not going to be neatly composed. It does not need to be. Ring us and it is four minutes.
Where we go around here
The postcode districts on this page are TN13, TN14 and TN15. TN13 is Sevenoaks town itself, running up through Riverhead, Dunton Green, Chipstead and Bessels Green. TN14 takes in Otford, Halstead, Knockholt, Badgers Mount, Shoreham, Eynsford and Sevenoaks Weald. TN15 is Seal, Kemsing, Borough Green, Ightham, Wrotham, Plaxtol and West Kingsdown. Westerham sits just west of us and we are over there most weeks too. The district council is Sevenoaks District Council; the county council is Kent.
North of the town we do a lot of house clearance in Swanley, and further up the same road house clearance in Orpington on the London edge. Eastward across the county, house clearance in Ashford is a regular enough run that it is booked like any other day's work. Those are the neighbours we will genuinely take on in the same week — we are not going to claim the whole of Kent.
Sevenoaks station is on the main line and the A21 and M25 junction 5 put a van at the top of the town without much drama, so we book jobs here as ordinary work rather than as a special trip. Bat and Ball station sits at the north end, and the streets behind it are Victorian terraces with no off-street parking at all — worth telling us at the booking stage, because a caged tipper needs a length of kerb and a wheeled bin route from the door. Dunton Green and the newer closes off it are far easier: driveways, turning space, and usually somewhere sensible to stand the van. Out in TN14 and TN15 the problem is rarely parking and usually the lane — Ightham, Plaxtol and the roads down off the ridge are narrow, and a big vehicle wants to know in advance whether it can turn at the end or has to reverse back out.
House clearance in Sevenoaks: garages, lofts, flats and end of tenancy
Garage and loft clearance in Sevenoaks
A fair share of the house clearance work in Sevenoaks is really garage and loft clearance with a house attached to it. The loft hatch is on the landing, it may or may not be boarded, and there may or may not be a fixed ladder. Garages round here often have not had a car in them since the eighties: bikes with perished tyres, tile offcuts, a chest freezer still humming away in the corner, camping gear, half a kitchen kept in case. We bring our own ladder and lighting. Tell us at the booking stage whether the loft is boarded and whether the garage door still opens, because those two answers change how the day runs more than the number of bedrooms does.
Garage and loft clearance on its own, with the rest of the house left alone, is a perfectly normal booking. So is a single item — a piano, a chest freezer, one sofa.
End of tenancy and flat clearance
Landlords and managing agents book us for end of tenancy work, usually to a deadline: the check-out is Friday and the new tenant is in on Monday. Flats above the shops in the town centre mean stairs and no lift, and a narrow dog-leg at the top that a three-seater will not go round in one piece. That is fine — the team carry the tools to take furniture apart and will lift doors off hinges when a sofa argues. Say at the booking stage which floor it is on and whether there is a lift, and the crew sent will match the job.
What leaves the house, and where it ends up
Anything still usable we would rather see used again. Furniture in decent order, kitchenware, books, tools and unopened household goods get offered on to charity shops and reuse projects in Kent before they go anywhere near a tip. What is genuinely finished with is taken to permitted transfer and recycling sites, sorted there, and paperwork raised for the load — ask and we will send you the waste transfer note. We are a registered upper-tier waste carrier, licence CBDU419679, and fully insured; The household waste sites are run by Kent County Council and their rules apply to what you take yourself, not to what we carry, but the two overlap enough that people ask, and we are happy to explain the difference on the phone.
A few categories are handled separately because the law treats them separately. Fridges, freezers and any cooling appliance are dealt with as hazardous waste. Mattresses and upholstered furniture — sofas, armchairs, padded dining chairs, headboards — fall under the persistent organic pollutant rules, so the foam must be sent for incineration through a controlled route and cannot be recycled with ordinary bulky waste. That is why two mattresses out of one flat are two separate items to us and not just two more things on the van. Paint tins, gas cylinders, solvents, asbestos sheeting and car batteries are not things we can lift onto a standard load; tell us what is in the shed and we will either arrange the right disposal or point you at who can.
Probate house clearance in Sevenoaks, and houses that have filled up
On what it costs, this page says one thing only: ring the office on 0800 046 5555, or send a few photographs through the form on this page, and you will get a figure back. Photographs get you a far closer answer than a description does — six pictures from the doorway of each room, plus the loft hatch and the garage, and we can tell you where you stand. The estimate is free and commits you to nothing.
Where a clearance follows a death, we are used to the probate side of it. We invoice the solicitor, the executor or the administrator of the estate directly, and the payment can come out of the estate rather than from anybody's own pocket. There is no deposit — nothing is asked for before the work is done. If probate has not come through yet and the timing is still uncertain, or the estate is waiting on the sale of the house, say so at the outset and we will set the paperwork up that way from the start. Executors are very often two counties away and working from a key safe number and an agent's phone number, and probate house clearance is booked and paid for perfectly well at that distance.
Probate work also wants a slower hand indoors. If cash, jewellery, documents, medals or photographs might be buried in a drawer somewhere, tell us and the team will set anything of that sort aside for you rather than bagging it.
Houses that have filled up over decades are no trouble either. If the loft is packed, the garage door has not opened since 2011 and there are boxes on the stairs, that is a bigger load and possibly a second day, and nothing more than that. Nobody comments.
Common questions about house clearance in Sevenoaks
How much does a house clearance in Sevenoaks cost?
There is no figure printed on this page, deliberately — every house is different and a number here would be a guess about yours. Ring 0800 046 5555 or send photographs through the form on this page and you will get a real answer and a date.
Can you invoice a solicitor or executor for a probate house clearance?
Yes. We invoice the solicitor, the executor or the administrator of the estate directly, the payment can come from the estate, and there is no deposit — you are not asked for anything before the work is done.
Which areas around Sevenoaks do you cover?
TN13, TN14 and TN15: the town, Riverhead, Dunton Green, Chipstead, Otford, Halstead, Knockholt, Shoreham, Eynsford, Seal, Kemsing, Borough Green, Ightham, Wrotham and West Kingsdown, and Westerham to the west. We also work in Swanley, Orpington and Ashford.
Will you take fridges, freezers and mattresses?
Yes, but they travel separately from the rest of the load. Cooling appliances count as hazardous waste and mattresses and upholstered furniture fall under the persistent organic pollutant rules, so both go through their own route rather than in with general bulky waste.
Can you clear just the garage and the loft?
Yes. Garage and loft clearance without touching the rest of the house is a normal booking, as is a single heavy item. Tell us whether the loft is boarded and whether the garage door opens.
How long does a house clearance in Sevenoaks take?
Most three-bedroom houses are a single day, starting around nine. A packed loft, a full garage or two sheds can push it into a second day, and if the team think on the morning that it is heading that way they will ring you rather than let you find out at four in the afternoon.
To book, or just to sound out what a clearance in TN13, TN14 or TN15 would involve, ring 0800 046 5555 or email a few photographs over through the form on this page. You will get a real answer, and a date.
