House clearance in Cheddar is mostly probate work — a house standing empty after a death. A family who need it emptied so it can go on the market. Here is one of ours, and it didn't go perfectly.
The job came to us from a long way off. The man arranging it was a good two hours' drive away, sorting out his late father's house so it could be put up for sale. He met our team at the property first thing to let them in, then got caught in traffic and couldn't get back to see them out at the end of the day. We cleared the place as agreed, room by room, and left the key where he'd asked.
He wasn't entirely happy afterwards, and he told us so plainly. When he next got to the house, the carpets hadn't been vacuumed the way he'd expected. He wrote that he "needed to knock on a neighbour's door to ask to borrow a vacuum cleaner in order to make the house presentable for sale" — not what anyone wants to be doing at the end of a two-hour drive. He was fair about the rest of it. The clearance itself had gone well and the team had kept him posted through the day; in his words they were "friendly and appreciated their communications through the day as well as the clearance aspect", but the finish wasn't there. We agreed he shouldn't be paying for a clean that hadn't been done to his satisfaction, so we took it off. That is the sort of thing that happens on a real clearance. How you sort it out afterwards is most of the job.
We've been clearing houses since 2007, and a fair share of that work looks like this one: someone handling a property from a distance, wanting it emptied, tidied and closed up without having to keep driving back. Cheddar sits at the foot of the Mendip Hills in Somerset, and a good number of our Cheddar house clearances are exactly that. An executor or a family member organising things over the phone and by email.
What a house clearance in Cheddar usually involves
A full clearance means the lot: furniture, white goods, the contents of every wardrobe, cupboard and drawer, the loft, the shed and the garage. You don't need to sort or box anything up first — that's ours to do. If there are carpets and underlay to lift, we lift them. We sweep the place through so it's ready to hand over to an agent or a buyer.
If you'd rather some of it stayed put, say so before the day and it saves everybody a phone call. Plenty of people want the beds, the wardrobes and the three-piece gone but the kitchen left standing for a buyer, or the curtains and light fittings left on. A list, or a sticker on what's staying, and we work round it.
Cheddar has a real mix of housing, and each type clears differently. There are older stone cottages and terraces down near Cliff Street and the gorge, some with narrow stairs and small doorways. Furniture comes apart before it comes out. There are post-war semis on the estates spreading back towards the reservoir, straightforward to load. And there are bigger detached places up on the Mendip side, which tend to come with full lofts and outbuildings. We've done all three.
Getting a van in — access and parking around Cheddar
Access is worth talking about honestly, because the middle of Cheddar can be tight. The lanes running up towards Cheddar Gorge are narrow and busy with tourist traffic through the summer. Parking a Luton van outside a cottage on The Cliffs or up Tuttors Hill isn't always a matter of just pulling up. We work it out beforehand — where the van goes, how far we're carrying, whether we need to arrive early to get a spot before the day trippers do. On the newer estates off Sharpham Road and Lower New Road it's easier, usually a driveway or a kerb right outside.
If it's a flat or a place with shared parking, tell us when you ring and we'll plan around it. Out in the smaller BS27 places — Draycott, Rodney Stoke, the lanes climbing to Bradley Cross and Nyland — it's often a farm gateway or a verge. We would far rather know that the night before than find it out at eight in the morning.
How a clearance day in Cheddar runs
We get there early. First thing is a walk round the whole house with whoever has let us in, agreeing what is staying and what is going. Having a look at the loft hatch and the garage door before anyone starts carrying. Then it's top down: loft, bedrooms, downstairs, and the outbuildings last. The shed and the garage are usually where the awkward items are hiding and we want the van packed sensibly by then.
Most three-bed houses in Cheddar are a single day. A packed one, or a house where the loft has forty years in it, can run to a second load or a second day. We'd sooner tell you that at the quote stage than at four in the afternoon. If you can't be there — and often you can't — we keep you updated as the day goes. We photograph every room once it's empty and email the lot over.
The BS27 postcode and the area we cover
Cheddar's postcode district is BS27, and that's the core of what we cover here, along with Draycott, Rodney Stoke and the hamlets on the lower slopes. But we're across this whole corner of Somerset, so if you're in one of the neighbouring places we can help there too. Just up the road is Axbridge with its old market square, and out across the moor is Wedmore. South and west we cover Highbridge and Burnham-on-Sea on the coast, and there's house clearance in Bridgwater further down towards the M5. Round the coast we also do house clearance in Weston-super-Mare and house clearance in Clevedon. It's all comfortable working distance for a day's clearance.
The old Cheddar Valley railway — the Strawberry Line, named for the fruit it carried — closed to trains long ago and is a walking and cycling path now, so Cheddar itself has no station. The nearest railway is at Highbridge and Burnham, with Worle and Weston-super-Mare a little further round the coast. We come in by road off the A38 and A371 rather than by rail anyway.
Kinds of clearance we do in Cheddar
Probate house clearance in Cheddar
A lot of our Cheddar work is probate — clearing a house after a death so the estate can be settled and the property sold. If a solicitor, a power of attorney or the executors are handling matters, we can invoice them directly rather than you. The cost can be met from the estate. There's no deposit and nothing to pay up front. You don't have to be there either: we can collect a key from an agent or a neighbour, clear the house. Email you photographs of every empty room when we're finished. If there are papers, photographs or small items of sentimental value to be kept back, tell us what to look for and we'll set them aside. A watch, documents in a particular drawer, whatever it is — and get them to you. There's more on how probate house clearance works across the board on its own page.
Hoarder house clearance in Cheddar
Some houses have got away from the person living in them. Every room is packed to the door with years of things. We clear those without making anyone feel awkward about it. It takes longer, and sometimes more than one load. It's ordinary work for us and we get on with it quietly. A hoarder house clearance usually needs a bit more planning on parking and loading, because the volume coming out of the door is far more than the house looks like it holds from the pavement.
Flat clearance, part and single-room clearances in BS27
Not everything is a whole house. A flat clearance is one of the commonest jobs we do. A first-floor flat, a warden-managed place, a one-bed above a shop — and we'll equally do one room, a garage that hasn't been opened in years, or just a few heavy items you can't shift yourself. If you only need a bed, a suite and a fridge-freezer gone, that's a job worth ringing about. Straightforward rubbish removal with no furniture in it at all is fine too.
Garage and loft clearance in Cheddar
A garage and loft clearance on its own is a job in its own right, and around here it's a common one. The house has already been sorted by the family, and what's left is the two spaces nobody wanted to face. Lofts in the older Cheddar cottages have a small hatch and no boarding. It's a case of passing everything down by hand: suitcases, boxes of paperwork, Christmas decorations, the odd water tank that was replaced and never taken out. Garages tend to hold garden tools, tins, bikes, timber offcuts and a freezer that stopped working years ago. We bring our own lighting, because half of these places haven't had a working bulb since the last owner.
End of tenancy clearance in Cheddar
Landlords and managing agents ring us between tenancies — a property left part-furnished, a garage full of a previous tenant's belongings, or a flat that needs emptying before the decorators can start. Same job, tighter deadline, usually.
Arranging a Cheddar house clearance from a distance
The job at the top of this page is the standard shape of it: family two hours away, one day to be on site, everything else done by phone and email. So we've built the way we work around that. You can send photographs of each room through the form on this page and we'll come back with a proper figure without anyone having to travel. We can take a key from an agent, a neighbour or a keysafe. We return it where you tell us to. And you get photographs of the empty rooms at the end, which is what most executors actually need. Evidence for the file that the house is clear.
If there is anything you want checking before it goes. A drawer of documents, the back of a wardrobe, the pockets of coats — say so and it gets checked.
What we can't take on the van
There's a short list of things we can't simply load with the furniture. Old paint tins, a gas bottle off a caravan, a car battery, solvents from the shed. Those need proper hazardous disposal and can't ride with a general load. Fridges and freezers have to go down the refrigerant route rather than in with the scrap. Upholstered sofas and armchairs fall under the POPs rules brought in for that kind of furniture. Means the foam inside has to be sent down its own controlled disposal route rather than tipped as ordinary waste. And if there's asbestos sheeting on a garage roof or an old flue, that's a licensed job and not ours. None of it is a problem; it just gets handled correctly. We'll flag anything in the house that needs it on the day.
Where everything goes
We don't drive straight to the tip with a full van. Furniture and anything with more use left in it, we put in front of the reuse projects and charity shops around Cheddar and the Mendips first. A sofa that's sound, a working washing machine, boxes of crockery. What's genuinely finished with is taken to a licensed transfer station, weighed in and recorded. We keep the paperwork for each load. We're fully insured for the work and registered to carry waste; our carrier licence is CBDU419679. Since the county reorganised, household waste across the Cheddar area falls under Somerset Council, and we work to those rules.
Frequently asked questions
How much does a house clearance in Cheddar cost? It depends on the size of the property and how much is inside. The honest answer is that we give you a proper figure once we know what's involved. Ring the office and talk it through, or send photographs of the rooms through the form on this page and we'll come back to you.
Can you invoice a solicitor or take payment from the estate? Yes. On a probate clearance we can invoice the solicitor, executor or power of attorney directly. The cost can be settled from the estate. No deposit, nothing up front.
Do I need to be at the property? No. We can pick up a key from an agent or a neighbour, carry out the clearance. Email you photographs of the finished, empty house. Plenty of our Cheddar clearances are arranged entirely by phone and email by someone living elsewhere.
Do you clear lofts, sheds and garages? We do. They're part of a full clearance, and often where the most is hiding. A loft full of boxes, a shed rusted shut, a garage you can't get the door open on: all part of it.
To arrange a house clearance in Cheddar, or anywhere across BS27 and the surrounding Somerset villages, call the office on 0800 046 5555 or send us the details through the form on this page.
