We have been doing house clearance in West Bromwich since 2007, This is Black Country ground, whatever the borough is called. More often than not we are the only people who set foot in the property. Executors, a solicitor's probate department, a managing agent, a son or daughter living three counties away. They ring, they send photographs, we go. B70 and B71 are our own ground, and the vans are on the Expressway off Junction 1 of the M5 within a couple of minutes of leaving the town centre.
Most jobs run to plan. Here is one that didn't, and it is worth telling properly.
The flat, the books, and the keys that went astray
It was a flat, and the instruction was a single van load and nothing beyond it. That kind of scope works fine when the contents are furniture. It works badly when the contents are paper. There were books everywhere, shelves of them and boxes of them, and paperwork stacked in among them, and paper is heavy in a way nobody expects until it is sitting on a tail lift. The van filled up long before the flat emptied.
The crew rang from the property to ask what to do next. Several times, no answer. So they worked to the letter of what they had been given. Furniture away, and the two mattresses away with it, those going because they were compromised and were never going back into anybody's home. The televisions stayed exactly where they were, because taking them had not been asked for. The paperwork that was left, and the kitchen things in the cupboards, the utensils and the cooking equipment, stayed for the same reason. When a customer says one load and one load only, the crew does not get to decide otherwise halfway through the afternoon.
Then there was the small parcel of personal items and the keys, both to be posted rather than handed over, because the customer was nowhere near the place. The parcel went out that evening. The keys did not. They had come out of the box somewhere between the flat and the yard and were sitting in the van, which nobody knew until the message arrived:
"Got the package today but no keys inside. Where the keys posted separately?"
They were needed back for the hand-back, and needed quickly. The team turned the van out, found them the same day, and they went in the post that afternoon with an apology rather than an excuse. One thing went wrong on that job, we said so, and the keys went back.
A probate house clearance in West Bromwich run from 130 miles away
The second West Bromwich job worth describing came through a probate maintenance team based over in Cambridgeshire. Nobody from the client's side had ever stood in the house. It was marked urgent, wanted inside the week, and the whole thing was organised on photographs, a reference number and phone calls.
Then the access went wrong. The back gates were locked and so was the rear door, and another contractor sent ahead of us couldn't get through to the garden at all. The administrator was straight with us: either the garden came out of the job until the locks were changed, or we looked at it on the day if the crew found a way in. That is the sort of thing that decides whether a clearance takes two days or four.
We got in. The house side ran to two days and three loads. The garden took another two days and two loads of its own, a proper cutback and not a lawn trim, because the beds had gone over completely. Out of the same address came a mattress, a fridge freezer, an upholstered item classed as POP waste, a gas bottle and, of all things, a car tyre that had been sat behind the shed long enough to hold water. The house was cleaned afterwards to a three-bedroom spec so the agents could get someone through the door.
POP is worth a plain-English word, since it turns up on nearly every job now. It stands for persistent organic pollutants, the flame retardants used in the foam of sofas, armchairs, padded stools and office chairs. Since 2023 that padding cannot be tipped, recycled or mixed into a general load. It travels apart from everything else and is destroyed at a permitted facility, and that is why a settee is handled differently from a wooden dining table.
The gas bottle went the same way in principle: separately, to a site set up to take it. Paint tins, solvents, car batteries, oil, asbestos sheeting off a garage roof, none of that goes in a mixed load, ours or anyone else's. If it is in the house, tell us on the phone and we will sort the route for it rather than leaving you a pile in the drive. Fridges and freezers travel on their own as well, because the gases in them are regulated, and mattresses are separated at the transfer station for recycling.
Smaller West Bromwich jobs: flat clearance and end of tenancy work
Not every West Bromwich house clearance is a two-dayer. A flat with one room's worth in it can be done between breakfast and mid-afternoon, and if a crew is already in the borough that is usually how it goes.
Flats round here are mostly low-rise, which helps. Where there is no lift it is a carry down, and we allow for it when we look at the job instead of pretending stairs don't exist. Parking is the bigger nuisance. On the terraced streets between Carters Green and Hateley Heath the tipper takes up most of the road, so we get there early and knock on next door before we block anyone in. Around the town centre the loading restrictions are enforced, and either side of the Expressway you sometimes cannot stop within fifty yards of the door, so the crew walks it, and we say that at the start rather than springing it on you at the end.
Garage and loft clearance in West Bromwich
A small terrace can be a van load. A three-bed with a loft nobody has opened since the seventies and a garage you cannot get the door past is a different animal, and more often than not the garage and loft between them take longer than the house did. Lofts here are usually boarded halfway and reached by a hatch on a landing, so everything comes down by hand, one armful at a time, and somebody stands at the bottom of the ladder. Garages on the Stone Cross and Friar Park side are often up a shared drive with a door that has not moved in years. Tell us on the phone if that is the case and we will bring the tools to get it open. When you send photographs, send the loft hatch and the garage as well as the rooms, because that is the part people forget and it is the part that changes the day.
Where the contents go
Sofas aside, a good half of what leaves a house is still usable. Wardrobes people would happily buy, working washers, bagged clothing, crockery, books, garden tools. That gets offered on to reuse projects and charity outlets around Sandwell first, because there is no sense destroying a chest of drawers somebody wants. Metal goes for scrap. Green waste off a cutback goes to a green-waste site, not into mixed skip waste. What genuinely cannot be used again is weighed in at a permitted facility and we hold the transfer notes. Ask and you will get copies for the estate file. We are registered with the Environment Agency as an upper-tier waste carrier, licence CBDU419679, and insured for work in occupied and empty property alike.
Sandwell's own household recycling centres, at Shidas Lane in Oldbury and Bevan Way in Smethwick, are fine for a few bags in the boot of a car. For a whole house they are not. There are limits on loads, vans and trade waste, and you would be doing thirty trips.
The postcodes and places we work
West Bromwich sits in the West Midlands, in the borough of Sandwell, and we clear across the lot of it: B70 for the town centre, Black Lake and the Dartmouth Park side, B71 for Charlemont, Stone Cross, Hateley Heath and Friar Park, B66 over towards Smethwick and Bearwood, DY4 for Tipton and Dudley Port, and WS10 for Wednesbury. Great Barr, Hamstead, Oldbury, Handsworth and Greets Green are all inside the same day's run for us.
Several of those places have a page of their own, so if you have landed here for the wrong town: house clearance in Wednesbury for WS10, house clearance in Oldbury and house clearance in Smethwick for the B68 and B66 side, and house clearance in Rowley Regis south of the A4123. Same crews, same vans, usually the same week.
Getting here is straightforward, which matters when you are arranging a clearance from Sheffield or Sussex. Sandwell & Dudley on the main line is minutes from the town centre, the Metro runs through West Bromwich Central and Kenrick Park, and Tame Bridge Parkway covers the Friar Park side. Junction 1 of the M5 puts the vans on the Expressway in a couple of minutes.
Executors, landlords and houses that got away from someone
A lot of what we do in this borough is probate work, and it is usually being run by someone who lives nowhere near B71. Executors, a solicitor's probate department, a managing agent, a family member who has taken it on because nobody else would. We are used to being the only pair of eyes on site: photographs before and after, a written scope, keys collected and returned to wherever you say, valuables left where you want them left. On a probate house clearance we invoice the solicitor, the executor or the estate directly, so it can be settled from the estate rather than out of anybody's own pocket. There is no deposit, and the invoice comes after the work is finished, not before it starts. Nobody needs to travel up to stand in a cold house watching us carry.
And some of these properties are full. Not untidy, full, with a path worn between the rooms and the back bedroom shut for years. We do those, and a hoarder house clearance takes longer, we say so up front, and the crew works through it the same as any other house without a word said about it. If it is only a room's worth or a garage's worth, that is house rubbish removal rather than a full clearance, and it is a shorter conversation.
Questions we get asked about house clearance in West Bromwich
How much does a house clearance in West Bromwich cost?
Ring the office on 0800 046 5555 and talk it through, or send photographs of each room, the loft hatch, the garage and the garden through the form on this page. Tell us the postcode district and whether there is anywhere to put a tipper, and we will come back with a figure and a date. It is free and it commits you to nothing.
Can you invoice the solicitor or the executor on a probate clearance?
Yes. We invoice the solicitor, the executor or the estate directly, and payment can come from the estate rather than from you personally. No deposit is taken, and the invoice follows the work rather than coming before it. Waste transfer notes and before-and-after photographs go over with it for the estate file.
Do you clear the garage and loft as well as the house?
Yes, and it is usually the garage and loft that decide how long a West Bromwich house clearance takes. Say up front that both are in, send us a photograph of each, and tell us if the garage door has not opened in years so the crew brings the right tools.
Do I have to be there on the day?
No. Plenty of our West Bromwich clearances are done on keys, with the client several hours' drive away. We collect and return keys wherever you ask, photograph the property before we start and again when the rooms are empty, and ring you if anything on the day is not as the photographs suggested.
What will you not take away?
Paint, solvents, oil, car batteries, gas bottles and asbestos cannot travel in a mixed load. Fridges, freezers, mattresses and POP-classed upholstery all go separately by law, and we deal with them, but they need saying on the phone so the right vehicle and the right route are arranged.
Can you leave certain things in the property?
Yes, and it happens on most jobs. Tell us what stays, whether that is a television, a carpet, a fitted wardrobe or anything a family member still wants to look at, and the crew will stack it in one room and work around it. Nothing goes on the van that has been marked to stay.
If you want a figure for a house clearance in West Bromwich, ring 0800 046 5555 or send photographs through the form on this page, and we will come back with a price and a date.
