We have been doing house clearance in Bognor Regis since 2007 — interwar bungalows in Aldwick, flats behind the Esplanade, and the villages a couple of miles inland where the town runs out into fields. Most of it is probate work, or a house being emptied before it goes on the market. The van went out to a PO22 address at Barnham on the tenth of December 2018. One load. A Luton, three of our lads, on site for nine and finished inside the day. Nothing exotic about the job on paper. It was not a straightforward day for the person who had to stand in the hall and watch it happen, and the customer said as much afterwards: "The men were very polite and did a superb job in what was a difficult task for me, will highly recommend in future."
That is the bit of the work that does not show up on any paperwork. Furniture is furniture. The awkward part is usually somebody standing in a doorway deciding what leaves and what does not, and the crew reading that correctly without being told twice.
Where we go along this stretch of coast
Bognor Regis sits in the Arun district of West Sussex, under West Sussex County Council, and the postcodes here split two ways. The town itself and the seafront run through PO21 — Aldwick, the Steyne, North Bersted, South Bersted, Rose Green, Nyetimber and Pagham, plus the roads behind the Esplanade. PO22 picks up Felpham, Middleton-on-Sea, Elmer, Ancton, Barnham and the Eastergate and Westergate side, with Yapton next door. Those two districts are where house clearance Bognor Regis jobs actually happen for us, and they are the ones to quote when you ring.
Head east along the A259 and the next towns are neighbours with pages of their own: house clearance in Littlehampton, then house clearance in Arundel and the villages under the Downs, and further along the coast house clearance in Worthing. West of Pagham it is house clearance in Chichester and the villages that side. We clear across all of it. Four neighbours is about the honest limit of a working day out of here, so we name those four and leave the rest of the county to the pages that own it.
Trains help more than people expect. Bognor Regis station is a terminus, so the line stops dead at the town and everything else routes through Barnham junction a few minutes up the track — that is the change for Chichester, Portsmouth or Brighton. For us it means the road, not the rail: down the A29 through Fontwell, or along the coast road from Littlehampton. Traffic in July is a different animal to traffic in February, and we plan the start accordingly.
The Barnham day, and what a single load actually means
One load is a Luton furniture van filled properly, with the crew clearing cupboards, wardrobes and drawers rather than leaving you the fiddly bits at the end. Nothing needs boxing up beforehand. If a property turns out to hold more than one van will take, the team keeps going and runs another load the same day rather than booking you in again for a fortnight's time. There is no deposit to pay and nothing is asked for up front — the invoice follows the work, once it is done and you have seen the rooms empty.
Two working days' notice is usually plenty to get a date. If you want a particular day — completion is Friday, the keys go back Monday, that sort of squeeze — say so early and we will hold it. Ring the office on 0800 046 5555, or send photographs through the form on this page and we will come back to you with a figure.
Reuse first, tipping last
Sorting happens as the van is loaded, not afterwards. Furniture that is sound, crockery, tools, books, unopened bedding — those go towards reuse wherever a charity shop or a community project this side of the county will take them. Around Bognor Regis and Littlehampton the charity shops are choosy about upholstery, fairly reasonable about everything else, and we have learned which ones will send a driver.
Everything else is weighed in at a licensed transfer station and paperwork follows it. Our waste carrier registration is CBDU419679. If you want the waste transfer notes for the estate file, ask and we will forward them, along with photographs of the cleared rooms. Sometimes the notes take a week or so to come back to us from the site, so it is not instant, but they do come.
A few categories cannot travel in an ordinary mixed load and are handled separately, because the regulations say so rather than because we fancy it:
- Fridges and freezers — the gas has to be taken out under controlled conditions.
- Mattresses and divan bases — these are baled and go for recycling on their own ticket rather than in the mixed load.
- Sofas, armchairs and padded dining chairs, which count as POP items under the persistent-organic-pollutant rules and cannot be recycled with general bulky waste.
- Televisions and monitors.
- Part-used paint tins, which go off in bulk to a paint-specific stream.
- Gas bottles, whether the patio-heater sort or camping cylinders.
Chemicals, solvents and anything sealed and unlabelled we will discuss on the day rather than guess at. There is no drama about it — we just cannot tip an unknown drum in with the sofa.
Flat clearance along the seafront
Flat clearance is a steady part of the work here, because so much of the seafront and the roads behind it is flats. Retirement blocks with a warden and a booked lift, converted houses with a stair that turns twice and no lift at all, and a bay outside that a delivery van will be sitting in at nine. We plan a flat clearance around the carry and the parking rather than the contents, and we tell the managing agent before the day rather than on it.
Coastal houses and the parking problem
The building stock round here is mixed in a way that changes the job completely. Interwar bungalows in Aldwick and Felpham, usually single-storey with a loft hatch and a garden shed that has not been opened since the last owner-but-one. Victorian and Edwardian terraces close to the town centre, narrow hall, tight turn at the foot of the stairs. Seafront flats and the newer blocks with a communal door, an entryphone and a bin store you are not allowed to leave anything in. Bungalows are why so much of the house clearance Bognor Regis work turns into a garage and loft clearance as well as a house one — everything that would have gone in a spare bedroom elsewhere went up the hatch or out the back here.
The garage is the part that swallows the hours, every time. A lock-up in a block behind the road is often a twenty-minute round trip on foot for each armful, and that is worth telling us about when you book, because it changes the crew size and the shape of the day.
Parking: some of the older streets are one-way with cars along both kerbs, which sounds bad and usually is not — a caged tipper will find a gap in the working day. Where there is a genuine restriction, seafront bays or a permit zone, tell us in advance and we will sort a suspension or work out a carrying route. What we would rather avoid is arriving to find the only space is a resident's bay with a warden due at ten.
Executors, agents and people who cannot be there
Plenty of the Bognor Regis and Littlehampton work is probate. The family has moved away — Rutland, Peterborough, further — and the house has been sitting empty since the funeral. That is workable. We collect keys from an agent, a neighbour or a key safe, the team leader photographs the rooms before starting and again once they are empty, and the pictures come to you by email the same evening. Keys go back wherever you tell us.
Here is one from PO21, in the town itself. A full house, one van load, and the person instructing us was two counties away in Hertfordshire and never saw the property on the day. Mattresses are counted separately, because they cannot ride in the mixed load, and our note of what had left the house said two. She read it properly, the way people at a distance often do, and wrote back: "We did only have 1 mattress though. Please could you check." She was right, and it was corrected the same day. That is the whole story, and it is the reason we write down what comes out room by room — the one person who can check it is usually the one who was not there.
On a probate house clearance Bognor Regis solicitors and executors handle every week, we invoice the solicitor, the executor or the estate directly, whichever suits how the estate is being run. Payment can come out of the estate rather than from anybody's own pocket, there is no deposit, and the invoice goes out after the work. We have also split the invoice between two parties where that is how the estate sits. More on how we handle probate house clearance generally, if it helps.
And if there is something small and sentimental — a photograph album, a box of letters, a ring in a drawer — name it before the day and it will be set aside rather than loaded. We keep an eye out for the obvious anyway: cash tucked in books, jewellery in kitchen tins, documents behind a wardrobe. Sometimes it is a flat and a garage to be emptied before a family flies out; sometimes it is the last few items before an exchange in a fortnight. Both are ordinary weeks for us.
Full houses, gardens, lofts and sheds
If a house has been filling up for thirty years, say so plainly when you ring. It changes nothing about whether we will take the job — it changes the number of loads we bring and the number of hands on site. Nobody in the crew comments. We have done far bigger and far worse than whatever you are apologising for.
Outside spaces count too. Greenhouses full of cracked pots, a shed with a rusted mower in it, a patio stacked with broken garden furniture, a loft cleared down to the insulation and no further. All normal, all quotable — and a garage and loft clearance on its own, with the house left alone, is a perfectly ordinary booking.
Getting a number to work with
What we need is a description: number of bedrooms, loft, garage, garden, roughly how full. That over the phone gets you a real figure before anyone drives to Bognor Regis. Photographs help and are welcome — send them through the form on this page. The quote is free and commits you to nothing. If what we find is bigger than what was described, we tell you on the spot and agree it before we start, never afterwards.
We are licensed and carry full insurance, and the paperwork for both is available if a managing agent or solicitor asks for it.
Common questions about house clearance in Bognor Regis
Do you cover the villages as well as the town? Yes. PO21 and PO22 are our own patch — Aldwick, Bersted, Pagham, Rose Green, Nyetimber, Felpham, Middleton-on-Sea, Elmer, Barnham, Eastergate and Westergate — and we go on to Littlehampton, Arundel, Worthing and Chichester from the same yard.
Can you invoice the solicitor for a probate house clearance in Bognor Regis? Yes. On probate work we invoice the solicitor, the executor or the estate directly, and payment can come from the estate. No deposit, and the invoice comes after the work is finished.
How much notice do you need? One or two working days is usually enough. If you need a specific date — a completion, a key handover — tell us early and we will hold it.
Do we have to be there on the day? No. We collect keys from an agent, a neighbour or a key safe, photograph the rooms before and after, and email the pictures the same evening.
Can you clear just the garage and loft? Yes. A garage and loft clearance without the house is a normal booking here, and it is often what a bungalow actually needs.
What cannot go in the van with everything else? Fridges and freezers, mattresses and divan bases, upholstered POP furniture, televisions, part-used paint and gas bottles. They are all taken, just handled down their own routes because the rules require it.
Ring 0800 046 5555 with the postcode, the property and the date you are aiming at, or send photographs through the form on this page, and we will tell you honestly whether it is a one-load day or a two-day job — for house clearance Bognor Regis, Felpham, Littlehampton, Arundel or anywhere else in this corner of West Sussex.
