Parents finally downsized. Now what to do with all this stuff?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Op, first of all -- your parents have said goodbye to all this stuff. Said goodbye by not taking action. None of it is your burden. If it is a burden.

Your biggest challenge is managing resentment of this process vs any joy you get from the sentimental journey. Only you can evaluate this and any decision is reasonable.

When in doubt I like to donate, and I donate the easiest way possible, whatever that is -- and say a small prayer that an object will find a new owner that needs and appreciates it.

I’m not the OP, but I really needed to read this! I’m learning to cope with the fact that NO ONE stepped up over the years to deal with a family home that should have been sold decades ago. Now, I’m left with the burden of figuring out what to do with things that have been in my family for generations. Time has taken a toll on a lot of things, but there’s still a ton of old photos, tchotchkes, and items like old furniture that might be valuable - but only for a very small market of people. Some items I’ve found bring me a smile, so I keep them, but I don’t want to clutter up my current home with excess stuff. I’ve had to be ruthless in what I keep vs toss.

It’s hard to not feel resentment that this chore has fallen to me, but I’m learning to do what I can and just let the rest go. It’s also been a learning experience because I really don’t want to burden my own kids in this way. There’s just so much stuff to sort through. I have no actual memory of the great-grandparents, etc. whose stuff I’m sorting through.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
I’m not the OP, but I really needed to read this! I’m learning to cope with the fact that NO ONE stepped up over the years to deal with a family home that should have been sold decades ago. Now, I’m left with the burden of figuring out what to do with things that have been in my family for generations. Time has taken a toll on a lot of things, but there’s still a ton of old photos, tchotchkes, and items like old furniture that might be valuable - but only for a very small market of people. Some items I’ve found bring me a smile, so I keep them, but I don’t want to clutter up my current home with excess stuff. I’ve had to be ruthless in what I keep vs toss.

It’s hard to not feel resentment that this chore has fallen to me, but I’m learning to do what I can and just let the rest go. It’s also been a learning experience because I really don’t want to burden my own kids in this way. There’s just so much stuff to sort through. I have no actual memory of the great-grandparents, etc. whose stuff I’m sorting through.

I was the one who ended up dealing with my ILs' brimming house when they died (my spouse and his sibling were useless), and it was similar. There were letters from the 1850s, there was a ton of old furniture that might have been useful to someone if I'd had months to find that person, but my ILs believed that anything old was a precious antique, and unfortunately, that's not true. We kept a few things, but there wasn't time to give everything away, and we misguidedly thought an estate sale might at least pay for itself, which they almost never do.

Plus the useless relatives wanted to know where their money from the estate was. I told myself it was their way of grieving.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
I’m not the OP, but I really needed to read this! I’m learning to cope with the fact that NO ONE stepped up over the years to deal with a family home that should have been sold decades ago. Now, I’m left with the burden of figuring out what to do with things that have been in my family for generations. Time has taken a toll on a lot of things, but there’s still a ton of old photos, tchotchkes, and items like old furniture that might be valuable - but only for a very small market of people. Some items I’ve found bring me a smile, so I keep them, but I don’t want to clutter up my current home with excess stuff. I’ve had to be ruthless in what I keep vs toss.

It’s hard to not feel resentment that this chore has fallen to me, but I’m learning to do what I can and just let the rest go. It’s also been a learning experience because I really don’t want to burden my own kids in this way. There’s just so much stuff to sort through. I have no actual memory of the great-grandparents, etc. whose stuff I’m sorting through.

I was the one who ended up dealing with my ILs' brimming house when they died (my spouse and his sibling were useless), and it was similar. There were letters from the 1850s, there was a ton of old furniture that might have been useful to someone if I'd had months to find that person, but my ILs believed that anything old was a precious antique, and unfortunately, that's not true. We kept a few things, but there wasn't time to give everything away, and we misguidedly thought an estate sale might at least pay for itself, which they almost never do.

Plus the useless relatives wanted to know where their money from the estate was. I told myself it was their way of grieving.

This. The point of the estate sale is for someone else to deal with the sorting, disposal, sale etc. And the sale can offset some of the fee. It's not about making money but making it easier for the family.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Can you pay a company to digitize photos? Make few short videos with them too? I don't know what lithograph and Stains are. I'd keep gun, ask expert to check if its safe to use. sell sword. Trash rest.

My mom had a bunch of old photos digitized and made into a video for my grandmothers 90th birthday 20 or so years ago. My grandmother loved it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
This. The point of the estate sale is for someone else to deal with the sorting, disposal, sale etc. And the sale can offset some of the fee. It's not about making money but making it easier for the family.

And for an estate sales company to make money, it has to grab the lowest of the low-hanging fruit, so no one is going to figure out if any of the books are valuable or if there's something in any of those boxes.

Ours came and went, and a few days later my brother came downstairs with a box containing silver. Labeled as containing silver. But we hadn't read the labels of the stuff in that room yet, and the estate sales company (a local one) hadn't done more than look in the room, see that there wasn't a Chippendale secretary or Stickley bookcase in there, and move along.

The odds that there would be a bunch of sterling in a random box is pretty low, so the company was being economically rational. But if you're going to go through all the stuff to make sure the tea service makes it out (to auction, to be melted, whatever), you might as well call the junk haulers and a house cleaner yourself.

[Anonymous]

Lots of good advice in this thread. I will say that I found freecycle and buy nothing groups more trouble than they're worth since you have to list, reply, put out, followup etc. I just hauled anything usable to Goodwill.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP I think you should find out by appraisal if any of the collected items have value. Then stage a yard/ estate sale. As for the photos re: Mary Kondo many of them are scenes that will just take up time and give little pleasure or value. My neighbor went on a historical trip to Europe and took 1500 pictures of scenes.

Recently I looked at some photos I took on a trip to Europe 20 years ago and I couldn't figure out what most of the photos were or why I took them.

[Anonymous]

Our parents had a huge house and kept adding-on to it as the decades went on, to hold more stuff. My brother and I had an average knowledge of what was valuable. But there were a lot of unique historical items in the house which were the hardest to sort and agree on who gets what. We all knew those items would be touchy for our relationship. We were not likely to fight over usual items that might bring in money. We actually hired a company. It cost 3K. That's shocking but split 4 ways it was money well spent, we all agreed. They sorted the contents of the whole estate: one room were salable items, they would sell and give back some of the profit. One to donate, one likely sentimental, one junk. Everything was displayed so it was easy to see what we had. The viewing lasted about a month, different family members showed up at different times when they were town, to take what they wanted. It was like shopping.

This was after the 4 of us had lifted the most sentimental/valuable items. This post may not be helpful since the co. hasn't in DMV.

[Anonymous]

brother(s)

[Anonymous]

There are services that will digitize the photos. You could do that and then toss.