Unwanted furniture virtually new - any chance a house clearance place would pay us rather than the other way round?

[PuzzledObserver]

We have bought a show home, complete with all contents - down to the nick nacks on the shelving units and pasta in the jars in the kitchen. We are already living in a fully furnished house (which we don’t own - it’s complicated).

We have arranged to dispose of what we don’t want to keep from the old place and the rest of our stuff will be going into storage while we move in. We will then have 10 days to dispose of the unwanted stuff from the new place, including 3 beds, a dining table and chairs, 2 small desks, various corner tables, shelving units etc. Roughly 2/3 of the furniture in a 4-bedded house.

So it is not brand new, but it has been sat in a show home for 2 years not being lived in.

If we had infinite time and energy we might try advertising on shpock or whatever, but, you know, life too short and all that. Plus don’t know how quickly we will be able to get broadband installed.

Is it realistic to think that a clearance place might pay us for the furniture? Or is getting them to take it away for free the best we could hope for?

To add to the complication, new place is 150 miles away, so we can’t just pop in whenever we fancy to make inventories, measure things etc.

I wonder if there’s a Facebook or WhatsApp group for the development? There is one for the town, which is not very big - population c. 10,000. That’s what makes me a bit uncertain about people coming to pick bigger items up, because there’s not a very big population to aim at.

It might be worth joining all the local selling pages in the new area you are moving to. I've had loads of stuff sold and picked up same day.

Facebook marketplace is a great way to get stuff sold. You can lower the price if it doesnt sell and Ive found theres always a buyer if the price is right. Yes people come and collect in their own or hired vans .There are lots of 'man with van ' adverts on marketplace just for this reason.
But as a PP said - check your own furniture first or you might find out youve sold the only sofa that fits

I would advertise either advertise an Open Day on that area's local facebook marketplace, and put on pics of everything that will be fore sale, and go there for the day, and first come first served, or list everything individually and sell to buyers and arrange 1 day to be there for the buyers to collect.

That's what I did with my gran's house 30 miles away when she died a couple of years ago.

Price it cheap to sell, and just make it clear that buyers must collect that day.

Anything we had left over, we got BHF to collect for free.

*for sale....

oK, so what would you class as cheap? I’m sure it’s regional, so this is Devon.

King size bed with headboard and mattress..... £20, £30, £50?

Child’s cabin bed.... £15, £20, £25?

Dining table and six chairs..... £30, £50, £75?

I really have no idea....

If they’re new(ish) a lot more than that. Depends on the brands of course. At least double your highest figures would still be very cheap.

And you don’t need broadband - tether to your mobile increasing your limit if necessary.

They are 2-3 years old, but completely unused. Brands - don't know. I would assume they are chosen for looks rather than durability.

I rang the local saleroom for all of our unwanted furniture.

So easy, they sent two men and a van, who took all of the furniture away in one trip, it was displayed in the saleroom for customers to view and auctioned for the best price on sale day. From the total raised the saleroom took off the charge for collection, auctioneer fees and sent me a cheque.

So, one call, an arranged collection and a cheque, very little to do.
So much easier than the faff of marketplace...repeated viewings, people letting you down, people asking for delivery, haggling over prices....

How do you get paid for FB marketplace stuff... is it cash, or is there an electronic payment method?

@PuzzledObserver

How do you get paid for FB marketplace stuff... is it cash, or is there an electronic payment method?

Cash on collection.

Would ‘home staging’ companies want to buy it perhaps?

If its a show home I assume its a new estate? Check if the estate has a community page or a buy and sell page, ours does and its handy because generally items are only being sold / moved within a few streets or so.

Take heed of what ILoveShula said on P1 though.

It would be a nightmare to get rid of new furniture that fits and then find you can't get your own sofa / wardrobe / bed / whatever in.
When we moved into our house, although the rooms are plenty big enough, we had to get rid of our lovely comfy divan bed as there was no way of getting it into our top floor bedroom. Had to buy one we could build in the room. Would have been the same with quite a bit of furniture.
Remember they 'dress' a showhome with smaller furniture for a reason.

Thanks, BackForGood. I'll take that as a compliment.

Butelse I'm thinking of doing that but aern't auction fussy about what do they take? Was your furniture trendy / nearly new? I have very good furiture which was very expensive originally but it's years old (good condition but obviously some wear). Some needs dismantling to move (wardrobes, bed).
Would they do all this?
And finally, did it all sell for peanuts or ok prices - and what happens if it doesnt sell first time, are they willing to keep selling it for a few more times...
Not keen on faffing with people visiting and collecting as I'm currently on my oen in the house and you just never know - plus some people could haggle after agreeing a price when they arrive, woiuld find that awkward.

Well, two of the bedrooms are going to be used as studies, so obviously we need to get rid of those beds. There are two sofas facing each other, one of which we will keep (at least initially), but we have bought two stressless recliners to replace the other. Our dining table is smaller than the one that's already there.

Our next visit is a detailed measuring up visit - that's DH's department.