Estate Sale Fees & How You Get Paid Explained

How soon does your company provide payment to me from the estate sale?

This isn’t 1950! Any professional estate sale company should be able cut your check within no more than 10 business days. Our policy is within 7 business days from the time services are completed! This way you get paid fast!

How Do You Get Paid? & How Does The Estate Sale Company Get Paid?

We work on a commission structure. This amount is determined by the Sale Manager at the time of the walkthrough by determining how much time it will take to properly process the estate which includes valuations and appraisals where need be, organizing and tagging items and staffing. The other part that helps determine the commission percentage is the value of the sale. The higher the value of the content in the estate, the lower the commission, the more work required to process the sale above the norm or if the value of the content is lower than average the higher commission rate we charge. The average commission percentage Prestige Estate Services earns is around 40%. We take all the risk and we typically invest several thousands of dollars into your sale before we ever open the doors. Once the sale is completed, we mail you a check.

Does your estate sale company charge for labor?

No. Many providers charge for labor on every sale in the range of charge a labor fee of $2,000.00 or $2,500.00. We believe in the vast majority of what our company earns should come from the commission from the sales, not some massive up-front fee guaranteed to the company regardless of the results. You want companies incentivized to sell your items for the highest prices they can and to sell as many items as they can. On certain level of sales that are very, very large projects, such as something from the television show “Hoarders” there may be some additional costs on the sale however these sales make up maybe 2% of the sales we run in a year and typically gross well over $50,000.00 to $100,000.00 or more!

Does Your Estate Sale Company Have Minimums?

No not a minimum. We occasionally host some smaller sales that may only gross a few thousand dollars. So, we do not have any set minimum on value that must be present. We do have to be able justify the cost of setting up and running a sale and this setup cost is a very small sale setup fee that comes off the top of the gross sales so there is no out of pocket expense and it’s a very small amount and disclosed in the agreement very clearly.

You want the estate sale services provider to be in the same boat you are as a client. Nobody makes money unless the estate sale company does their job well and there is no better way, than to be motivated and incentivized to sell the most items possible, for the highest prices possible, in the time we have to sell it. That happens when everyone has some skin in the game very little guaranteed. Yes, we spend approximately a week prepping the entire sale and then run the sale and all we are guaranteed is the sale setup fee which will only be a small fraction of the cost we have to put into the sale to get it ready. We take most of the risk, and there is no up-front cost, or out of pocket cost to you. If you have a company that has large sale minimums ($1,500.00, $2,000.00 or even as high as $2,500.00) in labor fees or sale minimums they start getting guarantees no matter how well the sale does. This structure doesn’t motivate the estate sale company to fight for every dollar, as they will make their money one way or another regardless of the results.

The vast majority of what an estate sale company earns should come from the commission which is a direct reflection of how they perform on the preparation, advertising and throughout the entire sale process.In rare cases of massive projects or hoarder situations where our team is on site for multiple weeks or months even, prepping a sale, we may impose a larger minimum. In these rare instances this will be explained and agreed upon by both parties before ever signing an agreement. This happens less than 1% of all the sales we run.

What is your estate sale company’s commission?

An average commission for any estate sale company is anywhere generally from 35-50% at current market rates.You want to hire a company with some real skin in the game. This way their goal is, to sell as much as they can, for the most money they can, in the limited time they have to sell it.Be leery of other large amount fees like $2,500.00 labor fee and a low commission like, a 25% commission. These are not in your best interest. A company is not able to pay a working wage and make money, running sales for 25% to 35% unless they charge a very large fee like a $2,500.00 labor fee.There is a reason they are so low and it’s not because they are the best. Often these companies are small mom pop shops and they do not really care how well the sale does they simply put very little effort into prepping and advertising the sale and they make what they can make, with very little effort and move on to the next one. If they simply have a very low rate, they can be limited on how much time they are willing to invest in the sale preparation phase because they are making such a small percentage. This can force the company to cut short of the effort in prepping the sale and this allows for significant things to be missed, or mis-priced. Be VERY leery of low commission rates and high labor fees etc.

 

Estate Sale Company Fees

When choosing an estate sale company, consider more than just their commission rates. For example, Company A might charge a lower commission of 35%, resulting in a sale of $8,000 and your share being $5,200. However, Company B, despite a higher 40% commission, may bring in a total of $14,000 due to better advertising, preparation, and a strong customer base, leading to your share being $8,400. In this scenario, choosing Company B is more beneficial despite the higher commission, as their quality of service leads to a significantly better outcome.

Attending Estate Sales & What To Look For:

1. Do they have professional signs that are visible from several directions?

2. Is the parking situation being handled effectively?

3. What does the checkout process look like? Is it smooth? Clear posted signs on the process. Are the checkers fast and efficient or is it so painfully slow that people are leaving after putting items back due to this slow process?

4. Did the estate get staged and fully setup?

5. Did all items get priced in some form (tagged individual items, bulk pricing when appropriate or did everything get bulk priced) This is how companies lose value and profit in a sale is not allowing a home to not being fully prepped.

6. Is the staff friendly, available, moving around the home during the sale? Are they easily identifiable with professional uniforms etc.? Can you tell the difference between an estate sale company employee and shoppers or are they hard to find or identify? Are they making themselves available for help? Or are they sitting on a chair or couch not paying attention to the sale and it’s customers?

7. Does it appear the employees are restaging items, as other items sell during the sale process?

Is the estate sale company collecting sales tax at checkout?

8. Is the signage in the home clear, concise, professional, not hand written?

9. Take a look at their online marketing. You should see a list of items available for sale in that particular sale on that particular estate sale listing. If you don’t see a list and only see an address of the sale location be concerned.

Why is this important? When you go to some of the conglomerate sites or even search engines such as Safari, Internet Explorer, Google, etc. and type in something like “antique desk for sale” our website, social

media pages and listing sites like estatesales.org, estatesales.net etc. those listings will appear.

Why? Because the word “antique desk” is noted in the listing. Now a shopper that is online seeking an antique desk, see that ad, sees the sale, realizes it’s this weekend and looks at the picture, loves the antique desk we took pictures of and decides to show up and buy that antique desk. Cha-ching! We just made another sale for you! Why? Because we did our job well and you reap the benefits!

10. What is their marketing like? Did they list items for sale or is it just general categories or, just an address and no listing of what is being sold at all?

11. Do they have listings on EstateSales.net?

12. Do they have the sale listing on EstateSales.org?

13. Do they have the sale listing on EstateSale.com?

14. Does the estate sale company have a website that is updated, easy to navigate, can shoppers find the sale listing? Can they ask questions on the sale listing page on the estate sale company’s website?

We sincerely hope this helps you to better understand estate sale companies in general and ideally, to better understand our estate sale company and how our, process works at Prestige Estate

Services. It’s our goal, that at every estate sale we process, receives the same prestigious services as the next!

We look forward to seeing you soon! Thank you,

Prestige Estate Services