17 Questions to Ask Before You Hire an Estate Sale Company
Interview more than one company, and ask every one of them the same questions. It is the only way to compare apples to apples. Here is the list — along with our answer to every question on it, in writing, before you ever pick up the phone.
Go Deeper on the Two Questions Families Ask Most
A company should be willing to explain—in writing—how your sale is documented and how your home is protected.
How will I know what sold?
See our checkout, receipt, itemized reporting, and seller settlement process.
See how reporting works → Security & accountabilityHow do you protect the home?
See our staffing, no-presale, insurance, checkout, and employee-purchase controls.
See how we protect your sale →Most families hire the first company they call
That is understandable. You are usually doing this in the middle of a move, a probate, or a loss — and estate sale companies all sound roughly the same on the phone.
They are not the same. Commission structures, insurance, presale policies, and what happens to the house afterward vary enormously from one company to the next, and almost none of it comes up unless you ask.
So ask. Interview at least two or three companies, ask each of them the identical list of questions, and write the answers down side by side. The differences show up fast.
We have published our own answers below, in public, so you can hold them up against anyone else’s. If another company’s answer is better than ours, hire them — you should end up with the right company, and we would rather earn it than win by being the only one you called.
Ask everyone the same questions. Different questions produce answers you cannot compare. Use one list for every company.
Write the answers down. After three consultations they blur together. Take notes during, not after.
Get the important ones in writing. Commission, fees, and how the home is left belong in the contract — not in a conversation you half remember.
Money and terms
The commission rate on its own tells you almost nothing. What matters is the rate plus everything charged underneath it, and when the money actually reaches you.
What is your commission?
Industry commissions generally run in the 30–50% range depending on the size and complexity of the sale. A low headline rate with fees stacked underneath it can easily cost more than a higher all‑in rate, so never take this number by itself — always ask question 2 in the same breath.
40% of gross sales. That is our standard rate. It is agreed with you in writing before we begin any work, and there is no upfront cost to you at any point.
We are not the cheapest company in Nashville and we do not try to be. 40% sits in the middle of the 30–50% range the industry runs on, and it covers the whole job — setup and staging, research and pricing, photography, advertising, a fully staffed sale, checkout and cash handling, and settlement with an itemized report.
Some companies quote a lower headline rate and then bill several of those pieces as separate line items. That is exactly why question 2 matters more than this one. When you compare us against anyone else, compare the rate and the fee list together.
We wrote a longer piece on what that commission actually pays for, including a full cost breakdown: Are estate sale companies worth the commission?
Are there any fees besides the commission?
This is where companies differ the most, and where surprises show up on the final settlement. Ask specifically about each of these: advertising and photography, labor or staffing charges, dumpster and haul‑away, credit card processing, moving heavy or oversized items, cleaning, and any minimum. Ask for the answer in writing.
No upfront fees and no hidden ones. No consultation fee, no listing fee, no setup charge. Our compensation is the agreed commission on gross sales, so we are paid out of what the sale earns rather than billed to you up front.
Optional add‑on services such as a full clean‑out to empty are quoted separately and only proceed with your written approval. Nothing appears on your settlement that you have not already agreed to.
Do you charge sales tax?
In Tennessee this is not a matter of company preference. It turns on a specific rule about whether the company discloses who owns the property it is selling, and the answer changes who owes the tax — you or them. Ask any company you interview what their basis is. A clear, specific answer in either direction is fine. A shrug means nobody has looked, and on your sale that is a question you inherit.
No — we do not charge sales tax on the household contents of your sale, and the reason is worth understanding, because it is also a test of how carefully a company operates.
Under Tennessee’s agent rule (Tenn. Comp. R. & Regs. 1320‑05‑01‑.01), when a company sells property for a disclosed owner, the sale is taxable to that owner rather than to the company. Separately, under Tenn. Code Ann. § 67‑6‑102(8)(B), occasional and isolated sales by someone not regularly engaged in business fall outside the definition of “business” altogether — which is exactly what an estate, or a family downsizing, is.
Put those together and you get the result the Tennessee Department of Revenue states directly in its own guidance for auctioneers and consignees: where the principal is disclosed, sales tax does not apply to an estate sale, because the estate is not engaged in business. Where the principal is not disclosed, the company running the sale is deemed the owner, and the sale becomes taxable.
We disclose. That is why your sale is not taxed.
Two things worth knowing. Motor vehicles are carved out of that exemption — a title transfer is taxable on its own terms regardless of the rest of the sale. And we are not your tax advisor: if your situation is unusual, such as a business liquidation, dealer inventory, or a trust with its own filings, confirm the treatment with your CPA or the estate’s attorney.
Every transaction runs through Square at checkout either way, so each sale produces a complete, auditable record of what sold and for how much.
How long after the sale will I be paid?
Reputable companies commit to a specific window and hand you an itemized report showing what sold and at what price. “As soon as we get everything counted” is not an answer. Ask for the number of days, and ask whether the report is itemized or just a total.
A check is mailed within five business days of the sale ending, along with a detailed, itemized sales report.
The report lists what sold and for how much, item by item — not a single lump‑sum figure you have to take on faith.
Five business days is deliberately short. Families are usually settling an estate or closing on a house, and money that arrives six weeks later is money that arrived too late to be useful.
Trust and protection
You are handing a stranger the keys to a house and everything in it. These four questions are the ones that protect you, and they are the ones most people forget to ask.
Do you have insurance? What types?
Hundreds of strangers are about to walk through a property you own or are responsible for as executor. If someone is injured, or something is damaged, the company’s coverage should answer for it — not your homeowner’s policy, and not your personal liability as an executor. Ask for a certificate of insurance. A verbal “yes, we’re insured” is not a certificate.
Estate Greats is bonded and insured. Specifically, we carry general liability insurance, which covers injury and property damage arising from the sale, and workers’ compensation, which covers our own team.
That second one is easy to overlook and matters more than it sounds. If a company without workers’ comp has someone injured carrying a dresser down your stairs, the question of who is responsible does not have a comfortable answer.
Do you have a written contract? Can I review it before I sign?
Most consultations happen at your kitchen table, and a company that wants a signature at that first visit — before you have had a copy in your hands — has told you something important. Ask for a copy to keep, and when you read it, go straight to five things: the commission rate, the complete fee list, what condition the home will be left in, what happens to unsold items, and how either side cancels.
Yes — and you do not have to remember to ask for a copy, because it lives in your client portal. You can open it, read it, and re‑read it whenever you like, before you sign and for as long as we are working together.
That is deliberate. Families ask about the contract because some companies make it hard to get hold of — a paper you glimpse once at the consultation and never see again. Ours is a login away, so take the time you need with it and have your attorney, executor, or family read it too.
If anything in it is unclear, ask us to explain it before you sign. That is a fair request and we treat it as one.
Do you pre-sell items or allow early entry?
This question protects your bottom line. If the best pieces are sold to dealers or insiders before the doors open, the public sale is picked over on day one, foot traffic drops, and so does your total. Ask it directly and listen for hedging.
No presales. No early entry. Ever.
Everyone shops the same sale at the same time, on the same terms. Nothing is sold ahead of opening, and no shopper gets through the door early — not dealers, not friends of the company, not favored buyers.
The one thing that happens before the doors open is our own staff setting items aside for themselves — which they pay full price for, and which question 8 covers in detail. You can switch it off for your sale entirely.
Do you or your employees buy items from the sale?
This is the single most important conflict‑of‑interest question on the list, and the one companies are vaguest about. Anyone who both prices an item and is allowed to buy it has a direct financial incentive to price it low. A yes or no answer is not enough — ask to see the written policy.
Yes, in limited circumstances — and we will show you exactly how it works, because the controls are the whole point. Our written picking policy governs it:
- Staff never price their own purchases. Anything a team member intends to buy is priced by the owner or the general manager, without exception, even if that person was pricing that day.
- Claiming an item early costs more, not less. Anything set aside during setup, before the sale opens, is paid at full price. Sale‑day markdowns do not apply to items pulled in advance.
- Nothing leaves without a paid ticket. Every staff purchase runs through Square exactly like a customer sale. Taking anything without a ticket is theft, is grounds for immediate termination, and we will support a homeowner who chooses to file a report.
- New team members cannot pull items at all for their first 60 days.
- You can turn it off entirely. If you would rather no staff purchase anything from your sale, say so and we honor it — customers shop first, full stop.
Ask every company you interview to show you their policy in writing. If they do not have one written down, that is your answer.
The people and the expertise
Two companies can charge the same commission and produce wildly different totals. The difference is almost always who is pricing the items and how many people are working the floor.
Do you have an appraiser on staff, or access to one?
The gap between a $40 sticker and a $4,000 sale is entirely a matter of knowing what you are looking at. Ask who does the pricing, what their training is, and — just as important — what happens when something turns up that nobody on the team recognizes.
We have multiple certified appraisers on staff, and every team member is trained in appraisal methodology — so the person tagging items in a back bedroom knows when to stop and flag something rather than guess.
Items are priced on current market value, local demand, and condition, with research behind the number rather than a guess. High-value pieces are researched individually.
What is your field of expertise?
Every company has a center of gravity — antiques, mid‑century, art, tools, jewelry, or simply moving volume quickly. If your estate is concentrated in one category, you want a company that has sold that category before and knows who buys it.
Fine furniture, antiques, art, jewelry, and collectibles — alongside the ordinary household goods that make up the bulk of nearly every estate and are easy for a specialist‑only company to undersell.
Our particular strength is presentation. We stage homes to feel like a retail shopping event rather than a liquidation, because a house people enjoy walking through sells more of everything in it.
How many people will staff a sale like mine?
Understaffing costs you money twice: items walk out unpaid, and buyers abandon a long checkout line with full arms. Ask for a number for a home your size, not a general answer, and ask how checkout and cash are handled.
We size the crew to the sale — how much is in the house, and how big a crowd we expect — with a minimum of two staff on site at all times, never one. A packed four‑bedroom on a Saturday gets a materially bigger team than a one‑bedroom condo on a Sunday afternoon, and we will tell you the number we are planning for your sale at the consultation.
We staff every sale fully, every prep day and every sale day, no exceptions. Beware of any company that answers this question the same way regardless of the size of your home.
On sale days the team manages crowd flow, floor coverage, checkout, negotiation, and customer service. Cash drawers are counted and logged twice a day, before opening and at close, and every transaction runs through Square.
The schedule
If there is a closing date, a move‑out date, or a probate deadline in play, these three questions decide whether a company is actually an option for you.
How many days do you think it will take to set up?
Setup time tells you two things at once: how thorough the company intends to be, and how long the house is unavailable to you. Be wary in both directions — a company promising to set up a full house in a single day is either bringing a large crew or cutting corners, and it is fair to ask which.
A sale week runs in three phases: setup days, where we sort, stage, and organize the home so it is clean and easy to shop; pricing days, where items are researched, tagged, and logged; and sale days.
For a typical estate: about two days of setup, then one to two days of pricing. We start the Monday or Tuesday of sale week and wrap by Thursday, with the sale opening Friday. So the working week runs roughly Tuesday through Sunday, and your home is in use three to four days before the doors open.
Larger or more complicated estates need more runway, and that gets planned in advance rather than discovered halfway through. You will know the exact days before we start, not as we go. The whole process from first consultation to completed sale typically runs one to two weeks.
How many days will the sale itself be?
Sale length affects your total. Too short and you miss buyers; too long and you are discounting to an empty house. Ask about the markdown schedule too — when prices drop, and by how much — because that schedule determines what your last day is worth.
A typical sale runs Friday through Sunday, with Saturday consistently the strongest day. Depending on the size of the estate, a sale may run anywhere from two to four days.
Prices come down on a published schedule: day one is full price, day two is 30% off, and day three is 50% off.
We also negotiate throughout, rather than holding rigidly to sticker until the schedule says otherwise. That is a deliberate choice in your favor — a sensible offer accepted on Friday very often beats the same item leaving at half price on Sunday, and it is the difference between running a sale and running a countdown.
When would you be able to do the sale?
Ask for specific dates, not a season. Good companies book out, and the honest ones will tell you plainly when they cannot meet your deadline. If your timeline is driven by a closing or a move‑out date, put that on the table at the consultation rather than discovering the conflict later.
We respond to every inquiry within 24 hours and give you real dates at the consultation, which is free and carries no obligation.
If you are working against a closing date, tell us at that first conversation and we will tell you honestly whether we can hit it. We would rather turn down a sale than take one we cannot do well.
After the sale
What happens once the last buyer leaves is the part families think about least and regret most. Settle it before you sign, not after.
How will my home be left? Broom clean, empty, or as‑is?
“Broom clean,” “empty,” and “as‑is” are three very different outcomes, and the difference can be thousands of dollars and several days of your time. Whatever a company promises verbally, get the exact end condition written into the contract.
We agree the exact end condition with you before we begin, and it goes in your contract. Different families need different things — a home going straight on the market is not the same job as one that stays in the family — so we do not pretend one standard fits everyone.
Full clean‑out to move‑ready condition is available as an add‑on. For whatever is left unsold, you choose: donation to a local charity, re‑consignment through our offsite location, disposal, or return to you.
Do you have a store?
A company with its own retail store has somewhere to move inventory that did not sell, which can work in your favor. But it also creates a question worth asking directly: if unsold items go to their store, who owns them at that point, how are they priced, and do you share in what they bring?
We do not operate a retail store. What we have is an event space: our 2,500 sq ft showroom on West Iris Drive in Berry Hill, which we use to host offsite estate sales.
That matters when a sale cannot happen at the house — HOA or gated community restrictions, a home already listed and being shown, a family that wants privacy, or a closing date that will not wait. We collect the items, stage and price them there, and run the sale while you stay home.
Any re‑consignment of unsold items through that space is agreed with you in advance, in writing, on terms you approve.
The one that tells you the most
Do you have any sales coming up that I could visit?
This is the most useful question on the entire list, and almost nobody asks it. Go stand in a sale that company is actually running. Look at the signage, the staging, whether the house feels organized or ransacked, how long the checkout line is, how the staff speak to shoppers, and whether items are priced or randomly guessed at. Fifteen minutes in a live sale will tell you more than an hour of conversation in your living room.
Yes — and we would genuinely encourage it. Our upcoming sales are listed here, with addresses and times. Come to one before you decide.
You do not need to tell us you are coming or announce yourself when you arrive. Walk through as a shopper and judge it the way a shopper would. That is exactly the version you want to see.
Seven answers that should give you pause
None of these is proof of a bad company on its own. But each one is worth slowing down for, and two or more together is a pattern.
“I’d have to check on the commission”
Every company knows its own rate. Not naming it usually means it depends on how much they think you will accept.
You can’t take the contract home
There is no legitimate reason to keep a contract from the person being asked to sign it.
“We’ll sort out the fees later”
Fees settled after the sale are settled without your leverage. Get the complete list before you sign.
No certificate of insurance
“We’re insured” is a sentence. A certificate is a document. Ask for the document.
A vague payment timeline
If nobody will commit to a number of days, you have no recourse when it takes six weeks.
No sale you can visit
An established company has upcoming sales. If there is nothing to see, ask why.
Pressure to sign today
“This date will go to someone else” is a sales tactic. A good company will still be there on Thursday.
Take the checklist with you
A one‑page printable version of all 17 questions, with space to record three companies’ answers side by side. Bring it to every consultation, fill it in while you are sitting there, and compare them properly afterward.
This list is adapted from the questions EstateSales.NET suggests families ask when choosing an estate sale company — rewritten in our own words, with our answers added. They also suggest you mention if you found a company through their site, which we would echo — it is a genuinely useful resource, and our sales are listed there alongside everyone else’s.