Downsizing the Family Homestead Pt 2

Are you faced with the process of downsizing your family home? I broke the process down into a series of manageable steps!

Springtime Action Items

After the first auctioneer told me I didn’t have enough to have an on-site auction, I decided that an estate sale might be a better idea.  In the Spring of 2018, I contacted a lady (Judy) who did estate sales.  In addition to doing estate sales, she had previously had a brick-and-mortar antique store in a nearby town and she still set up at select antique shows.  My Mom had helped her a few times at her antique store, and she knew me thru my flower shop/antique shop, Petals & Porch Posts.

Judy came out to the farm in April 2018 and looked over the houses and the various buildings.  By this time, Dave and I had purchased the house in Florida but were thinking of it as a “snowbird” house. I had already shipped several boxes to Florida full of things I needed down there.  By having an estate sale, I wouldn’t have to move all the items out of the house. We could allow people to come into the house in order to view (and purchase) the things.  We would need to move things out of the modular (rental) house into either the pavilion or the main house as people would not be allowed to go in that house.

We set a date of early October 2018.  My job was to continue sorting thru the items in order to remove things I knew we wanted to keep.  Judy and her helper would come at beginning of September to start organizing and marking things.  Dave and I rented a U-Haul van in late June and filled it up with furniture, dishes and other things that were ready to go to the “snowbird” house.  We were gone a little over a week.

Off Site Storage Units

One of my goals was to clear out at least one of the two remaining storage units I was renting in town.  The 3rd unit was being used by the tenants.  The other two units held things from my brick-and-mortar flower shop that wouldn’t fit in the pizza building or things I had been using when I still did herb shows or antique shows.  In order to help with the moving, I contracted with a local moving company Two Men and A Truck.  I had used them a couple of other times with moves involving the flower shop.  I believe I had them come three times while I was getting ready for the estate sale.

We set the pavilion up like a mini-Petals & Porch Posts.  It was full of tables, cabinets, display pieces and various smalls.  The picture below is of one of the base cabinets that had been in storage being carried into the pavilion.  The guys really liked working for me because they usually got pizza for lunch! In the background, you can see the burn pile and the Santa house.  The burn pile eventually was almost as tall as the Santa House!

Prepping for the Estate Sale

Dave and I spent one whole Sunday unloading the Glass house.  Everything you see on the lawn had been in the Glass house (the building made of windows with the red roof).  I had to wash it all off and get it ready for the sale.  You can also see my parents’ house in the background.

Because we had items that we knew we would eventually want in Florida, I rented a portable storage unit and had it on the property for several months.

From mid- August thru the sale, Dave worked lunches at the pizzeria with my manager so that I could concentrate on working at the farm to get ready for the sale.  We had to keep items separate from the sale that we wanted to keep.  Several things in the house had NFS signs on them, especially if they were too big to move easily.  We also had three rooms in the house that were off limits where we had our personal belongings and things that were already boxed up for the Florida house. I kept working my normal evening schedule at the pizzeria.

Thyme for the Sale

We had perfect weather for the sale.  I set up a food stand in the garage and sold beverages and lunch items.  We had a great turn out and sold quite a bit.  People even tried to buy things that in my opinion belonged with the property, for example the windmill!   I had a goal in mind, and we did reach that after the commission amount was paid to Judy.  It was worth it to have Judy organize and run the sale.  She and her helpers were amazing.

For this sale, I had concentrated on getting the storage units in town cleared out, the glass house, the pavilion and the main house.  I brought a lot of smalls (china, crystal, tea cups, etc) out from the rental house.  We did not even try to do my Dad’s workshop, the barn or the back shed.  I think we pulled out a few things from the corn crib.  I did get the biggest storage unit in town completely emptied.

Once the sale was over, I resumed working the lunch shift 4 days a week and continued working my evening shifts.   Even though I had had a lot of help getting ready for the sale, it had been emotionally and physically exhausting.  And we really weren’t through.  We had made a nice dent in things but there was still quite a bit left.  I started working on phase 3 of the downsizing.  I started by going through the things that didn’t sell in the sale and donated quite a few things to a local non-profit organization.  I made plans to send the things I called “fancy” to an auction house in Blue Mound, Ill shortly after the New Year.  The “fancy” things were all the China, glass, and Christmas dishes that I knew I didn’t have room for or didn’t need.

After the Sale was Over

In mid-October 2018, I came to the realization that it didn’t make sense to try to maintain the houses in Illinois and the house in Florida.  Dave really wanted to leave Illinois.  He was tired of the cold winter weather.  The picture below was actually taken in February 2007.  I included it just to show what the snow looks like after a particularly bad blizzard!

After a lot of soul searching, I decided that it was thyme to let Dave choose where we would live.  He didn’t really like living in the country.  I decided to sell my pizzeria and put the Illinois property on the market.  There was still a lot of work that would need to be done before the houses could go on the market.  I set a target date for March 1st, 2019, to have the houses ready to go.  I had roughly 4 months to get things ready.

to continue on the journey:

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