Services

Giving you peace of mind and time that you didn't have to begin with. 

Liquidating assets is a major undertaking, but we have it down to a compassionate science! Our job is to help families along their journey of downsizing, settling an estate, appraising the value of a household or cleaning out a property while making it as stress free as possible. 

Relic Road is a local family business that offers nursing home/assisted living clean-out services, appraisal, auction or sale coordination within 15 miles of La Crosse, Wisconsin including; Onalaska, West Salem, Holmen. In Minnesota our service area includes Hokah, Dresbach, Dakota  & La Crescent.

Our team thoroughly evaluates each piece of paper, box, folder and drawer to make sure your family photos, insurance policies, any money and important documents are safely in your hands while assessing value of items. We have vast experience in a wide variety of subject areas ranging from household goods and furniture to jewelry and antiques. Further, we have licensed experts on our team in areas such as firearms, hunting and fishing, as well as vehicle and real estate sales. When you work with Relic Road, you are not just hiring one person that knows a little about a lot of things. You are a getting an entire team of experienced and licensed professionals, with dozens of years of experience- all at your disposal to successfully appraise or liquidate your property!  

Our Services

Appraisals

With our years of estate and antique sales experience, we do perform personal property appraisals as often required by the courts for probate and divorce proceedings. We charge a flat fee for this service, dependent on the square footage of the property. Small to medium sized homes (1500 sq ft) require a $500 fee and large homes (1600 sq ft and up) or properties with several outbuildings require a $750 fee.  If you are looking to just have a few items appraised, we can do that as well at our shop for a $10/per item. Please give us a call to discuss your needs. 

Nursing Home/Assisted Living Cleanout

For many families, the death of a loved one can be very stressful. If family members do not live in the area, emptying the room your loved one lived in can be even more problematic. We can usually accomplish a haul away within 3-4 days and fees range between $500-$1,500. We often provide this service to Nursing Home and Assisted Living residents in our area. 

From one of our satisfied clients:
"Oh my gosh thank you so much! I can't believe you did it! I can't tell you how grateful I am for cleaning out my mom's! You are my angel!"  -Theresa, Hokah, MN
 

 

First thing to do: call us! We can discuss a variety of options with you and are happy to provide a free consultation.

Wondering where to start? We get that question a lot. Here are some tips when downsizing or working on an estate: 

-Remove everything you wish to keep from the home prior to your estate sale/cleanout company starting their work.

-Tell friends and family about your sale and make sure they know what folks are doing there. As a business, we are not there to gossip about your family, as our clients are the number one priority! We will be polite, but inquiries and visits from neighbors as we work can interfere with our ability to effectively get the job done.

-Understand that we may sell some of your items prior to sale. Examples include furniture being pre-sold to allow for safe movement in the home, selling items on eBay rather than locally, to specific buyers or jewelry stores. This is always done with the client's best interest in mind.

-Empty all refrigerator/freezers completely or advise us if you need us to do so. 5 year old frozen chicken is no one's friend!

-Do remove all food from kitchen cupboards. If it is new and still sealed, we can sell it or donate it. If not, toss it!

-Continue to keep the power and water on, as well as lawn mowed, snow shoveled, and trash picked up until after your sale.

-If you have hired a realtor, please have them provide business cards as this may help sell your home! We do ask that your realtor not actively list/show the home until after your sale. 

-Understand that it takes more than 200 hours of labor and approximately 3 weeks to adequately prepare and run a successful estate sale and cleanouts can vary based on the size of the home.

-Understand that dates may change due to weather or other circumstances, but we work hard to communicate well. 

-Understand that items will be priced to sell, which will be significantly less than you paid for the item, or donated. Our goal is to provide you with an empty home.

-Expect that cleanup of the property and removal of remaining items may take up to 1 week after the sale and that removal of large items that do not sell may incur extra expenses.  

We recommend that you do not:

-Get a dumpster and throw things away. Often families throw away items that will sell at a sale believing it is junk. 

-Spend days sorting paperwork- we will have to sort through everything and can confidentially destroy paperwork containing your information and set aside those that will be needed for taxes, the estate, memories or medical care.

-Allow friends, family and neighbors to gain early entrance to the sale. They should plan to come to the sale on the advertised dates like the general public as this will hurt your overall sale proceeds if allowed, as other buyers will assume it is “picked over”.

-Worry about disposal of chemicals and other specific items. We will take care of it legally and within state and local regulations.

-Throw away cardboard boxes, plastic bags, newspapers, etc. prior to the sale- we never seem to have enough for sale day so we’ll use them.

-We advise that clients and family do not attend their sale, as this can be emotional and hard to watch folks buy your memories.

-Expect that large items may not physically fit through doorways or hallways. If something cannot be removed without risk of destruction of property please advise - we do not wish to damage your home so those items may be your responsibility to have moved outside if we cannot see a way to safely remove them.

 This list of helpful tips is drawn from our years of experience, and may not be applicable to every situation.