these declutter discussions are enormous (200 messages in a month ...)
I have to deal with my own clutter but my family have to deal with my deceased father's clutter. I spent about 50 hrs in a week going through bags and boxes, throwing out newspapers and old stock market reports, organising books, photos, personal letters etc that were all mixed up together. I only got through a fraction of it before I left the country again. My brother and sister say it is just too much, they won't even try and we just have to accept that some things we may have wanted will be dumped. They say we won't know what we are missing.
I have a question about professional house clearing. Will they actually go through mixed bags and try to save what they think may interest family and what may be valuable (letters from authors, etc) and/or of interest to archives. Do they give clothing and kitchen ware and so on to charity or do they just dump it? Do any of the charities such as Goodwill Industries actually offer their own house-clearing services.
Location is New York City.