When my grandmother passed away I underwent the daunting task of holding her estate sale. With the help of my mother, we organized, photographed and put photos of the sale items online. For many years I've worked with antiques and props in the motion picture business, and I have held several garage sales in the past - so I felt that I was up to the task.
Overall we did fairly well, but realized into day three that the process was physically and emotionally taxing. We quickly understood the reasons and importance of hiring a professional estate sale company. With no additional help, we ran out of time and energy.
To thorougly research all the collectables and antiques we needed more help, and time... The dealers did well, and capitalized on our lack of preparedness.
That was over a decade ago...
I have learned the importance of proper preparedness and knowledge since then. On our staff we have appraisers with over 30 years of experience.
It'll be sunny (we hope)! Temp 2119.