When the home office closes for good
In Killiney, a lot of working lives have been run from home. Consultants, architects, solicitors, engineers and accountants have worked from a study at the front of the house, a consulting room by the side door or an office over the garage, often for decades. When they retire, that room is suddenly full of things nobody needs any more.
Clearing it can feel like a bigger moment than it looks. It isn't just furniture; it's a career's worth of files, books and drawings. We take that seriously and work at your pace, removing what you've decided can go and leaving everything else as it was.
What a retiring professional's office holds
Every office is different, but the same things come up:
- Files and archives. Filing cabinets, lever-arch files, deed boxes and boxes stored in the attic or garage.
- Books. Reference shelves, professional journals and bound reports.
- Heavy furniture. Large desks, glass-fronted bookcases, plan chests and steel cabinets.
- Old equipment. Computers, printers, fax and dictation machines and boxes of cables.
- Drawings and plans, rolled in tubes or laid flat in drawers, for architects and engineers.
A few things are worth a second look before they go. An architect's plan chest, a good drawing board or a fine partners' desk may interest a dealer or a younger colleague, and drawings and plans may still be wanted by clients or by whoever takes over the practice's work. Check before the day, and anything you decide to keep stays exactly where it is.
Some of this you'll want to keep, sell or give away, and some has to be dealt with by you before it goes, which is where we start.
Client files: the part that's yours
Client records remain the retiring professional's responsibility, even after the practice has closed. Before we touch the cabinets:
- Check how long records must be kept, with your professional body, insurer or accountant.
- Arrange storage or transfer for records that must be kept, or that a successor is taking on.
- Send the rest to a shredding company. We don't shred.
- Wipe or remove computer drives. Old PCs, laptops and external drives go to electrical recycling, but data destruction isn't a service we provide.
Once the files are dealt with, we take the empty cabinets, the general paper and the shelving.
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Big houses, long carries
Practices in Killiney's larger houses bring their own access questions. The office may be on the first floor, at the end of a long hall, or in a separate building in the garden. We'll ask for a photo of the drive and the route from the office to the door, so we can plan where the van stops and how far everything has to travel.
Heavy pieces come apart where they're designed to: desk tops lift off pedestals and bookcases separate from their bases. Stairs and floors are protected as we work, and we take particular care with antique furniture, whether it's going or staying. If a valuable piece is being sold, an antiques dealer may prefer to collect it whole, so arrange that first.
A garden office or cabin is common here too. Clearing one is straightforward: furniture, shelving and boxes out, and the building left empty. If the overflow has spread into a garden shed, see shed clearance.
Closing a home office in Killiney? Send a few photos of the office, the stairs and the drive, and tell us whether you'd like it done in one go or in stages. We'll come back with a fixed price, usually the same day.
At your pace
Some people want the whole office gone in one morning. Others prefer to go through it in stages, a few cabinets at a time, deciding as they go. Both are fine. We can do one visit, or several shorter ones, each with its own fixed price. If you'd like a week between visits to go through the next batch of cabinets in your own time, that's no trouble at all. Family members are welcome to be there, and if anything turns up that looks personal or valuable, such as photographs, certificates or letters, we put it aside for you to look at.
Where it goes, and the price
Books in good condition are packed for reuse where possible, furniture that can be used again is set aside, electricals and metal are recycled, and the rest goes to licensed facilities. Our page on what happens to furniture after a clearance explains the process. We're an authorised waste carrier and fully insured.
The price depends on volume, the carry and any dismantling, and it's fixed before you book. If it's only one or two large pieces, furniture removal may be simpler. For a whole house, see house clearance in Killiney, and in the village next door, house clear-outs in Dalkey. For practices in the town, see office clear-outs in Dún Laoghaire, and the full service is on our office clearance page.
