A&E Estate Sales

I can't recommend A&E highly enough. My grandmother moved to assisted living and her home was sold so we had to get rid of the contents of her home. The family decided on hiring an estate sale company because emptying the house ourselves, which would mean going through everything in the home and determining the value of each item, advertising the items, staging the items, selling the items, and then getting rid of whatever was left over, would take too long and consume more time that we could spare. Frank came to the home and he was professional and he explained how the sale would work. I was impressed by him especially compared to other estate sales companies that I called. Their fee is a percentage of what sells and the percentage that I was quoted  (35%) is standard for the industry. I was not quoted a lower percentage by other companies but I was given a higher percentage. We saw how much time it took four people to get the contents of the home ready for sale and the cost was worth it to us. If we had tried to do this ourselves we would have been stressed out, exhausted, and we would have hated each other (4 family members). Don't underestimate how difficult of a task this is.
A&E came to the home the week before the sale and went through everything (i.e., they went through every drawer, cupboard, closet, and you-name-it) and priced items and staged them in the home with like items in the same area on tables, clothes on racks, etc. As you can imagine, there is a lot of junk in any home (old pens, broken items, useless paperwork, and on-and on). During the staging process they bagged up these items and threw them away. The sale was advertised on the internet and the turn-out was good. There were four people (including Frank) that were present for the sale and we were very impressed with the way the sale looked and how it was managed. They asked us not to come by for the sale but we did anyway (but stayed out of their way). They do this because people get attached to their things and don't want them being sold for less than what they think it is worth. The idea of an estate sale is to get rid of as much as possible for the best prices possible but, ultimately, to get rid of things (in our case the home was sold. This is what they did. Ours was a 3-day sale and they had a strategy for each day and they amount of stuff sold and our net exceeded our expectation. Some items that didn't sell but were deem worthy were put on eBay and we received a check for things that sold from this. After the sale was over, Frank called a charitable organization that picked up many items and anything left over was bagged up as trash and we were left an empty home which is what we wanted.
Could I tell you 100% that any estate sales company (not just A&E) was totally honest? No, but I trusted Frank and A&E as much as I could have trusted any company and they gave us no reason to think otherwise. They communicated with us, were easy to get a hold of when needed, and answered any questions that we had. I recommend A&E without reservation and can't imagine having a better experience with another company.
If you have the time and energy to do this yourself (or with others) and want what you want for the items being sold then do it yourself. If you don't or you're under time constraints then hire a company that know what they are doing and will get the job done.

A little disappointing - one problem was that we were not able to be at the sale in person--
Some of the items were sold at a low price since we were not able to describe them correctly.
Unfortunately. the time was rushed. Payment  was made promptly and agreed percentages were not changed.

They stated they needed at least 10 day's prior to the sale to set everything up.  It looked like they had to scramble to set everything up before the sale.  When they did the sale they said they would have a listing of all the Big Items that was sold.  I didn't get a listing of items sold so I had to take their word for it.  They didn't want me to be there for the sale.  I understand why they didn't want me there because of the sentimental value.  I would advise that a friend of the family or a friend should be there to make sure everything goes smoothly.  I told them that I had 3 items that I wanted a certain value for and they sold them for next to nothing.  They never called me and their excuse was because the market is slow and that is why they sold it for a different price.  They put up 25 signs all over town and they didn't pick up the signs after the sale was over, so i still had people calling and coming to the house wanting to know if I still had things available.  They wouldn't return my calls when I asked about the signs.  They were adding things to the sale that I didn't even own.  Some of the things that were sold were not picked up so I had to pay the landlord to keep the things in the garage.

UPDATE 3.5.13
She said that I did not understand bundling. The things that I had would never have lost value. If you use them, you need to be very specific and let them know you do not want "bundling" done. She asked me, "Are you going to go toe to toe with me on this?" I feel that they lost track of who the client was in the sale. I am still the client, I still have say. Just because they were running it did not mean they should have the final say. They took 40% of the sale, which is high. At the time, I liked how they presented themselves, I thought they were really good sales people, I liked their energy so I had agreed to it.

She asked me if I minded if they brought their stuff to help with the staging. What happened was, they used their stuff in the bundling of my stuff so they lost track of everything. There were no specific receipts. They didn't list any of it.

They told me there was going to be a crew of them there, but it was only the two of them. I gave them the key to the house and I told them I needed it back. They told me at the end of the sale that they couldn't figure out which key was mine. I ended up having to take the lock off the door and go to the locksmith to have another one remade.

I talked to the silent partner who sponsored the team. He said that he was not happy with the gentleman salesperson and that he was going to help resolve it. But when I checked back with him a couple of days later, he said I would have to resolve it with the two of them. They never returned my calls. At the end, all I got was a check in the mail, no thank you, no letter, no key, nothing.

It went great!  I made much more money from the sale than expected, and the team stayed around after the sale to help with clean up and disposal of unwanted/unpurchased items.  They are great!  I am going through a divorce, and the estate sale was to liquidate property for settlement.  They also do sales for foreclosures, downsizing, relocations, and deaths in the family.  A super company!