Clearing an apartment or basement in Slovenia: how it works

Sometimes a property doesn’t need maintaining — it needs emptying. An inherited apartment filled with a parent’s belongings. A basement or attic where things you didn’t need have been piled up for years. A house left idle for a long time, with clutter built up inside. A property that’s due to be prepared for sale or rental, but first everything has to be taken out of it.

This is what clearing is — a separate service with its own logic, and often its own delicacy. This article is about how the clearing process works, the situations where it’s needed, and how to approach the hardest case of all — clearing an inherited home.

This material draws on the long-standing experience of the DomCare team in clearing apartments, houses and storage spaces in Slovenia.

What clearing is

Clearing is the full or partial emptying of a property of belongings, furniture and clutter, bringing it to an “empty and clean” state. It isn’t cleaning (cleaning deals with how clean a place is, not its contents) and it isn’t moving (a move transports belongings to a new place, rather than sorting them into “keep / give away / throw out / haul away”).

Clearing includes assessing the volume, sorting belongings, physically carrying things out and hauling them away, disposing of what needs to be disposed of, and a final clean of the emptied space. The result is an empty, clean property, ready for the next stage: sale, rental, renovation, or simply a settled state.

Typical situations

An inherited apartment. The most common and the most delicate case. After a relative passes away, a home full of their belongings remains, and the heir — often living in another country — needs to empty it. There’s a separate section on this below.

A basement, attic, storeroom. Storage spaces accumulate, over years, the things that are “a shame to throw out”. At some point they need clearing — before a sale, before a renovation, or simply to recover useful space.

A house after a long idle period. A property that has stood empty for a long time often accumulates not just dust, but abandoned belongings, old furniture, unwanted equipment.

Preparing for sale or rental. A buyer and a tenant want to see a clean property, not someone else’s daily life. Clearing is an essential step before putting a property on the market.

After a tenant moves out. Sometimes tenants leave behind belongings, furniture, clutter — and the property needs clearing before its next use.

How the process works

Clearing isn’t “we turned up and carried it out”. It’s a managed process of several stages.

Stage 1. Assessment. An inspection of the property, an assessment of the volume: how many belongings, what kind, what among them might be valuable, what is oversized, whether there’s anything requiring special disposal. The outcome is a clear plan and an understanding of the scale.

Stage 2. Sorting. Belongings are sorted into categories: what you want to keep and receive, what can be given away or donated to charity, what is to be disposed of, what is ordinary haul-away. This stage is especially important with an inherited home — here the decisions are made by the owner, not by our team.

Stage 3. Carrying out and hauling away. Physically carrying belongings and furniture out of the property (this overlaps with the moving furniture service), loading, hauling away. Oversized items, household appliances and construction waste often require different disposal methods in line with local rules.

Stage 4. Final clean. The emptied property is cleaned — often this is a deep clean, because under the belongings and furniture there’s usually something that hasn’t been cleaned in a long time.

The outcome of each stage is documented, and you see the process even if you’re in another country.

The delicate side: clearing an inherited home

Clearing an inherited apartment isn’t only logistics. Behind the belongings stands a person, and the heir — especially one who lives abroad and can’t come — ends up in a difficult position: having to make decisions about a loved one’s things from a distance.

A careful approach matters here. A few principles we follow:

• Only the owner decides what happens to belongings. Our team doesn’t decide what is “clutter” and what isn’t. Anything uncertain is shown and agreed.
• Personal items and documents — kept separate. Photographs, documents, letters, jewellery, obviously valuable or personal items are set aside and passed to the heir, not sent for haul-away.
• The owner sets the pace. If time is needed for decisions, the process can run in stages, rather than “everything carried out in one day”.
• Photo documentation. An heir who can’t be present sees what is happening and how, and can take part in decisions remotely.

The goal is for a task that is hard by its nature to be carried out neatly, respectfully, and without any sense that someone else’s hands have disposed of a family’s memory.

What to do with the belongings

Not everything carried out during clearing is rubbish. Sensible clearing separates:

• Keep for the owner — the valuable, personal, needed. Passed to you or stored by arrangement.
• Give away or donate to charity — furniture and items in good condition that can serve others.
• Sell — if there are items with market value (this is discussed separately).
• Dispose of properly — appliances, hazardous materials and oversized items are hauled away in line with local waste rules.
• Ordinary haul-away — what has genuinely had its day.

This approach is both more ethical and often more practical: less ends up in landfill, and some things find a second life.

How it connects to other services

Clearing naturally joins up with neighbouring services. Carrying out and moving large items is moving furniture. The final tidying-up of the property is cleaning. If clearing is part of preparing an inherited property for the future, property care may then be needed while you decide what to do with the property. And a small, one-off clearing can be arranged as a one-off visit.

How it works at DomCare

At DomCare, clearing is a managed process: assessing the volume, sorting with decisions agreed, carrying out and hauling away with proper disposal, a final clean. We approach clearing an inherited home with care: the decisions stay with the owner, personal items and documents are kept separate, the pace is yours, and everything is documented with photos for those who can’t be present. We work in Ljubljana, on the Slovenian Coast, in the Bled and Bohinj region, and in the Kranj region.

The easiest way to discuss it: message us through the form or on WhatsApp.

Frequently asked questions

How is clearing different from cleaning? Cleaning deals with how clean a property is. Clearing deals with its contents: it empties the place of belongings, furniture and clutter. Clearing is usually followed by a clean of the emptied space.

Can clearing be arranged if I’m not in Slovenia? Yes, that’s a common situation, especially with inherited homes. The process runs in stages with photo documentation, and all decisions about what happens to belongings are agreed with you remotely.

What happens to the belongings during clearing? They’re sorted: the valuable and personal is kept for the owner, items in good condition may go to charity, the rest is disposed of by the rules. The decision on uncertain items always rests with the owner.

How do you approach clearing an inherited apartment? With care. Only the owner makes the decisions, personal items and documents are set aside separately, you set the pace, and everything is documented with photos. It isn’t “carry everything out in a day” if you need it otherwise.

Does it include hauling away large furniture and appliances? Yes. Carrying out and hauling away oversized items is part of clearing; appliances and special waste are hauled away in line with local disposal rules.

Clearing is about emptying a property and returning it to a clean, ready state. It’s a managed process, not a chaotic carry-out, and in the hardest case — an inherited home — it requires not only logistics but care. The key thing is that even from another country, you remain the one who makes the decisions.

Need a property cleared in Slovenia — message us, and we’ll assess the volume and propose a plan.

Sources and further reading

• DomCare — Property Clearing — what the service includes
• DomCare — Moving & Furniture — carrying out large items
• DomCare — Cleaning — the final clean after clearing
• DomCare — About us — our experience clearing properties