Here is a summary of the facts: On Jan 10, 2016 M[redacted] and W[redacted] met C[redacted] at the house of G[redacted] on E[redacted] Avenue which was in total disarray and had not been cleaned in at least one year. We explained to C[redacted] that the house contents were of very modest...
value. We told her we would conduct an estate sale of her mother's items if we could bring in our items and stage the house with some fine quality high end items to make it a "good" estate sale. We told her we would totally clean up the house and place all the trash/junk and unsaleable items on the side of the house by the garage. The junk/trash would be hauled away after the sale. She agreed, gave us a key to copy and signed the contract. C[redacted] was to come back on Saturday, January 22, 2016 to pick up the last of the items she desired from the room she lived in as a child and arrange the donation of her mother's clothing. There was a miscommunication. As we were staging the house and preparing for the estate sale one of our people removed C[redacted]'s mother's clothing from the closet and placed the clothing in plastic bags and transferred the bags to the garage where C[redacted] could find them and donate them to the charity of her choice. It was a simple mistake that caused absolutely no damage to the clothing -- It was not malfeasance and certainly not an excuse for C[redacted] to meltdown, throw hangers, berate M[redacted] for over one hour and 24 hours later email a threatening letter demanding a change in the estate sale contract where she received 40% of the proceeds for our items which were selling at the estate sale.When M[redacted] came to the house on Saturday, January 22, 2016 M[redacted] apologized and accepted responsibility for the error. She told C[redacted] she would get someone to come and rehang the clothing as soon as possible. C[redacted] literally screamed at her and demanded that she immediately rehang the clothing or she would lock us out of the house. M[redacted] explained to C[redacted] that she had just underwent a prolapsed bladder surgery and the doctor had told her not to lift more than five pounds. C[redacted] screamed all the louder and coerced M[redacted] into immediately picking up the bags in the garage and rehanging the clothes.In an effort to placate C[redacted], M[redacted] immediately carried the bags from the garage to the closet and rehung the clothes. As a result of this over exertion, M[redacted] ended up straining herself severely causing lack of bladder control, rectal seal issues and may now need another surgery to correct these complications. After M[redacted] finished hanging up the clothing, C[redacted] kept saying, "This is not me" in response to her unacceptable "Joan Crawford" behavior. M[redacted] hugged her, forgave her for her behavior and thought her apology had been accepted and all was well.The following day we received the email below from C[redacted]:January 23, 2016[redacted] and Sons Estate SalesThousand Oaks, CADear Will and M[redacted],This letter is to inform you of the change to our contract due to the totally horrendous day you put me through.ANY ITEMS NOT SOLD AT THE SALE TO BE HELD ON FEBRUARY 5 AND 6, 2016 AND THAT YOU SELL LATER ON, 60% WILL GO TO YOU AND 40% WILL GO TO ME TO COVER THE PSYCHOLOGICAL AND EMOTIONAL TORTURE YOU PUT ME THROUGH TODAY. YOU HAVE 3 DAYS TO RESPOND AND SEND AN ADDENDUM TO OUR CONTRACT. Should I not receive said addendum, I may cancel our contract. When I signed the original contract with you, I stipulated very clearly that you were not to touch my mother’s clothes, the vacuum would not be sold and the crates in the garage would not be sold. I stated, very clearly, that I would put the clothes I wanted into my closet and the rest I would come and pack on, today, the 23rd of January. I reiterated that you were not to remove her clothes from the closet. When talking about this I started crying and you, M[redacted], explained to Will that this was part of the grieving process and you understood.When I arrived today, I wandered the house, impressed with what I saw. I went to my closet and there were the items from the other closet in this closet. They should not have been in there. I started to work. I wondered what had happened?Soon, I went to mom’s closet. I was shocked, angered, I felt like I had been shot, violated, I ached, I hurt and I was amazed to find no clothes!!! I wailed, I yelled, I cried, I frantically ran around the house looking for clothes. Where were they? Did I miss something? No clothes. I looked in the garage, no clothes. I was astounded! I had spent a week gearing up for this arduous task. I was ready to cry and get the task accomplished. I was not ready for the panic, anger, disappointment, the disrespect and violation I felt, the gut wrenching agony, the defilement of my mother’s belongings! You broke my trust. You hit me with a sledgehammer and I spent the entire day crying, no sobbing and wailing and crying, while trying to find my way through her clothes, that you had put in plastic bags in the garage!. I had a plan on how I was going to fold the clothing and arrange my piles, but everything was not in its place anymore. My plan was dislodged. I knew exactly where everything had been. Now, I had to search. You even made excuses for what you did instead of owning what you did. How could you? An apology is not enough. This is the reason for the contract change.The disrespect you have shown for my mother and me is abhorrent! I was the only one who should have touched her clothes. You disrupted my grieving process and violated my trust. I asked for 3 simple things, which you agreed to. What a mess!!!!!. Even my friends were appalled! R[redacted] was shocked, as he found me crying when he arrived! On another note, as I mentioned today, please bring the wooden bed back inside so it does not get ruined in the rain or watering. This bed is part of the set in my mother’s bedroom. Do not remove any bags from the front door. The Salvation Army will pick them up on Tuesday. Please send me the receipt they will leave.When you are done with the job, please give the key to R[redacted] Horn, who recommended you to me.Please get back to me by Tuesday, January 26, 2016 with the addendum.Thank you,C[redacted]In response to C[redacted]'s emotional breakdown, irrational behavior, her verbal assault, hanger throwing and the demand letter, we removed our items from the house on January 24, 2016 and canceled the sale with an email response. At this point [redacted] & Sons was done with C[redacted] and the $3000 cost to clean the house, prepare the estate items for sale, stage and decorate the house with fine furnishings and to remove the staging items was written off as a bad investment with an emotionally disturbed woman. The keys to the house were given to her realtor, R[redacted] as per her wishes on January 25, 2016.The bags of donated clothing were outside the front door on the porch exactly where C[redacted] had placed them. Those donation bags were not in our care and are definitely not in any way our responsibility. If in fact any bags are missing, it is 100% her issue not ours.The frame of the painting fell apart when it was removed from the wall. Prior to the sale we would have repaired the frame and re-stapled the canvas so it could be sold for about $50. However, after her inexcusable & irrational reaction to the touching of her mother's clothing, the frame was placed in the trash and the loose canvas was left in the house with the other estate items. There was a good size truckload of items removed from the house and placed in the trash pile on the side of the garage as the house was filled with a lot of junk. The items found in the trash which C[redacted] claims to be valuable were basically unsaleable and of negligible value meaning a total of less than $20 - $30 in possible total garage sale proceeds. The so called other missing items could have been found in the trash if she would have looked more carefully.. In a nutshell, [redacted] & Sons did not damage nor remove any of C[redacted]'s mother's estate items from the property. Therefore we owe her no monetary compensation for those items and this matter should be shelved.
Here is a summary of the facts: On Jan 10, 2016 M[redacted] and W[redacted] met C[redacted] at the house of G[redacted] on E[redacted] Avenue which was in total disarray and had not been cleaned in at least one year. We explained to C[redacted] that the house contents were of very modest...
value. We told her we would conduct an estate sale of her mother's items if we could bring in our items and stage the house with some fine quality high end items to make it a "good" estate sale. We told her we would totally clean up the house and place all the trash/junk and unsaleable items on the side of the house by the garage. The junk/trash would be hauled away after the sale. She agreed, gave us a key to copy and signed the contract. C[redacted] was to come back on Saturday, January 22, 2016 to pick up the last of the items she desired from the room she lived in as a child and arrange the donation of her mother's clothing. There was a miscommunication. As we were staging the house and preparing for the estate sale one of our people removed C[redacted]'s mother's clothing from the closet and placed the clothing in plastic bags and transferred the bags to the garage where C[redacted] could find them and donate them to the charity of her choice. It was a simple mistake that caused absolutely no damage to the clothing -- It was not malfeasance and certainly not an excuse for C[redacted] to meltdown, throw hangers, berate M[redacted] for over one hour and 24 hours later email a threatening letter demanding a change in the estate sale contract where she received 40% of the proceeds for our items which were selling at the estate sale.When M[redacted] came to the house on Saturday, January 22, 2016 M[redacted] apologized and accepted responsibility for the error. She told C[redacted] she would get someone to come and rehang the clothing as soon as possible. C[redacted] literally screamed at her and demanded that she immediately rehang the clothing or she would lock us out of the house. M[redacted] explained to C[redacted] that she had just underwent a prolapsed bladder surgery and the doctor had told her not to lift more than five pounds. C[redacted] screamed all the louder and coerced M[redacted] into immediately picking up the bags in the garage and rehanging the clothes.In an effort to placate C[redacted], M[redacted] immediately carried the bags from the garage to the closet and rehung the clothes. As a result of this over exertion, M[redacted] ended up straining herself severely causing lack of bladder control, rectal seal issues and may now need another surgery to correct these complications. After M[redacted] finished hanging up the clothing, C[redacted] kept saying, "This is not me" in response to her unacceptable "Joan Crawford" behavior. M[redacted] hugged her, forgave her for her behavior and thought her apology had been accepted and all was well.The following day we received the email below from C[redacted]:January 23, 2016[redacted] and Sons Estate SalesThousand Oaks, CADear Will and M[redacted],This letter is to inform you of the change to our contract due to the totally horrendous day you put me through.ANY ITEMS NOT SOLD AT THE SALE TO BE HELD ON FEBRUARY 5 AND 6, 2016 AND THAT YOU SELL LATER ON, 60% WILL GO TO YOU AND 40% WILL GO TO ME TO COVER THE PSYCHOLOGICAL AND EMOTIONAL TORTURE YOU PUT ME THROUGH TODAY. YOU HAVE 3 DAYS TO RESPOND AND SEND AN ADDENDUM TO OUR CONTRACT. Should I not receive said addendum, I may cancel our contract. When I signed the original contract with you, I stipulated very clearly that you were not to touch my mother’s clothes, the vacuum would not be sold and the crates in the garage would not be sold. I stated, very clearly, that I would put the clothes I wanted into my closet and the rest I would come and pack on, today, the 23rd of January. I reiterated that you were not to remove her clothes from the closet. When talking about this I started crying and you, M[redacted], explained to Will that this was part of the grieving process and you understood.When I arrived today, I wandered the house, impressed with what I saw. I went to my closet and there were the items from the other closet in this closet. They should not have been in there. I started to work. I wondered what had happened?Soon, I went to mom’s closet. I was shocked, angered, I felt like I had been shot, violated, I ached, I hurt and I was amazed to find no clothes!!! I wailed, I yelled, I cried, I frantically ran around the house looking for clothes. Where were they? Did I miss something? No clothes. I looked in the garage, no clothes. I was astounded! I had spent a week gearing up for this arduous task. I was ready to cry and get the task accomplished. I was not ready for the panic, anger, disappointment, the disrespect and violation I felt, the gut wrenching agony, the defilement of my mother’s belongings! You broke my trust. You hit me with a sledgehammer and I spent the entire day crying, no sobbing and wailing and crying, while trying to find my way through her clothes, that you had put in plastic bags in the garage!. I had a plan on how I was going to fold the clothing and arrange my piles, but everything was not in its place anymore. My plan was dislodged. I knew exactly where everything had been. Now, I had to search. You even made excuses for what you did instead of owning what you did. How could you? An apology is not enough. This is the reason for the contract change.The disrespect you have shown for my mother and me is abhorrent! I was the only one who should have touched her clothes. You disrupted my grieving process and violated my trust. I asked for 3 simple things, which you agreed to. What a mess!!!!!. Even my friends were appalled! R[redacted] was shocked, as he found me crying when he arrived! On another note, as I mentioned today, please bring the wooden bed back inside so it does not get ruined in the rain or watering. This bed is part of the set in my mother’s bedroom. Do not remove any bags from the front door. The Salvation Army will pick them up on Tuesday. Please send me the receipt they will leave.When you are done with the job, please give the key to R[redacted] Horn, who recommended you to me.Please get back to me by Tuesday, January 26, 2016 with the addendum.Thank you,C[redacted]In response to C[redacted]'s emotional breakdown, irrational behavior, her verbal assault, hanger throwing and the demand letter, we removed our items from the house on January 24, 2016 and canceled the sale with an email response. At this point [redacted] & Sons was done with C[redacted] and the $3000 cost to clean the house, prepare the estate items for sale, stage and decorate the house with fine furnishings and to remove the staging items was written off as a bad investment with an emotionally disturbed woman. The keys to the house were given to her realtor, R[redacted] as per her wishes on January 25, 2016.The bags of donated clothing were outside the front door on the porch exactly where C[redacted] had placed them. Those donation bags were not in our care and are definitely not in any way our responsibility. If in fact any bags are missing, it is 100% her issue not ours.The frame of the painting fell apart when it was removed from the wall. Prior to the sale we would have repaired the frame and re-stapled the canvas so it could be sold for about $50. However, after her inexcusable & irrational reaction to the touching of her mother's clothing, the frame was placed in the trash and the loose canvas was left in the house with the other estate items. There was a good size truckload of items removed from the house and placed in the trash pile on the side of the garage as the house was filled with a lot of junk. The items found in the trash which C[redacted] claims to be valuable were basically unsaleable and of negligible value meaning a total of less than $20 - $30 in possible total garage sale proceeds. The so called other missing items could have been found in the trash if she would have looked more carefully.. In a nutshell, [redacted] & Sons did not damage nor remove any of C[redacted]'s mother's estate items from the property. Therefore we owe her no monetary compensation for those items and this matter should be shelved.