Factory and workshop clearance in Northampton

An asset sale is about getting the best price for the good items. A clearance is about the building being empty on a date, and the good items are the part that pays for it. Both matter, but the deadline sets the plan.

We start from the handover date and work backwards. Cataloguing, the auction period, viewing, collection, then a final strip of whatever is left. Each stage has a minimum duration, so the earlier we are instructed, the more of the contents we can sell rather than dispose of.

The saleable items fund the rest. The cost of clearing residual material and taking down fixed installations is set against the sale proceeds, and we agree the terms for that before we start.

A typical clearance covers more than the machinery:

• Production and workshop machinery, tooling and benches
• Racking, mezzanine floors and storage
• Compressors, pipework, extraction and other site services
• Electrical distribution, busbar and cable tray beyond the landlord's supply
• Office contents, IT, furniture and partitioning
• Stock, raw material, packaging and consumables
• Scrap metal, waste oil, chemicals and general waste

Most of this list has a buyer at some price. Mezzanines, racking and extraction systems sell, but they must be dismantled by the buyer's contractors during collection. Fixed electrical installation is often the landlord's, so check the lease before it is sold or removed. Waste and chemicals go through a licensed carrier, not the sale.

We catalogue every saleable item on site, from the main machines down to grouped lots of hand tools and stores. The sale runs online as a timed auction with a viewing day at the premises. Buyers pay the hammer price plus the buyer's premium, plus VAT where it applies, and collect during a fixed window.

Lots are sold as seen. Dismantling and removal are at the buyer's expense. Where an item must be taken down carefully, such as a mezzanine or an overhead crane, the catalogue says so and buyers price the work in.

You keep the premises accessible, safe and powered until collection ends. We attend to release lots. The more that leaves through the auction, the less there is to clear at cost afterwards.

After collection there is always something left: unsold lots, the material nobody bid on, the contents of the far corner. This is the stage that separates a clearance from a sale.

We can sell residual items to a clearance buyer as a single lot, arrange scrap metal collection, and bring in contractors for the strip out and waste removal. Each of these is priced and agreed with you rather than assumed. Where the residual value covers the cost, the clearance pays for itself. Where it does not, you know the figure before the work starts.

The end point is a building that is empty to the standard the lease requires. We are not a dilapidations contractor, so redecoration and repair of the fabric are outside the scope, but the contents will be gone.

From instruction to an empty building, a few weeks is typical for a single unit. A large factory with heavy plant, fixed services and a lot of residual material takes longer, mainly because riggers and strip out contractors need time on site.

The things that most often cause delay are:

• Late discovery that assets are on finance or belong to someone else
• Power being cut off before collection is complete
• No decision on what happens to the residual material
• Access restrictions the buyers did not know about
• Disputes with the landlord over what is a fixture

All of these are avoidable with an early conversation. Give us the lease, the asset register if there is one, and your deadline, and we will tell you whether the plan fits the time you have.

If the business is moving rather than closing, you want a relocation sale that disposes only of the items not making the move. If a buyer is taking the premises with the equipment in it, the equipment may be worth more sold with the building than removed from it.

If the contents are mostly high value machinery and the handover date is flexible, a dedicated machinery auction with no clearance element may bring more, because there are no clearance costs to net off.

If the building is a site with many departments, vehicles, plant and stock, a complete site dispersal auction is the same idea on a larger scale.

Northampton is one of the main distribution centres in England. Large warehouses and parcel depots take up much of the land at Brackmills, Swan Valley and Pineham, and many haulage and pallet firms run fleets from these estates. Footwear manufacturing continues in the town on a smaller scale. Food processing, engineering and print firms are spread across Moulton Park, Round Spinney and Lodge Farm, with trade counters and vehicle workshops on the older estates near the town centre.

The M1 passes the west side of the town, with junctions 15, 15a and 16 all in use for freight. The A45 and A43 link to the A14 and to Silverstone and Oxford. Northampton railway station is on the West Coast Main Line loop. Access for low loaders is straightforward on the big estates, and most of the smaller units are within a short drive of the motorway.

We regularly handle factory clearance in Northampton and across Northamptonshire. Sales are run on site, with viewing and collection at your premises, and the online catalogue reaches buyers well beyond the area.