Great Estates

Great Estates was contracted to have an estate sale Oct.26−29,2014. We were to have a check within 10 day. it is Dec.1^st, we have not been paid.
My mother and I hired Great Estates to run an estate sale for my mother’s home, which she moved into in 1973. She has been in and out of hospitals, rehabilitation centers and a hospice facilities (numerous times). The first two years she was able to go back home for short periods of time. She has not been able to live in her home since January 2014. After long and a painful decision on her part, she came to the conclusion she needed to have an estate sale prior to her death and she wanted to be involved in the interviewing and selection process. We interviewed several companies, after the owners of Great Estates visited mom several times and they told her how much better they were than other companies — they used barcodes on everything, had security cameras and itemized every item that sold $ 40 and over, Great Estates was entrusted with selling mom’s life long belongings.
According to the terms of the contract (Section 4: Proceeds 4.1): «No later than ten business days after the last sale date a certified check & itemized sales overview will be mailed.» The last day of the sale was October, 29, 2014. To date, December 1, 2014, neither my mother or myself have received either the itemized sales overview or a certified check.
When Great Estates came to sell us their services, they mentioned their registers would ring up items in several different categories. They also said they would have security cameras throughout the premises. This was not true — they had no security cameras. My mom is a senior citizen who grew up in the depression and saved everything she had — as the ad for her estate sale said: Mom had approximately 57 fine china sets and over 250 ‘regular’ quilts In addition, approximately 150 «nicer quilts» were removed from the premises without prior permission. Great Estates told me, (when I happened to unexpectedly drive up when they were removing the ‘nicer quilts’) these items would be sold on Ebay at a higher price than would be realized at a ‘regular’ estate sale. We have received no proceeds from Ebay, Craigslist or the regular estate sale. I/​We need the money from the estate sales to pay for my mother’s funeral and future living expenses. I am very worried for my mother — for a company to come in sell her items and yet not be accountable to her for what they sold causes me/​us a great deal of concern. In addition, after the failure of Great Estates to honor their contract with us I have extreme reservations now as far as how their «accounting» will look. I do not have any faith that it will be authentic and correct. To verify what we had for sale, I can supply pictures and verbiage used to describe and advertise the sale.
Once the contract was signed — the main person I dealt with (Benjamin Paige) would not return calls, texts or emails with questions I had. I literally had to find out where he was working another estate sale, personally go there, stand in the checkout line, and confront him as to the reason (s) for his lack of response. This matter should have been resolved no later than November 8, 2014. I am still struggling with this matter and am extremely apprehensive of what the final dollar amount will be — assuming I do not have to take legal action to determine that amount. I finally did receive a check on December 17, 2014, after hiring a lawyer to write a ‘demand letter’ and sending a complain to the Better Business Bureau, case no. 75 233 788. The Great Estate’s representative has constantly told me, when he responds: «I’ll get that right out to you,» or «I though the accountant sent that to you» «You haven’t received it, yet?» Blah, blah, blah. I don’t believe anything the representative has said to me now is true and I am very apprehensive as to how his accounting for all the items sold, will be. On the last day of the sale he did quickly show me on his Ipad which demonstrated what the daily proceeds, including tax, were — not including items taken off site without previous permission.
This has been a nightmare that I would not wish on other families having to make difficult decisions about disposing of their loved one’s belongings.
There were ‘dozens’ of items I personally saw at the estate sale listed for one price and on the ‘accounting of items’ sent me, there were different prices (example: I saw $ 100 as a sale price for a less than 1 year old clothes washer — on the accounting sheet it stated the sales price was $ 60 and that is what was received for it. I saw that same $ 100 on the clothes washer all four days of the sale. They told us they would have regular pricing for the first days of the sale and ½ off the last day — NOT SO — 2 days full price, 2 days ½ off. All I can say, if you come in contact with either Great Estates or Next Estates, RUN don’t walk the OPPOSITE DIRECTION. RUN, RUN, RUN!