A 2026 guide to starting an estate sale business in Canada: registering the business, the municipal second-hand dealer licences that actually apply, pricing on a percentage of gross proceeds, contracts with executors, and the in-person sale versus managed online auction choice.
Applies in: across Canada
An estate sale business is a service business with a municipal-licence trap. The work itself is straightforward: a family, an executor, or a downsizing homeowner hires you to turn a house full of belongings into money, and you sort, price, sell, and clear it. The trap is that the licences do not sit in one place. Business registration is provincial, business licensing is municipal, and the second-hand dealer rules that catch resale businesses are written city by city. An operator licensed in one city can be unlicensed in the next city over. Get the paperwork right for each place you work, put the fee and the cleanout terms in a written contract, and the rest is execution.
Start with structure. Most estate sale operators start as sole proprietors and incorporate later, when revenue and liability justify it. The registration rules follow the province:
Registration gives you a business number for tax purposes. It does not give you the right to run a sale in any particular city. That is the next step, and it is the one people skip.
This is where estate sale businesses differ from most home-based businesses. Because you are selling second-hand goods to the public, several Canadian cities license that activity specifically, and the category names vary:
The practical rule: before you book a sale in a city, check that city's business licence categories for second-hand dealers, used goods, or auctioneers. Some cities fold estate sales into a general business licence; some want the specific category; some want nothing beyond the general licence. The requirement follows the sale address, so an operator working across a metro area may need several licences. Budget for the applications and the lead time — police checks and inspections do not happen overnight.
A percentage of gross sale proceeds is the standard fee model for an in-person estate sale. The percentage, any minimum fee, and what it covers — sorting, staging, pricing, advertising, sale staffing, cleanout — all go in the contract. So does the settlement timetable: when the client gets paid after the sale, and in what form.
Managed online auctions are the alternative model, and their published terms give you a comparison point. MaxSold's managed service has been reported at a 30% commission plus a $2,000 flat fee, with the platform handling photography, cataloguing, hosting, marketing, invoicing, payment, and pickup. Its seller-managed option, where you do the photography and cataloguing yourself, has been reported at $99 or 30% of gross sales, whichever is greater. Treat those figures as reported terms to verify, not as your price list — platforms change fees, and your in-person costs are different from a platform's.
The contract also carries the two clauses that prevent the most common disputes. First, authority: name the person hiring you and the basis of their authority — executor, estate trustee, administrator, attorney, or homeowner — and list the items that are not for sale. Second, unsold items: state what happens to leftovers, whether donation, consignment, buyout, or disposal, and who pays for it. A sale without a cleanout clause is an unfinished job.
Pricing is the skill clients pay for, and it rests on sold evidence: completed auction results for comparable items, recent local estate sale results, and dealer asking prices discounted for the fact that asking is not selling. Original retail prices and sentimental value are not pricing inputs, and saying so plainly is part of the service — families routinely overvalue furniture that the market prices as used household goods, and undervalue small categories like jewellery, tools, and collectibles that actually move.
Group low-value items into lots rather than pricing each piece. A lot of kitchenware sells; forty individually priced mugs do not. Reserve individual pricing and research time for the items that justify it: jewellery, art, antiques, instruments, and anything with a maker's mark worth checking.
A typical in-person sale runs in this order: walk the house with the client and mark what stays; sort room by room into sell, donate, and discard; stage the sale areas so buyers can move through them; price everything, including the lots; advertise to your buyer list and local channels; run the sale days with staff at the door and at payment; then execute the cleanout clause for whatever is left.
Staffing matters more than most new operators expect. One person cannot run the door, answer price questions, handle payment, and watch for theft at the same time. Budget for at least two people on sale days, more for a full house. And keep a record of what sold and for how much — the settlement report is both your accounting and your defence if a family member later questions a price.
After the sale, pay the client from gross proceeds less your fee, with an itemized settlement showing what sold, what it sold for, and what was donated or disposed of under the contract. Keep that report with the contract: estates have multiple beneficiaries, and the settlement is the document that answers their questions.
On tax: commission income is a taxable supply. Once your taxable supplies exceed $30,000 over four consecutive calendar quarters you must register for GST/HST; voluntary registration before that point lets you claim input tax credits on business expenses. Keep sale records for at least six years, matching the Canada Revenue Agency's record-keeping expectation, and separate client proceeds from your fees in your books from day one — commingling them is how a simple business becomes a messy one.
The two models are not rivals. In-person sales reward local knowledge: a buyer list, a feel for what a neighbourhood buys, relationships with dealers and consignment shops for the pieces that need a different channel. Managed online auctions reward reach and timetable certainty: a platform's buyer pool, a fixed auction window, and pickup handled on a schedule. New operators often start in-person in one city, build the buyer list, and add a platform partnership for estates outside their area or clients who need a faster clearout. The right mix is the one that matches where your buyers are and how much of the work you want to do yourself.
Most of a house sells the same way. Two categories do not, and both turn up in estates often enough to plan for them before sale day.
Firearms. An executor generally has the same rights as the deceased to possess firearms left in an estate while the estate is being settled, and does not need a firearms licence for that handling — but an heir who receives a firearm needs a Possession and Acquisition Licence (PAL) with the right privileges. The executor's job is to find out what is there: contact the Canadian Firearms Program (1-800-731-4000) with proof of death and the completed RCMP form 6016, Declaration of Authority to Act on Behalf of an Estate, to get the deceased's firearm inventory. Firearms must be stored safely while the estate is settled, and then transferred to a properly licensed person or business, deactivated by an approved gunsmith, or turned over to police for disposal. Never put a firearm on a sale table, and never let a buyer take one home on a handshake.
Vehicles. A car, truck, or motorcycle in the estate is a separate transfer, not part of the general sale. In Ontario, the seller is legally required to provide the buyer with a Used Vehicle Information Package (UVIP) when selling a pre-owned vehicle: a $20 ServiceOntario document listing the vehicle details, Ontario registration history, lien information, and the average wholesale value used for retail sales tax. The buyer needs the package to register the transfer at a ServiceOntario centre. Family transfers and dealer purchases are exempt from the UVIP requirement. Other provinces run their own ownership-transfer process, so check the equivalent in the province where the vehicle is registered before you price it into a sale.
If you are starting from zero, the first week has four concrete moves: register the business name in your province; check the municipal licence categories in the first two cities you plan to work in; draft the contract with the authority clause and the cleanout clause; and price twenty items from your own house against completed auction results to calibrate your eye before a client is paying for it. That is enough to take a first small sale — a downsizing client, not a full estate — and learn the rest on a job where the stakes are survivable.
There is no single estate sale licence. The licences that apply are the general ones: a provincial business registration, and a municipal business licence in each city where you work. Some cities add a second-hand dealer or used-goods licence on top — Winnipeg licenses used goods dealers, Calgary licenses used merchandise businesses, and West Kelowna puts secondhand dealers in a higher licence tier with policing checks. Check the city where each sale takes place, because the requirement follows the sale location, not your home office.
It depends on the province and the structure. In Ontario, registering a sole proprietorship under a business name costs $60 through the Ontario Business Registry, and the registration lasts five years; operating under your own legal name does not require registration. In British Columbia, a sole proprietorship registration costs $40 plus a $30 name approval fee, and the approved name must be used to register within 56 days. Incorporation costs more in both provinces and is a separate decision — the registration fee is the smallest cost of starting, not the largest.
A percentage of gross sale proceeds is the standard model for an in-person estate sale, with the percentage and any minimum fee set in the contract. Managed online auctions publish their own terms: MaxSold's managed service has been reported at a 30% commission plus a $2,000 flat fee, while its seller-managed option has been reported at $99 or 30% of gross sales, whichever is greater. Fee structures change, so confirm the current terms before you quote them to a client — and never quote a competitor's fee as your own price without checking it first.
Only someone with the legal authority to dispose of the property: an executor or estate trustee named in a will, a court-appointed administrator, an attorney acting under a power of attorney, or the homeowner themselves when downsizing. Your contract should name that person, state their authority, and list what is not for sale. Selling items you have not been authorized to sell is the fastest way to a dispute, and no commission is worth it.
You must register for a GST/HST account once your taxable supplies exceed $30,000 over four consecutive calendar quarters, and you can register voluntarily before that. Commission income from running sales is a taxable supply, so it counts toward the threshold. Registration is free through the Canada Revenue Agency, and once registered you charge GST/HST on your commission and claim input tax credits on business expenses.
In-person sales suit houses full of mid-value household goods in a city where you have a buyer list, and they let you control pricing, staging, and the sale weekend. A managed online auction suits clients who need the house cleared on a fixed timetable and are comfortable with everything starting at a low opening bid, with the platform handling photography, listings, payment, and pickup. Many operators do both: in-person sales where they have local demand, and a platform partnership for overflow or out-of-town estates. The choice is a business decision about where your buyers are, not a quality ranking.
Whatever the contract says. Common terms: donation to a named charity with a receipt to the client, consignment of higher-value pieces to a dealer or auction house, a buyout price for the lot, or disposal at the client's cost. Decide this before the sale, in writing, because after the sale weekend nobody wants to negotiate it. A cleanout clause is what separates a finished job from a house full of leftovers and an unhappy client.
Yes, in practice. Commercial general liability covers the risks of running a sale in someone else's house — a buyer tripping on a rug, a damaged floor, a broken item. If you hire staff or casual help for sale days, you also need to handle workers' compensation coverage for your province. Clients and executors will ask about insurance before they sign, so having it in place is both protection and a selling point.