The house we finally let go of in Robina

We've been in Robina for a while now, and this was the first time I'd paid someone to take rubbish away. We'd been in the house for twenty-two years and raised three kids there. When we decided to downsize, I walked through it with a notepad and gave up by the second bedroom.

There were two lounges, a dining setting for ten, a piano with a cracked soundboard and a garage stacked with paint tins, old bikes and a chest freezer that hadn't worked since the 2011 floods.

Robina is a planned suburb of townhouse complexes, medical precincts and retail centres, and getting things out isn't always simple. Visitor bays and shared driveways need short-stay loading.

When I rang, the person who answered asked a few simple questions about what it was, where it was and how to get to it, and said they could come and look that afternoon.

The crew pulled up, had a look, and told me the price straight away. No surprises, no 'we'll see how it goes'. I said yes and they got started within five minutes.

The piano was the thing I was dreading. It had to come down four steps at the front, and I'd already had one removalist refuse it. The crew had a board and straps and talked it down step by step like it was nothing.

What I appreciated most was that nothing was rushed and nothing was a hassle. They explained where everything was going: charity, recycling or the tip. I felt good about it.

It's a small thing, but having someone else carry it all out made a much bigger difference than I expected.