Westlake Executive Downsize

Standard intra-Austin moves run 1 day. Estate moves run 3-7 days minimum. The reason: item-by-item inventory tagging, climate-controlled wine handling, art-handler coordination, and the partial-decommission decisions that drive the estate-sale + donation pickups.

Site survey: our senior estimator + project lead spent two days at the Westlake property in November 2025. The walk identified:

- Main house room-by-room scope (4 bedrooms + library + media room + master suite) - Wine cellar (~800 bottles, ~250 with provenance documentation) - Art collection ($400K aggregate value across ~35 pieces — paintings, sculpture, photography) - Custom furniture (3 custom pieces including a Berman-attributed dining table) - Pool house contents (entertainment + bar setup) - Detached garage workshop (woodworking tools, sports equipment) - Holiday + storage items (estate-sale candidates)

Decommission plan: 70% to the new home, 20% to estate sale, 8% to family (one daughter in Austin, one son in Seattle), 2% to donation.

Two specialty handlers were coordinated alongside our crew:

Art handler. A specialty art-handling firm in Austin (the executive's preferred firm from prior art-installation work) handled the 12 highest-value pieces — the museum-quality pieces, the framed photography, and the sculpture. Our crew handled the remaining 23 pieces with specialty packing (acid-free wrap, custom crating on the larger framed pieces, photo documentation at origin). The art handler scheduled placement at destination two days after our delivery.

Wine cellar specialist. The Westlake cellar was custom-built into the basement-mechanical room with two-zone climate control. The destination Spanish Oaks home had a similar setup. We coordinated cellar climate verification at origin + destination, and the bottles were re-shelved in the original packing order to maintain the customer's organizational system.

The wine cellar moved on a dedicated wine-only truck — climate-controlled, vibration-minimized. Two days of pack-out at origin, one day of transit (just to the other side of Austin), two days of placement at destination.

Three external vendors coordinated during the move week:

Austin estate-sale firm. Pre-arranged in November. They came twice during our pack-out — once for the larger furniture pieces (the Westlake dining set, the media-room sectional, the home-office desk), and once for the holiday + decorative items that didn't make the trip. Both pickups happened during our active pack-out so the timing required careful coordination.

Family-distribution movers (in-state). The daughter in Austin received 4 furniture pieces + some kitchenware. We delivered those directly the day after the Spanish Oaks delivery — single-day Austin move, half-day of crew time.

Family-distribution carrier (out-of-state). The son in Seattle received 6 pieces of furniture + the Westlake library (the executive's professional book collection). We packed and palletized these items for shipment via a long-haul carrier (not us — separate cross-country freight quote). Coordinated handoff to the long-haul carrier two days post-Spanish Oaks delivery.

Donation pickup. Goodwill scheduled for the Friday after the move week. The donation items were staged in the original Westlake garage; our crew left them in place for the pickup.

Spanish Oaks delivery completed in two days (a day for the main household + a day for the wine + art coordination).

The destination cellar accommodated all 800 bottles — barely. The cellar capacity was rated at 850 bottles, and the executive had purchased 50 additional bottles in the months between the November estimate and the February move. We re-shelved everything, verified climate, and the executive added 12 more bottles from his personal hand-carry the next week.

Total project: 6 days end-to-end. Pack-out + load (3 days at origin), transit + delivery (1 day across Austin), specialty + decommission coordination (2 days alongside delivery).