estate sales?

As the summer has gone on, it's occurred to me that I'm pretty sure I haven't seen an equivalent to the estate sales we often have back home in the US.  Is this not done here?  Do families tend to sell items through auction houses or whatever?

DH's grandmother passed away at the beginning of the year and all of her stuff has been sold through an auction house.  It was quite a bit of furniture and china and other stuff and there was never any talk of holding something similar to an estate sale.  The auction houses came in and gave an estimate for everything they would take.  Came back and collected it and sold it.