Tuesday, June 11, 2013

Yard Sale Day!

 While cleaning house last week I was looking around at all the clutter in our small house (Our family of 4 lives in under 110 sq feet) and out in the garage the boxes had been piling up to save for a garage sale later this summer and I flipped, I couldn't look at it any more, some of it had to go! So we decided to do a Friday only yard sale and I spent the next couple of days pricing and going through everything to weed out some of the stuff we just don't need anymore.


It wasn't a super big sale by any means but my sister brought some stuff and my neighbor contributed too. Plus I let Naomi have her first lemonade stand since she is saving up to buy an American Girl Doll soon. She did pretty well, I also gave her the money for any of her toys that sold so she ended up with $21 to add to her piggy bank which puts her savings at around $75! Girl is determined to buy one of those dolls! I'm hoping maybe around Christmas time she might get her wish!

We didn't do bad overall but it was colder and windy that day after being sunny and beautiful all week so I'm not sure if some people were not out that day or maybe the sheer volume of sales in the area was too many for people to get to. (over 10 within a 3 mile radius!) We ended up getting some rushes in the later afternoon and ended up keeping the sale open until after 5pm and then took almost everything that was left over to Value Village.

I ended up with around $125 for all my "junk" and I'm totally happy with that! Plus I can breathe a little easier when I walk out to the garage and see a little less of a pile!

Online sales have been the pits for 2 months now. Last week I went an entire 7 days without hearing that Cha Ching sound on my phone, which for an online seller can be pretty distressing! I know its slow because of summer but man it is SLOW! I have more listings up than ever right now but no one appears to be shopping. Usually I get desperate and slash my prices but I feel like everything is priced really reasonably right now so I'm being stubborn and just waiting for things to pick up.

I have had a couple of decent sales and I can show you a few here:

 This is Owl from Winnie the Pooh. Most of you sellers of plush know this already but for anyone looking to find valuable plush here is a tip: Everyone has the main characters already and they don't go for much most of the time. But when you find a character that is not super popular or didn't have a huge role, they tend to sell for more because there probably weren't many of them sold when they were in the stores.

I picked up Mr. Owl for 50 cents at a garage sale a few weeks ago and he sold within the 1st month for $29.99 - shipping! Someone who either collects owls or someone looking to complete their Winnie the Pooh collection was looking for this guy and since he is a little harder to find he went for much more than the Pooh bear would have!

 This was the last of the mugs I picked up on our road trip to Seaside back in March. I bought it for 50 cents and it sold for $14.99 with free shipping. Not a lot but not complaining about any of my sales lately! I sold another Starbies mug for $16.99 the other day as well. The way I see it is that everything that leaves my storage area the better so I can make room for more exciting treasures!

This was just a funny pic I wanted to post. I always pick up vintage Scrabble games because the tiles can sell for a great profit and I can usually find them for $1-3 at garage sales. I can sell the games for maybe $6 or I can save them and then break down into bigger supply lots and make way more. This listing was on Etsy for 16 tile racks. People use these in crafts and paint them or sometimes in tournaments. I sold these for $11 + $5 shipping. I also have the tiles listed and then I can sell the boards all together in a big lot as well.

When it comes to selling on Etsy your photographs are everything! If you have an eye catching picture of the item you are selling you are more likely to sell your's first than someone else because most people who buy on Etsy are artists themselves and like pretty pictures!

7 comments:

  1. $125 is great, but having new found space is even better! The lemonade stand is adorable!

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    1. The extra space is awesome! We are thinking it may be time to relocate next year so I think I'll be doing a lot like you guys over this next year and getting rid of a lot to see just how little we really need! Having 2 little ones is a little more of a challenge with ALL the toys and such but there are definitely places we can cut back. I just have to learn to not be so sentimental with unimportant objects!

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  2. Good job on the garage sale! We have been saving up "junk" all year in the garage to have a garage sale. I love the extra $$$ we get from them but I hate all the work it takes to put one on. Thanks for the inspiration though!

    Good tip on looking for plush that is NOT the main character!

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    1. Good Luck with your sale Kristine! It is so much more work than its worth sometime but that feeling of unloading makes it all worth the effort!

      Yes on the plush! And also main characters on older movies can do well sometimes too, I found a Balto plush dog last year at a Church sale for less than $1 and he sold the next week for over $100! He was the main character but it was not a crazy popular movie so he does well because he's hard to find! Spirit is also another main character BOLO!

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  3. I sure hope you meant 1100 sq feet and not 110 square feet! I don't know how anybody could do that!

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    1. Cindy I didn't even notice that typo! haha! Yes! I meant 1100!!

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    2. Whew! I figured that was a typo. lol!

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