This "downsizing" stuff isn't for sissies! Talked to a couple of realtors this week about putting the house up for sale. Actually thought we might sell it without ever going on the market - 1 agent that I called had a very interested couple who wanted to look at the house immediately before we even had it listed. They looked at it, loved it & offered us about $40,000 less than what we want to list it for!!! Even the realtor said that was ridiculous. I know the market is really bad but I just couldn't take such a drastic cut before the house is even listed on the market. So we haven't listed it yet, but we probably will before long. In preparation for leaving, we're having our 1st yard sale this weekend & I am totally overwhelmed. We have a 4200 sq ft house, a 4 car garage & waaaaay too much stuff!!! Been getting up all week at 3:30am to sort, throw away & pile stuff for the sale. Can't wait until this weekend is over! If anyone has tips for a successful garage sale, I would love to hear them! Other than that, just cross your fingers that we can rid of a LOT of stuff this weekend!!
HapyKamper said
09:17 AM Oct 22, 2009
We have had three garage sales this year! We plan to put house up for sale in January. It was quite an undertaking and just a little bit emotional at times. You are right...it's not for sissies! Be brave and just keep pricing and sorting. I've included a few tips that you might find helpful.
#1 Best Hint...Advertise in Craigslist....!!! Most of our "customers" came because of our ad. It's free! List as many of your items as possible and upload pictures. Also include the time of your garage sale and directions.
#2 Second best hint-Create some good signs to put up in your neighborhood. We attached a pink flamingo to one of our signs. Several people said they stopped because of our flamingo.
#3 Put everything on a table. Borrow them from friends and family -Try and obtain as many as you can. Keep everything off the ground if possible.
Here are a few more tips
*Play music in the background (creates a happy atmosphere)
*Serve something to drink (they linger longer and hopefully will buy more)
*Price items to sell fast (approximately 10% of original value)
*Be willing to negotiate-most people will ask for a lower price
*Greet people as they come and welcome them to the sale. Remember to smile!
*Have a few specials. I had a lot of CD's selling for $1 a peice. Only sold a few. The next day I changed the price to ...buy 5 get one free. Sold them in a flash!
*Jewery, tools, cookbooks, and CD's sold well. Christmas/Thanksgiving items did not.
*Recommend accepting cash only, no checks. Be sure to have plenty of $1 and $5 bills. Have one person handle the money.
*Need plenty of plastic bags, boxes etc
*Take whatever doesn't sell imediately to Goodwill!
Good luck! We really enjoyed the actual sale and met some great people. Remember what is one man's trash is another man's treasure.
-- Edited by HapyKamper on Thursday 22nd of October 2009 12:59:47 PM
Judy said
09:23 AM Oct 22, 2009
We had 4 sales at the house and had close friends that helped us with it. In one door of the house and out the other, pay station was set up on leaving the house. It worked well. southwestjudy
Workinrvers said
09:26 AM Oct 22, 2009
"If anyone has tips for a successful garage sale, I would love to hear them! Other than that, just cross your fingers that we can rid of a LOT of stuff this weekend!!"
Good luck on your sale!
The only advice I can offer is "make deals". We sold so much stuff for so little $, we even had a "fill the bag for $1.00" deal on clothes and small items. We made sure we had plenty of the grocery style plastic bags on hand and this worked pretty well for getting rid of things.
Some of the tools that I had we bundled together rather than selling as seperate items. I remember a box of "stuff" that had a vise, a level an old saw and some hand tools that we sold for $5.00 for the whole box. This technique helped us get rid of more stuff to a single buyer.
Just remember your ultimate goal is to get rid of the stuff which means you'll have to sell it for a fraction of what you paid or even what it may be worth elsewhere.
Phil
princess tonya said
11:20 AM Oct 22, 2009
We're having our fifth sale in the past two months this Saturday. The best thing you can do is to advertise. For this one we are going to our church garage sale. They have one once a month and we get rid of so much more there than we do at the ones we have at home. Even when we advertise for our home ones, we still only get rid of about a third as much as we do at the church. Check around your area, a lot of churches do these. Ours is $10 to rent a space then $3 for each table you need. It is well worth the money, plus the rent money goes to help the church. Ours is for our youth group.
PattiRon said
12:50 AM Oct 24, 2009
Judy:
I'm not much of a yard sale person, but that is 1 great idea.
In the front door, through the house and out the garage, LOL. Love It. Did ya have several checkout lanes like Wally World? :)
Cindy T...you might want to have some flyers made up to hand out about the house being for sale. Ya never know where that buyer might come from. My sister steered her daughter to a house via a yard sale, but she had to ASK if the house was for sale too.
Good Luck, Ron
rjenkins said
08:26 AM Oct 24, 2009
There are some serious garage sales buyers and sellers out there. A funny story, years ago I had my first garage sale. I used to have a house with a quadruple wide driveway. When a few of my neighbors found out I was having one they wanted to set up tables and bring their stuff. I said, the more the merrier. There were about 5 families selling stuff from my driveway. My intent was to get rid of stuff and if I made any money that was just icing on the cake. My next door neighbor felt the same way. People were arriving shortly after dawn to buy stuff. It was fast and furious for everyone till about noon then the sales dropped to almost nothing. To make things move faster, my next door neighbor and I made everything else we had on our tables and boxes "FREE". OMG, the commotion we created. The other neighbors were saying "Free, how can we compete with Free?!". I told them they can beat FREE by 'paying' customers to haul the stuff away. As you can imagine that did not go over too well.
However, what happened when we posted FREE in the street corners is that it actually brought in even more customers which in turn helped the neighbors because there stuff also started selling. So you may want to use that as an extra 'incentive' towards the end of your garage sale. Free always brings in more people...
Cindy T said
11:18 AM Oct 24, 2009
Thanks everyone, for all the EXCELLENT advice! I greatly appreciate it!
In preparation for leaving, we're having our 1st yard sale this weekend & I am totally overwhelmed. We have a 4200 sq ft house, a 4 car garage & waaaaay too much stuff!!! Been getting up all week at 3:30am to sort, throw away & pile stuff for the sale. Can't wait until this weekend is over!
If anyone has tips for a successful garage sale, I would love to hear them! Other than that, just cross your fingers that we can rid of a LOT of stuff this weekend!!
We have had three garage sales this year! We plan to put house up for sale in January. It was quite an undertaking and just a little bit emotional at times. You are right...it's not for sissies! Be brave and just keep pricing and sorting. I've included a few tips that you might find helpful.
#1 Best Hint...Advertise in Craigslist....!!! Most of our "customers" came because of our ad. It's free! List as many of your items as possible and upload pictures.
Also include the time of your garage sale and directions.
#2 Second best hint-Create some good signs to put up in your neighborhood. We attached a pink flamingo to one of our signs. Several people said they stopped because of our flamingo.
#3 Put everything on a table. Borrow them from friends and family -Try and obtain as many as you can. Keep everything off the ground if possible.
Here are a few more tips
*Play music in the background (creates a happy atmosphere)
*Serve something to drink (they linger longer and hopefully will buy more)
*Price items to sell fast (approximately 10% of original value)
*Be willing to negotiate-most people will ask for a lower price
*Greet people as they come and welcome them to the sale. Remember to smile!
*Have a few specials. I had a lot of CD's selling for $1 a peice. Only sold a few. The next day I changed the price to ...buy 5 get one free. Sold them in a flash!
*Jewery, tools, cookbooks, and CD's sold well. Christmas/Thanksgiving items did not.
*Recommend accepting cash only, no checks. Be sure to have plenty of $1 and $5 bills. Have one person handle the money.
*Need plenty of plastic bags, boxes etc
*Take whatever doesn't sell imediately to Goodwill!
Good luck! We really enjoyed the actual sale and met some great people. Remember what is one man's trash is another man's treasure.
-- Edited by HapyKamper on Thursday 22nd of October 2009 12:59:47 PM
southwestjudy
Good luck on your sale!
The only advice I can offer is "make deals". We sold so much stuff for so little $, we even had a "fill the bag for $1.00" deal on clothes and small items. We made sure we had plenty of the grocery style plastic bags on hand and this worked pretty well for getting rid of things.
Some of the tools that I had we bundled together rather than selling as seperate items. I remember a box of "stuff" that had a vise, a level an old saw and some hand tools that we sold for $5.00 for the whole box. This technique helped us get rid of more stuff to a single buyer.
Just remember your ultimate goal is to get rid of the stuff which means you'll have to sell it for a fraction of what you paid or even what it may be worth elsewhere.
Phil