I love garage sales. I don't go to many, but I always do a slow drive by if I see one, just in case something awesome is sitting there waiting for me to do a little bargaining for it. But, mostly I love having garage sales because after gathering up all your no longer needed items, you can place them in your driveway and have people pay you to remove your extra clutter from your house.
After the kitchen remodel, we had a bunch of stuff like chandeliers, a stove-top, a vent-a-hood, and a variety of other kitchen items that I just didn't need any more. Add to that the gobs of baby/toddler clothes and old toys, and we had the perfect concoction for a successful sale. I had been thinking about having one for awhile, but I decided on Friday to have it Saturday, so I put signs out on Friday, woke up at 5am on Saturday and put it all out there. In the span of about 6 hours I raked in a cool $300. That roughly works out to about $50/hour, which is way more than I'll ever get paid at a teaching job.
I also bribed the kids to get rid of some of their toys by telling them they could have the money they made from selling their toys to take a trip to the store to buy one new toy. Christmas is coming up and the last thing we need is another toy around the house, but the exchange of many toys for one toy seemed perfectly logical and reasonable to me. And the prospect of a trip to the toy store meant they wouldn't fight me when I asked them to fill a box full of old toys to sell. I gave them $20 each as their share from the sale, and we took a trip today where my daughter picked a Barbie and my son got some legos.
As the sale came to an end, some lady came by and said she was pregnant, but it was too early and she didn't know what it was yet. She offered to take all the rest of my baby clothes(several boxes and she did buy some stuff first) off my hands for her future baby. I'm pretty sure she probably isn't pregnant and is just going to go sell all my stuff at a consignment shop, but honestly, I'm just glad I don't have those boxes of clothes laying in my garage collecting spider families, leaves and cat hair any more. Besides, the amount of work you have to put in to sell at a consignment shop (each item has to be on a hanger, not to mention all the sorting and organizing), is just not worth it for me. I have enough left-overs to deal with - some of which I can sell on craigslist, and the rest I"ll donate.
So, for 5 hours I got to sit in my driveway bundled up in a fleece jacket & gloves, reading a book, playing Words with Friends, drinking a nice Pumpkin Spice Latte brought to me by my 3 sweet children, all the while having people give me money in exchange for taking away my junk. Everyone wins. And that's why I love garage sales.
After the kitchen remodel, we had a bunch of stuff like chandeliers, a stove-top, a vent-a-hood, and a variety of other kitchen items that I just didn't need any more. Add to that the gobs of baby/toddler clothes and old toys, and we had the perfect concoction for a successful sale. I had been thinking about having one for awhile, but I decided on Friday to have it Saturday, so I put signs out on Friday, woke up at 5am on Saturday and put it all out there. In the span of about 6 hours I raked in a cool $300. That roughly works out to about $50/hour, which is way more than I'll ever get paid at a teaching job.
I also bribed the kids to get rid of some of their toys by telling them they could have the money they made from selling their toys to take a trip to the store to buy one new toy. Christmas is coming up and the last thing we need is another toy around the house, but the exchange of many toys for one toy seemed perfectly logical and reasonable to me. And the prospect of a trip to the toy store meant they wouldn't fight me when I asked them to fill a box full of old toys to sell. I gave them $20 each as their share from the sale, and we took a trip today where my daughter picked a Barbie and my son got some legos.
As the sale came to an end, some lady came by and said she was pregnant, but it was too early and she didn't know what it was yet. She offered to take all the rest of my baby clothes(several boxes and she did buy some stuff first) off my hands for her future baby. I'm pretty sure she probably isn't pregnant and is just going to go sell all my stuff at a consignment shop, but honestly, I'm just glad I don't have those boxes of clothes laying in my garage collecting spider families, leaves and cat hair any more. Besides, the amount of work you have to put in to sell at a consignment shop (each item has to be on a hanger, not to mention all the sorting and organizing), is just not worth it for me. I have enough left-overs to deal with - some of which I can sell on craigslist, and the rest I"ll donate.
So, for 5 hours I got to sit in my driveway bundled up in a fleece jacket & gloves, reading a book, playing Words with Friends, drinking a nice Pumpkin Spice Latte brought to me by my 3 sweet children, all the while having people give me money in exchange for taking away my junk. Everyone wins. And that's why I love garage sales.
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