Garage Sales Save Time
In addition to making a little bit of extra cash, holding a garage sale can help reduce the amount of time that you spend organizing and ridding your garage of unused or unwanted items.
Instead of having to spend time and effort battling to arrange everything in an orderly fashion, you can make a bit of cash and save plenty of time by holding a garage sale.
Prepare to Sell
You don’t need to spend a lot of time preparing for your garage sale. However, you should put in effort to cover the basics. Before holding a garage sale, you should be aware that certain jurisdictions have rules on garage sales, as well as laws that require sales of certain items to meet guidelines.
Most households don’t need to worry, especially for a quick garage sale, but you should be aware that some jurisdictions have laws governing these activities.
Before the sale, you should collect all the items that you wish to get rid of in the garage. Depending on the weather, you may wish to bring these items outdoors for the sale. All items should be price‑tagged and you should have bags, newspapers and boxes that make it easier for people to take your stuff away.
Promote Your Garage Sale
The more people that you attract to your garage sale, the greater the volume of unwanted things will be transported away.
Craigslist is an excellent spot to announce your sale, especially considering that bargain hunters tend to browse the website looking for deals and sales around your city. Traditional classified ads also help spread the word, as well as small posters announcing the garage sale around your neighborhood.
Kijiji, Facebook and Twitter can also attract a crowd to your sale. Word‑of‑mouth, in other words, calling your friends and family members and asking them to spread notice of the garage sale, is a tried and true method of cheap advertising.
Setting up a “free box” is another great way of attracting people to your sale. Items that you think won’t sell or will provide very little revenue can be used as “loss-leaders” that attract buyers to your garage sale. Everybody loves free stuff, so there’s a good chance that a lot of people will show up and carry away their free item, with a portion of free-seekers purchasing something else from your garage.
Finally, you should make a large sign that’s easily visible from the road. If possible, you can set up additional signage on intersections, crosswalks and other heavily trafficked areas of your neighborhood.
Tips For a Smooth Garage Sale
Make sure that you aren’t the only person on hand when conducting a garage sale. You’ll need to take a break every now and then and there are moments where you will be speaking with a potential buyer, drawing your attention away from others in attendance. When another person is present, they’ll be able to watch out for unscrupulous visitors and provide assistance to other customers during rushes.
If you place less valuable items, such as stacks of magazines or VHS video tapes, at the front of your garage sale, people might assume that the sale consists of stuff that nobody wants, driving customers away. Make sure you have at least a couple of high-end items for sale near the front.
You don’t need to serve breakfast or lunch to customers, but it doesn’t hurt to have water or lemonade ready as a cheap refreshment. This allows buyers to loiter around longer, which increases the likelihood of visitors buying an item.
As well as collecting bags, boxes and newspapers for customers to wrap and carry away their purchases, it’s absolutely vital to carry small bills and coin to prevent customers from getting frustrated and walking away from a sale because you couldn’t provide change for their purchase.
After the Garage Sale
When your garage sale is finished, you should have quite a few items sold, but it’s unlikely that all the merchandise you’re trying to get rid of was carried away.
Contacting a non-profit organization that picks up your items for charity is a great way of getting rid of the rest of your clutter. You might even get a receipt for tax purposes in the process.
After selling and giving away as much as possible, the stuff still left over from your garage sale represent the least desired items in your possession. Place them out on the curb before garbage collection to see if any scavengers are interested in making use of your unwanted items.
The amount of time that you spend trying to organize all the clutter in your home can be reduced greatly by having a garage sale. Getting others to pay you for taking away your unwanted items is a huge bonus – after all, money is time and time is money. Save both by holding a garage sale before moving or doing a large scale reorganization of your home or garage.
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