I’m in the Bay Area helping my Mom clean out her attic by running her garage sale tomorrow. (And I’ll be here to celebrate Mother’s Day in person on Sunday!) It’s the beginning of garage sale season so I thought I would share how I prepare for a garage sale:
+ In the week leading up to the sale, gather everything to be sold into one room.
+ Two nights before the sale sort your stuff into piles according to price for: free, $.50, $1, $2, $3, $5, $7, $10…If you have a LOT of stuff, the sorting process may take two nights.
+ Bigger items that are clean and in top condition can go for as much as 50% of what you paid for them. If they are worn or damaged, reduce the price even more.
+ Make signs for each price category (i.e. $1 pile, $2 pile) or put stickers/tags on each item. People may be too shy to ask or think you are ripping them off if you are not upfront about your prices. If you do not want to label each item individually, jot down your prices on a master list. At the minimum, mark your higher priced items.
+ Cleanliness REALLY helps sales. A damp rag removes dust and dirt quickly.
+ The morning before, post your sale on Craigslist. In the post list your top items, any hot brands you are selling, your unusual items, and mention if you have a free pile. The more detailed you are, the better the chance someone looking for these items will find you. If you have enough free items, post them on Freecycle.org (free membership required to post).
+ The night before your sale make 5-10 signs. I like to write in bold letters “SALE” with an arrow pointing to my yard on manilla folders. In smaller letters I write the date and start time. The address is usually irrelevant because yard sales are a visual magnet.
+ The morning of the sale haul your stuff out while keeping your items grouped by price, which makes it easy for customers to assess what you have. Be prepared for aggressive “early birds” who will want to wheel and deal before you have finished dragging everything else out.
+ Presentation is key. Put everything on tables, blankets or in buckets. Clothes have a better chance of selling if they are hung up.
+ Have a few low bills and quarters to make change.
+ As soon as traffic starts dying down, roughly two to three hours after the start time, cut prices. Wouldn’t you rather make a buck or two off an old pair of shoes than drag them to Goodwill?
+ Load up whatever does not sell into your car and drop them off at Goodwill or Salvation Army.
Here’s how the sale turned out!
Welcome to Bargain Babe! I’m Mara, and I’m so glad you’re here. I am an obsessive bargain hunter and penny pincher, and I am determined to live a full life without EVER paying full price.
if bargain babe is running a garage sale .. i’d like to visit!
where in the bay area?
A little warning to make sure you also take down your yard sale signs. A friend of mine had other people help her put up signs and apparently missed removing two. She got a $250 ticket for it. That pretty much negated any income from her garage sale. Not that you should litter without threat of a fine but be careful.
I had no idea you could get a fine for this sort of thing. Wow! Thanks for the reminder, Debra.
We get very aggressive shoppers who would move stuff from the $5 pile to the $1 pile. Best thing is to price everything, saves on arguments. Put jewelry in small plastic bags and staple to board or do something to keep people from stealing them. Helps to have a friend to keep an eye on the crowd while you do the selling.
We invite friends to bring their stuff. Only thing is they have to stay and sell it themselves. A large amount of “stuff” is the best magnetic. No one stops if you just have a few things out. Have extension cords ready so people can try the electronics.
Thanks for the Craig’s list tip, we’re having one June and I would not have thought of that.
Also, in the SFV there are 2 different groups who will come and collect donations from you so you don’t even have to drive to Goodwill or Salvation Army. They are Rescue Mission and Disabled Veterans. We give to them each alternate months. And the Rescue Mission retail store on Sherman Way near Etiwanda has great buys including 25% discount every Tue. before noon.
I read craigslist days before the weekend so if there’s something in particular I’m looking for, I might plan the rest of my browsing around it…I’d say post on Wednesday, and again on Friday (for Saturday sale). If you have specific items listed, it also gives interested buyers a chance to ask a question (say it’s an article of furniture, appliance, etc and you didn’t post the dims…).
When in doubt, list neighborhood AND City area, not just ‘Los Angeles’, ‘Hollywood’, ‘Oakland’.
Doesn’t hurt to specify CASH ONLY. Yes, some people show up and want to pay by check!!
Bring out a couple of extra chairs, put a ‘not for sale’ sign on them and let people use them when they’re waiting to pay/for a friend/etc.
Let the neighbors know about the sale and ask if they can let you keep the parking spaces open during the time of the sale…some people won’t stop if there isn’t convenient parking. To sweeten the deal, let each pick one item from a pile of a certain price….ask them to come over early, create the buzz of having people checking the goods out. You know how sales in stores work…nothing like the sense of a little competition to bring out the shopping urge…you can even ask friends to stop by and act as shills..(they may find something to buy also).
When it comes time to cut prices, try using the $__ per bag approach….and you might let shoppers know what time the discount starts….IF they want to risk someone else buying the article they have their eye on…
If you’re not selling children’s articles, keep your kids away….have them play inside, etc…..even well mannered kids can be distracting and confusing….that way if there ARE kids there, you know there should also be an adult to look after them…don’t see one? Ask them who they’re with, and chase them off if they’re by themselves (does not apply to teenagers with money). Selling DVDs or CDs? Put a rubber band around the package…enough to keep someone from slipping the disk out, but easy enough for you to open it if they want to check the condition. Or you can tape them closed, and just cut thru the tape. Selling old LPs? If the slip cover is in good condition, don’t tape it….but maybe do something to keep the vinyl inside so someone doesn’t switch records…
If you’re going to let a child sell cookies/candy/etc for scouts/school/etc, please have their table a certain distance from the rest of the stuff so interested parties can purchase but uninterested parties won’t feel the pressure. I may be a complete stranger and will never see you again but I still don’t like to have a small smiling face asking me if I wouldn’t like to buy some _____ to benefit____.
It’s pressure. Who feels good saying no?
Experiences at rummage sales (both well run and not-so)…provide boxes or bags for people to purchases in to make it easier for them to carry the goods around. Also means more difficult to pilfer…..when paying, unload the box/bag on a table, count out the prices so there’s no questions, then when the total is agreed on and paid, put them back in the box/bag.
Hand held calculators are nice but you can have plain paper and just write down the prices and then total them. Give it to the customer.
If you’re washing clothing before the sale, please don’t use a strong fabric softener….same thing if you polish wood furniture…keep odors to a minimum…even out of doors they linger.
If you’re in charge, wear a hat or something with an identifying device, like ASK ME….
If you’re selling large items, make certain the craigslisting says something about ‘can help load’ or ‘can’t help load’ and if it will need a truck (not the back end of a stationwagon, let them know that also.
TRY to keep the cellphone off….it may be your yard, your garage, and your sale…but i’m the customer and I want to pay you and leave, not wait while you talk to ______ about _______. Also, if you don’t have yours, if one rings, you know you don’t have to answer.
Do your homework before the event…check out local sales for a weekend or two…and check out thrift stores to see the going rate for items you’re thinking of selling. Good bargain hunters will already have an idea (from thrift stores) what something should cost…price it too high and if the quality is the same, they’ll wait and go back to the thrift store…where they can shop for others things…on any week day OR weekend…
If you have things which you think are collectibles, use eBay to research going prices…use Advance Search and select the CLOSED ITEMS only option….you’ll see what they started at, and what they sold for…or didn’t sell.
and above all: DON’T TRY TO SELL ME SOMETHING I’M NOT LOOKING AT ALREADY…
this could be subheaded: why I walked away from your yard sale without buying anything….
especially now, the urge to shop CAN be curbed and limited. Give shoppers a good reason to spend and a good environment…we’ll spend….and spend.
Hope your sale went well Julia, love reading your blogs
Great tips Lynda! I can tell you have run MANY garage sales. It’s a real compliment that a savvy lady like you reads Bargainbabe.com!
If you have an HOA, make sure you check with them first. Some require you to inform the HOA weeks in advance, some have very specific rules about signs and some don’t allow individual sales but will have a community sales. Getting hit with a fine definitely sticks.
If you advertise on Craigslist it helps to include photos of your better items and it really helps to include a link to your address on mapquest or another mapping site.
I second both of these recommendations!
Some good tips here, but I think some stuff should be done more than the night before as is indicated.
Lynda, thanks for all of your fabulous insight.
Hmmm…what else would you have done the night before? I’m curious.
About two weeks before the sale we start rounding up our stuff, wiping off and pricing and putting in boxes ready to take into the living room/or put in the driveway, behind the gate the night before the sale.
We have a pole set up we use for the clothes, we put that up night before and we haul out the tables we will use to put stuff on.
Hard work, but very satisfying to get rid of a lot of stuff and make a few dollars.