Garage Sale

Garage sale this past weekend. And it was pretty successful!

I love having garage sales. One of the things that I like the most is the prep work. I know that sounds silly, but it's great to have a time once a year to clean out the garage - move everything and sweep out all the dead bugs, leaves and debris. I also like clearing out stuff - making closets and cabinets more roomy! I've been gathering stuff, really since my last spring's sale. And I did a run-through of the house this past week to grab stuff that I could sell. Stuff I just didn't need anymore. My collection started out pretty small, but by the time I had everything out and arranged on Friday night, it was looking good.

What I do is get everything cleared out of the garage - cars included - on Friday and then set up shop. I loved playing store as a child, so this is my grown-up version of that! I have sections (housewares, clothes, gardening, etc) and try to price and merchandise things well. I have found that things sell when they look good.

My sale started at 7 am - I do open the garage doors at 6:45ish - for those early birds. They tend to buy stuff, and since I'm already up... This year, I didn't have any early birds. So my husband drove down to the end of the street to check the sign on the busy street. The dew had wet the sign so much that it was folded onto itself. When he came back to report this, I made a new sign. So with a fresh sign, the sale began!! It was pretty steady all day. Shoppers about every 20 minutes. And for the first 3 hours, everyone that came in bought something! My streak ended about 10:30 when a lone guy came in - he apparently was looking for something particular. He walked in and in about 10 second was already gone. He was my only non-buyer - even to the very end of the day (when pretty much nothing was left). Amazing!

This year's sale was smaller than last year's - I had about half the stuff. So I wasn't expecting to make that much. I was generously hoping for close to $100. But I made about $150!
And I only had the sale until noon. Which was perfect timing. Because about noon is when pretty much all the stuff was gone. I boxed up one little box to put up for next year. And filled one bag of trash. Success!