Yard Sale: Success?

It's all said and done.  I would call it moderately successful.

6:00AM - Alarm goes off.
6:10AM - I stop pressing snooze and drag myself out of bed for some coffee and open up the garage.
6:15AM - B gets up and heads out to post a few more signs, and check on the ones we put out last night. (A few were torn down. Who does that?!)
6:30AM - Our first visitor... and thankfully, at least first sale.

Yes, our signs and Craigslist ads had the time - as 8-2 - but whatever.  At least she wasn't creepy right?

Oh wait, she was INCREDIBLY creepy.  The general conversation and my thoughts went something like this...

Crazy Lady: You're so pretty, you don't even need make up.
S: Um, thanks *sips coffee* It's 6:30am, I'm hardly awake lady.
Crazy Lady: Are you excited to be having a yard sale?
S: Sure. *sips coffee* I will be at 8am when it STARTS.
Crazy Lady: How did you meet your husband?...Oh so you like him?...What kind of vacuum do you use?
S: Um, I think its a Bissell. *sips coffee* And no its not for sale...
Crazy Lady: OH aren't those the best? Bissell's are great. I have an Oreck. My boyfriend doesn't like it but I think its great.  How old are you?
S: Uh, 25. *pretends to sip coffee because cup is now empty* Please B, come home...
Crazy Lady: Wow. I'm 56, look at these wrinkles. You don't have any wrinkles.  Why are selling... (insert any random item we had)

It continued like this for at least a half hour. And just as she was done, my parents arrived.  Thank goodness.  She bought some gloves and a little "Believe" book or something - ya know, the kind you get at the Hallmark store - Total: $5.25

The rest of the day was a little less weird... who am I kidding, it was all weird.  Such as the man in a bathing suit and wife beater that did not cover his pregnant looking stomach enough...if it all.  He bought 3 fishing poles ($1 each). And his Asian wife (g/f?) found a stuffed toy of mine from when I was little.  It was one of those dogs that have a hard leash thing that you push, and it makes this barking/yipping noise.

I explained you push it, and she did.  And she then let out a totally joyous giggle and shoved it in wife beater tummy man's hand and made him push it.  Bigger giggles, "How much?", we tell her 25 cents.  She breaks out some change - we see quarters... she says hold on, runs back to the truck - giggling the whole way, and brings us a different quarter.

Whatever does it for you I guess.

Also, who knew there was so much butt crack at a yard sale? Just sayin'...  We only had one incident of attempted translation, so that was nice.  And no car accidents. Almost, but not quite - thankfully.

We sold a fair amount of items, but a lot of the big stuff - like TVs, oven, my parents cameras, a Thule rack, etc - didn't sell, for whatever reason.  I thought we had a pretty awesome selection, but I guess everyone didn't agree.  We were also shocked in how little some people haggled...

Shopper: "How much?"
S: "$20...?"
Shopper: "I see..." Walks away and gets in the car.

Just offer me $10...please?  I'll probably counter $15, and you'll end up getting it for $10 anyway if you try again.  Really, I'm not good at this, take a shot!


We sold the air conditioner for a little less than we wanted, but the women was recently put on disability and seemed to really need it.  We offered to let her take anything else she needed for her new apartment - and she  took like 1 pan.  Oooook, at least we offered.  Then there was the couple that bought a few VHS tapes to bring to the nursing home... I wish they had taken more, we would have just given them away at that point.

Unfortunately it did rain... hard... for about 45 minutes.  I think that hurt us some, but we were lucky to bring in most of the items that wouldn't survive in from the driveway.  And people did come after it rained.

Last customers - around 4pm?  Yea... our signs said 2.  But again, ooook. One couple bought some videos, candles and an adding machine, Total: $10.  Another couple came and looked around, and left.  Thanks.

For the big stuff, to Craigslist it all goes, hopefully we can get some more cash out of it.  And yes, there's a pile of 'Free Stuff' at the end of our drive way right now.  Otherwise, the small stuff remaining like glassware, housewares, etc will probably be passed on to younger family members just getting their own places.  We'll donate the books, and anything else that's left unwanted we'll donate - maybe some comforters to the animal shelter, housewares and clothes to goodwill...etc - you know the drill.

Between our stuff, my parents, and B's parents, we made around $300, which really isn't that much, but we've got a few bites on Craigslist, so we'll see where we end up.  I'm definitely motivated not to buy much stuff for a while now...it accumulates way too much.

B said it best...

"Well, I guess you don't get rich from yard sales"