My First Garage Sale

This past weekend I had my first ever garage sale. I’ve occasionally stopped at garage sales in the past but am by no means a regular garage saler. So this was my first foray the true world of garage sale-ing.

Every year our neighborhood association has a neighborhood garage sale and in a spur of the moment decision, I decided to participate this year. I was actually pleasantly surprised with the whole experience.

A few observations …

1. I wasn’t sure I’d have enough stuff to do an actual garage sale. Then I started gathering stuff. You don’t realize how much stuff you accumulate until you start going through closets. I’d do a garage sale every year just to clean my closets.

2. At first, the feeling of setting our stuff out on our driveway for people to buy felt weird. It felt kind of like this. But once people started stopping by and actually buying stuff, I quickly got over it.

2. It’s crazy the stuff people want to buy. A lot of the stuff I put out thinking no one will ever buy this was the first to go.

3. One of the keys to successful selling is to start early. Serious garage sale shoppers shop early. And also, many of them wear fanny packs.

4. Having a talkative two-year-old to greet people totally disarms them. If you don’t have one of your own and are having a garage sale, you should find one to borrow for the day. You won’t be sorry.

5. You have some really interesting conversations with people, especially when you’re selling random stuff. I had a never-been-used microwave bacon cooker and I learned a lot about people’s bacon eating habits. I also found out one lady has a collection of elk head Jaegermeister shot glasses. The one we got free at the liquor store the other day found it’s true home.

The most surprising and BEST part of this whole experience was the chance to meet and connect with our neighbors. I talked to three different neighbors I’d never met before, I made plans to connect with a neighbor with kids similar in age to ours, and Cara made some new friends.

I didn’t make a ton of money, but certainly enough to make it worth my time and effort. According to some, our neighborhood association didn’t do a great job advertising the sale this year, so getting the word out better might make next year even more successful.

I had a good enough experience to do it again next year, so I’d call that a success.