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What impressed me about the Curiosity Incorp. hoarder house series was how fast the guy worked to get the house emptied, cleaned and flipped. He really has tenacity. He was also fortunate that the prior owner was someone who had some valuable enough art pieces to make it all worth it.
My neighbor is a hoarder. I’m pretty confident his hoard is of no value. He likes to bring home live snakes, keep spiders, taxidermy beavers without any knowledge on how to do it, etc. That house will be the place of nightmares to whoever ends up having to clean it out one day.My best Yard Sale score- New sealed Christian Dior face powder. Paid $1, took a best offer of $175.
I don’t typically go to yard sales. It’s a lot of driving around, digging through damp boxes on the ground and for very little return. And I hate when I’m the only one there and an entire family watches as I pull up, dig through their stuff and then leave without buying anything. For some reason I always feel like I have to buy something. But a yard sale sign was just down the street from me so I whipped into the driveway and was stunned to see a mansion I never knew existed and that close to my house. It was the end of the day so I can’t believe can’t believe no one else noticed the dusty Christian Dior box just sitting there.
I’ve passed over so many Misook and Sandro pieces because I didn’t think they were of any value! I must have been basing my judgments on the plainness of the label designs.
Amazing thrift score! And love the tangent into sweepstakes. I used to enter sweepstakes anytime I was watching tv (I can’t just sit and watch tv, I have to multi task). But every entry means I’m also signing up to some email list and even though I have an email acct specifically for sweeps, there’s just too many emails to wade through to find the one that says, “You’ve won! Please confirm you address.” There are currently 17,642 unopened emails in that inbox.
Re: FedEx – if you have a Walgreens, most of them are now serving as a FedEx drop off site. They even scan the barcode and will email you the scan receipt. It’s so much more convenient for me than driving out of my way to the FedEx store. Anytime I have something going across country and it’s more than 2 lbs, smart post has often times been much cheaper than the post office. Not quite as cheap as they used to be a year or so ago but the difference is still quite noticeable. Haven’t had a damaged or lost item yet so I can’t speak to how they are with claims. Fingers crossed I don’t have to find out.
I know exactly how you feel. I figure returns are the price I pay for listing things that are easy to find, store and ship.
I almost always list the measurements when I list clothing and I still get 1. questions about whether something will fit someone, and 2. returns. I don’t think many people know their own measurements.
My “favorite” clothing returns are the messages that say “I have 3 other dresses by this same designer in this size that fit, but this one doesn’t. There must be something wrong with it.” Suuuure there is lady – or maybe you aren’t that size anymore? Of course I don’t say that, I just roll my eyes and accept the return.
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This reply was modified 2 years, 3 months ago by
Julie B.
A quick scavenging story I know some of you can appreciate. I always do a quick scan of the ground because I tend to find money a lot. I went to town the other night and while getting out of my car there was the cardboard tag that gift cards are usually sold in. I breathlessly flipped it over aaaannnndddd the brand new gift card was still in it! Checked it online and it has its full balance of $25 and can be used at any of 5 different restaurants. Not a typical scavenger story but it’s still a scavenge. We’ll probably use it towards a steak dinner at Lone Star this weekend.
Items in my “small item pipeline” that I’ve done well on are all multi-quant listings:
* single pepsi lapel pins – my boss received about 100 from our Pepsi route guy & were immediately thrown in the garbage but I fished them out. Only sell for $6 each but didn’t cost me anything.
* Mrs. Grossman stickers – I sell in lots and have made around $300 profit. A japanese buyer finally bought up the last of my listings a week ago.
* Dragonball party favor bags – brand new in original pkgs. Bought up a trash bag full from my local goodwill once they were marked 1/2 off. I’ve made over $250 profit on them so far.The only time I’ll buy small ROI items is when there are a lot of them so I can list once as a multi-quantity item. I do the work once and then ship as things sell. Easy peasy.
IndySales – your “we raised FVF” comment made my day. I actually lol’d.
Here it is! Nothing earth shattering as far as I’m concerned.
Not in Colorado but I have to do this where I live in Georgia. Ebay collects & remits tax for buyers in other states but I have to do it for those in my home state. Here’s how I do it, in case it will help you with Colorado sales: Because ebay will only allow me to enter one tax rate for the entire state, I charge the base state rate. I have to eat whatever the additional sales taxes are within jurisdictions of GA – it’s usually less than $5 total for an entire month. I keep a spreadsheet of all of my sales. For any sales to a buyer in GA – I make a note next to the item in the spreadsheet of what city/county the item shipped to. Then once a month I have to go to GA’s tax website to enter the sales by jurisdiction. Colorado may only require you do this quarterly or annually but in GA it’s monthly. It isn’t as much of a pain as you’d think as I only have a handful of GA buyers each month. Perhaps Colorado’s sales tax system works similarly. Good luck.
I’m going to Savannah for a few days later this month too!
I’m anticipating they will end the shipping supply coupon eventually. They started it as a way to market their brand during that period when they made a strong advertising push. But as with a lot of things Ebay does, the ad campaign seems to have fizzled out relatively quickly. The comments on the eBay for Business FB page will be a sh*t storm when the day comes that the coupons are reduced or removed entirely.
Thank Temudgin, You even included links in your reply – awesome! I checked and at one INAD, i’m below peers…for now. Not worth it to me to deal with eBay customer support.
On an unrelated note – I see you live in DC. I used to live in NW DC. It was right before I started reselling (although I did sell my own belongings on ebay at times). Now I kick myself because for awhile I lived in an apartment that was only a few blocks away from a church that ran a thrift store near the National Cathedral. I’d check out the thrift store for books for myself. It was a nice area with million dollar homes sandwiched between Georgetown and Chevy Chase. To think of all of the 1,000s of dollars of reselling profits I must have passed up by not looking at other things in that thrift store – it just kills me now.
Thank you for responding Inglewood. Fortunately INADs are about a once a year occurrence for me (let’s hope I didn’t just jinx it by saying that). I always accept a return, no matter what. And I’ve held the position that it’s not worth my time to challenge for a few bucks of shipping. But I wonder if the INAD is going to hurt me with eBay somehow – that is the only reason I would challenge it. Ebay policies seem unclear about it lately.
Hi Meagansmom – I’m in Georgia too. My advice is to start slow, don’t run out and buy all kinds of equipment (lighting kits, printers, cameras – these are things you can buy slowly over time), and don’t buy more to resell than what you can list. Listen to as many Scavenger Life podcasts as possible. Stay away from social media groups whose main focus is to bash ebay & other resellers. Reselling is a great way to supplement one’s income – I’m obsessed with it.
Welcome to the group.Julie
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This reply was modified 2 years, 3 months ago by
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