One man’s junk is another man’s treasure. Allegedly. I’m not sure anyone out there is coveting the glass punch bowl set that I, ironically, picked up at a yard sale a decade ago, but hopefully someone can find a use for it. I love the concept of tidying up to start a new year fresh, spring cleaning, and really any reason to declutter and purge. The less stuff you have, the less you have to maintain, store, and dust. I’m all about keeping what spark joy as the great Marie Kondo says, but for everything else? Why not pass it on to another home that will get more use out of it while making a few bucks toward your current financial goal? I grew up in the age of garage sales and have spent my share of Sunday afternoons strolling along other people’s driveways looking for a find. While I won’t claim to be the ultimate authority, I hope the guide to garage sales below can help you successfully hawk your wares.
Should I even have a garage sale?
Honestly, probably not. I come by this answer humbly after I used a Phone a Friend lifeline last year while planning our move from Florida to Colorado. With only one PODS storage container to crate all our earthly possessions across the country, we held a fire sale.
Growing up in the garage sale era, my first thought was to set up shop in the garage and driveway. I even had my husband buy a kit of yard signs to litter strategically around the neighborhood, creating a maze that ultimately led to our little house on our dead-end street. But I asked my friend her thoughts on garage sales and she talked me out of it. A few key points that changed my mind:
- People who attend yard sales are cheap, cheap, cheap and are going to haggle with you over $1 items. I don’t know about you, but I don’t have the patience to argue over a buck. I’d rather give it away to someone else out of spite than have to negotiate it down to $0.50.
- It takes so much time to prep and set up. You have to make the signs, you have to organize everything on tables, you have to price everything out, you have to deal with people loitering on your lot for hours on end… as a busy anti-social introvert, none of it sounded all that appealing.
- And then you have to devote an entire weekend to hurrying up and waiting for people to stop by. We’re at the stage in our lives where time is becoming a more valuable resource to us than smaller amounts of money, so this was a hard sell. Did I mention I was busy at the time? We were selling our house (that’s always a fun process), preparing for a road trip vacation across the US, and moving all at the same time. An entire weekend was a lot of time to give up.
- Our neighborhood wasn’t a great location for one. We lived on a dead-end street with only three other houses, all spread out. Foot traffic wasn’t a thing. I was lucky is someone cruised by on a golf cart or clopped by on their horse (an actual thing we saw every so often, much to our surprise).
If you’re living paycheck to paycheck on a low income and every $0.50 helps, a garage sale might be a great option as you declutter and look to create a little breathing room in your budget. Or if you have young kids and would rather stab your eyes out than have to deal with them complaining about how hot they are or how tired they are or can they have another snack while you stand in endless wait lines at a theme park, putting them to work for a garage sale could be a great way to teach them the value of a $1 so they understand just how much those tickets to Disney cost if they ever want to go back again.
I’m not saying a yard sale is a waste of time for everyone. The weather may be great where you live and it could be a good excuse to hang out with your friends or neighbors for a weekend. Neighborhood block sales are a thing, and may be a great way to generate more buzz and foot traffic. Just be mindful of the opportunity cost of arranging a traditional yard sale, and consider alternatives before you commit.
For the situation highlighted above, I opted for a virtual garage sale instead.
Consider having a virtual garage sale instead
Instead of setting everything up on display with price tags for $1, I focused on high value items (around $25+) or items I could sell in bulk ($3/each, but please buy a bunch, like all my B&BW soaps my husband wouldn’t let me take because liquids apparently expand when traveling from sea level to a mile up).
Any little trinkets we had, I tried to give away to someone I knew might like it, donated it, or as a last resort, trashed or recycled it.
For larger items, especially furniture, gym equipment, etc. that I thought there would be a lot of interest in, I made individual listings online for. In each listing, I mentioned it was a virtual garage sale for a moving sale and told them to check out my profile for additional items they might be interested in. For other things, I made one large listing and made a little graphic in Canva displaying all the items, grouped by category. I did this because I hosted my virtual garage sale on Facebook Marketplace, which limits the number of photos you can attach to a single listing.
Since I didn’t want to be stuck at home for the next week, I did not put our full address on the listing. Instead, I gave the general area/approximate location.
Here’s an example of what the listing looked like.
Anything highlighted in green I sold. Since it wouldn’t let me highlight the actual text in the listing description, I simply wrote SOLD before the item if it was gone, or updated the count for however many remained if there was more than one. This kept the listing current without having to redo the graphic every time.
I didn’t sell everything, but there’s no guarantee I would have with a traditional garage sale either. I don’t have the exact numbers anymore, but I want to say we cleared over $2,500 over a few weeks with our virtual moving sale, which is more than I honestly think we would have made even if we spent two entire weekends trying to manage a physical yard sale.
I coordinated so many sales during this moving sale that I put together a separate article on how to sell your stuff on Facebook Marketplace without losing your sanity. I also listed our virtual yard sale on our local Nextdoor neighborhood‘s page, but didn’t have much luck there because, again, there were three houses on our block, so our neighborhood wasn’t high visibility to begin with.
TBB’s guide to having a success garage or yard sale
If you decide you want to go the traditional route, great! I was one of those kids that loved to whine under the oppressive Florida summer heat at Disney, so my parents subjected me to a garage sale or two in my younger years. We’ve got advice for you, too.
- Set a date and get ready. Weekends are your best bet while most people are off work. Consider doing both days to catch people around plans and to give you a better shot at having a good day of weather. If you can only do one day, opt for a Saturday, as on Sunday you’ll be competing with God. If you don’t have a piece of toast with burn marks that look like the Virgin Mary, good luck with that. (Though on Saturdays you have to compete with the Chick-fil-A drive thru line, so there’s no real rule here.)
- Spread the word with some grassroots marketing. Tell your neighbors, tell your friends, tell your kids to tell their friends, but don’t rely on word of mouth. You need people to know if you expect them to show. Post on local groups online, such as Craigslist, your Nextdoor neighborhood, and any community groups on Facebook. Depending on where you live, there’s a good chance Facebook has a garage sale group for your city or local area. If you live in a community, print up some cute flyers to put on a notice board or lamp posts. Put some garage sale signs up to help direct people so they can easily find your house at the end of the rainbow. Start at higher traffic intersections and funnel them onto your street. Homemade signage is cheaper than buying the plastic ones, which are surprisingly expensive (I had my husband return them even before I decided to go the virtual route because yikes). Give people a hint of what you’re selling: exercise equipment, baby swag, or furniture, the Virgin Mary toast: whatever you think will attract visitors.
- Price your items to sell. You don’t want to be haggling over stupid shit all day. Price your stuff to sell. Feel free to tell prospective buyers this is a no-haggle dealership and that Soup Nazi rules apply (though make sure you’re nice about it). When that vein in your temple starts to throb because some jock bro only wants to pay $5 for the weight bench, remind yourself of what your goal is: to get rid of the stuff. Keep calm and sell on. Make it clear what everything costs. You don’t want people having to guess, or walking away because they don’t know. Make it as easy as possible for them. While individual price tags/stickers can be nice, they also cost money and a lot of time. Consider labeling prices in clear, big, obvious places for like-priced items (such as one table designated for $1 items and another table for $5).
- Group your items together by price and then by category (or vice versa). You know how bookshelves organized by color can be visibly appealing but a nightmare whenever you actually want to find a book to read, especially the next one in a series? (What color was the spine to Onyx Storm again?) Don’t be that yard sale. Make it super easy to navigate your stuff so people can find what they’re looking for.
- Have a freebie box to lure them in. Do you have some stuff that isn’t likely to sell and isn’t worth the hassle of organizing and pricing? Throw together a freebie box that’s clearly labeled for people to sort through to help reduce what ends up in the landfill. Like the free cookies at the grocery store, don’t put the box up front. Lure them through the tables of everything else to get to the freebies to see if their eye catches on anything else en route.
- Be clean and organized. Regardless of how you sort, present everything in a clean and organized fashion. Don’t line the driveway with LEGOs for people to trip over. Elevate everything that isn’t freestanding off the ground, so Grandma Jean doesn’t pop her hip out trying to bend over for a closer look.
- Keep a close eye on high-priced items. I’m not saying that most people are thieves, but there’s always the chance of a bad apple in the bunch. Better safe than sorry.
- Be ready before your stated time and have low expectations for later in the day. Interested people may show up early, especially if you’ve teased some high ticket items and they want to make sure they get the first opportunity to snag it. As you get close to the end of the day (or the end of the final day, if you’re doing more than one), expect people to low ball. Even if you say you’re no haggle, the reality is people are going to try to negotiate. The closer you get to the end of the posted hours, the more they’ll sense your desperation to get rid of whatever is left.
- Find a way to make it fun so you don’t hate your life. It’s going to be a long day or two. Prepare yourself for that inevitability and see if you can make it a little more entertaining. Ask the kids if they want to run a lemonade stand, or maybe have a spouse fire up the grill and invite a few neighbors over around lunchtime to hang out for a mid-day recharge.
The final word
Hosting a garage sale, whether it’s a day-long event or virtually through online outlets, it a great way to clean out your house while adding some extra money to your budget for the month. It can be a great way to meet neighbors and other locals. I’ve had some fascinating conversations with people who have swung by to pick up items for sale. With some prep and planning, a realistic expectation for the experience, and a little luck, you’ll clear some clutter and make some money.