How To Have A Successful Yard Sale

When you need quick money for merchandise to sell on eBay, the quickest, easiest way to get it is to have a garage sale. Here's how:

• Go through everything you own and pull out anything you don't need anymore or never liked anyway. Clean it up, fix it up, and put a price on it.
  
  
• Talk to all your friends and neighbors about making it a group sale. The more people you get involved, the more money you'll make and the more fun you'll have doing it.
  
  
• If someone you know is moving, offer to pick up anything they don't want to take with them. The big stuff you'll sell at your garage sale-the smaller items can go on eBay.
  
  
• Plan your garage sale when you won't have to compete with a major holiday or big local event. Be sure to check with friends and family members, to make sure the people you expect to help will be available when you need them. Get all the help you can find. If you can talk your friends and neighbors into bringing over some stuff to sell, they can help you sell your stuff, too. More bodies will also allow you a potty break when you need one.
  
  
• Advertise. Most newspapers offer a special 3-day rate. Take advantage of it. Friday sales pay off.. Your ad will be competing with many others, so make yours stand out. If your sale is huge, say so. If more than one family is involved, say so. "Multi-family" sales draw more customers than individual sales.
  
  
• Get lots of small change. Quarters and dollar bills are most important. You should also have enough fives to change out a couple of twenties. A fanny pack is the best place to keep change, so you don't have to worry about leaving a cash box unattended.
  
  
• Put all similar or related items together. Small things can be stuffed into zipper bags and sold as a batch.
  
  
• Spend a little time washing, brushing, or vacuuming your merchandise. You'll get more for it if it's clean.
  
  
• Offer refreshments. Bring out a cooler and stuff it with cheap canned sodas. Buy the economy packs of snacks. Price them all so you'll make a small profit. Your customers will love you and you'll ring up more sales.
  
  
• Put price tags/signs on everything. When you have 4 people lined up to buy something, that isn't the time to decide what to charge for it. Inexpensive items can be bagged and priced that way. As a general rule, you can ask 25% of the original suggested retail price of each item. On high-ticket items, in great condition, you should get more - maybe 50% to 60% of what you paid. On used clothing and books, you won't get nearly that much unless it's something special. With DVDs, you might get 50%. VHS videos are only worth about $2 each at this writing. With collectibles, who knows? You could get 200% to 300% of what it sold for new.
  
  
• Find the paperwork. Anything that has the original box, instructions, or video, will sell for more than it will without them. Take the time to find them. They won't do you any good after the item sells, anyway.
  
  
• Put up good signs (and lots of them). Neon poster board, in one color only, makes the best signs. Pick a bright color, like hot pink, and stick with it. Once your shoppers spot the first sign, all they have to do is follow the pretty colored paper to find you. WRITE BIG and use FAT arrows. Put up plenty of signs. Be sure your arrows are up at all intersections, so shoppers can't make a wrong turn. Don't make the mistake of attracting traffic from only one direction. That handful of people coming the other way have money to spend, too. Put those signs on both sides of the telephone pole. Get your signs out the night before. Early birds start prowling when the sun comes up. If you're still driving around, putting up signs, you could be losing business. (If business drops off, unexpectedly, go check your signs, to be sure they haven't blown down or been sabotaged.)
  
  
• Put some stuff out front. Department stores have display windows for a reason. The more merchandise you can display, prominently, the more you'll sell. People who weren't even looking, will stop if your sale catches their attention.
  
  
• Get your stuff off the ground. Rummaging through boxes is fine for your 10-cent items, but get the good stuff up on tables, where shoppers can get to it easily. (Tables don't have to be fancy--lay a piece of plywood across a couple of saw horses or stack cartons and tape them together to make tables.) Hang your clothes--they sell better than they do folded on a blanket.
  
  
• Get the kids involved. Let them sell their own stuff, make their own signs, and keep the money they make. Sometimes people will buy something from a kid when they wouldn't buy the same item from a grownup.
  
  Get rid of the junk. If you have stuff that's too good for the trash, but not worth fooling with, stick it in a FREE box. Let your customers haul it away and save you a trip to the dump. By early Sunday afternoon, you can expect to call it quits. Consider giving away anything you don't want to haul back into the house.
  
  
• Get the word out. Garage sales are a great opportunity to promote your favorite cause or your new online business. Pass out flyers, announcements, coupons, surveys, etc., as market research or sales promotions. Plan your garage sale around a charity drive, to generate revenue for a worthy cause. You can even advertise that a percentage of the proceeds will go to that cause, which sometimes generates more traffic and more dollars.
  
  
• If someone offers you a low price on a high-ticket item, get their phone # and offer to call if you can't sell it for more. A price that sounds insulting on Friday morning, may sound like a fortune, come Sunday afternoon.

Your new eBay business is all about buying and selling merchandise, so pay attention to what sells and what doesn't at your garage sale. Notice what questions buyers ask. Go to other garage sales and watch the buyers and sellers. Ask your own questions. Everything you learn will pay off later on.

After your garage sale, put all the proceeds into a special sock or bank account. This is your seed money. Leave it alone until you're ready to invest in eBay merchandise. Do not dip into this money for any reason and don't mingle it with any of your other funds. This is your business-take it seriously--even while you're having fun.

Eventually, you want this money to find its way into PayPal, through eBay purchases from your auctions. If all goes well, it should double in the process. If you aren't already a PayPal customer, please read Do You Need PayPal?. If you're ready to learn how to start your eBay business, please read Step Into eBay, Slowly.

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