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Throw a Successful and Hassle-free Garage Sale

Awww the sunshine is finally here and that means it’s the season for one of my favorite pastimes: Garage Sales!!!  I’m one of those fanatics who can’t resist stopping everything I have planned as soon as I see one of those cardboard signs pinned up on a telephone pole. This drives my husband crazy as I’ve yet to convert him.  I love the thrill of the unknown as to what treasures I might find or weird items I may discover.  Plus, garage sales are the best place to get really cheap deals because people usually just want to have their junk gone!

Last weekend I wound up having my own garage sale to get rid of the basement full of crap I unearthed while spring cleaning.  If you recall from my last post, I found some rather strange items like heart-printed toilet paper, a neon unicorn and a giant martini glass. Well, I ‘m happy to report that both the neon unicorn and giant martini glass were sold for a profit of….$0.75!!!  Woo-hoo!  A little girl pleaded with her mother for the unicorn stuffy and the martini glass went to a guy who plans to give it to his mom for Mother’s Day (he told me that she loves margaritas so he’s planning on making her a giant one in the glass…now that’s what I call a great Mother’s Day present!!)

It had  been a while since my last garage sale and from this most recent one, I’ve come up with some helpful tips that I thought might be come in handy for any of you out there planning on purging your houses this summer and hosting your own.

1. Don’t price your items:  This sounds strange as you would think it would be best to price everything so people know right away what you’re selling an item for.  Trust me, it’s so much more hassle than it’s worth.  You’ll spend hours putting price tags on all your items and only 25% will actually sell.  Plus I’ve realized that it’s human nature for us to overprice items that we personally own as we are attached to them. So, when you put a price tag of $5 on the ugly candle stick holder that your grandma gave you, it’s not going to sell. It’s better to make up a sign that says “Make me an offer” so that you can barter with people.  Example:  When someone asks you how much the candlestick is and you say five dollars, you’ll quickly realize that the price is too high and then can ask them how much they would like to spend.  This brings me to my next tip.

2. Don’t overprice your items:  As I said, it’s human nature to feel that your personal items are worth more than what most people would pay, but remember you want to get rid of all this junk!  I fell victim to this at my own garage sale: a woman asked how much this poster was and I came back at her with a price of $10!  By the look on her face, I suddenly realized that I was asking way too much for it and had to remind myself that I actually wanted all of this stuff out of my house.  Plus, the game plan was to donate everything left over to good will, so getting any money at all was a bonus. I asked her what she wanted to pay and we agreed on five dollars….poster gone!

3. Make a free box:  One of the best ways to get rid of a lot of stuff is to put some of it in a box labelled “Free Stuff.”  People can’t resist the word free and will gladly take these items off your hands, lightening your load to good will!  We had a funny thing happen at our garage sale.  This lovely older couple were shopping around and had purchased several items from us.  The woman noticed that my friend Caron had a large free box at the end of the driveway.  She asked how much she was allowed to take and Caron jokingly replied that she could take the whole box if she wanted to.  A few minutes later I noticed that the box had gone missing and asked Caron where it had gone.  She pointed to a car across the street and said “I believe it’s now in that couple’s trunk!”  They took the entire box!! We killed ourselves laughing and I was kicking myself for not putting some of my items in it earlier. As the old saying goes, “one man’s junk is another man’s treasure.” I’m guessing that couple thought they had found a treasure chest!

4. Donate it ALL:  Once the garage sale is over and you’ve made a few bucks to go towards that road trip this summer, make sure to just pack everything up into the truck and drive directly to the Salvation Army to donate it. DO NOT start going through all the items again thinking that you might actually use them again one day.  This defeats the entire purpose for having held a garage sale in the first place. Remember, you want to get rid of all this stuff otherwise you wouldn’t have had the garage sale!  You will be tempted to keep some items so my advice is to invite some friends over for beer in exchange for them helping load up the truck so you don’t even see what’s being taken away. Plus, maybe they’ll want some of your things…my girlfriend stopped by and wound up leaving with a water bottle, a camping lantern and some clothes!

All in all, our garage sale went really well and I managed to make $79.25 to go towards our trip to Halifax this summer to see my husband’s family. Plus, I followed my own advice and donated everything else as soon as the sale was done. My house is finally clean and uncluttered…now the only dilemma is stopping myself from re-cluttering it with items from garage sales this summer!  It’s a vicious cycle I tell ya!  Lol.

Reclaimed Barn Wood + Coffee Table Frame = Inspiring DIY

We love this awesome upcycle using reclaimed barn wood and a frame bought off of our very own UsedRegina.

Justine of Birch & Lily posted easy-to-follow instructions on how you can do this yourself. It will take you a little time and some elbow grease, but the end result is pretty great. Or, if you’re the kind of person who should never (ever) be allowed near  power tools, you can buy a table like this one on UsedOttawa. Either way, showcasing wood with history and personality is both a romantic and practical way of bringing some sustainable decor into your home.

Spring has arrived, why not eat bugs?

I had a tiny friend sleepover on Friday, so I decided it would be a good night to practice some fun parenting. After all, we now have less than three months until this baby arrives. I did a bit of digging online and decided it would be a fun spring time activity to prepare bugs for dinner. I should have videotaped P’s reaction when I told her. It was priceless.

First up… Snails

Ingredients

• Mayonnaise (we used ranch dressing because P doesn’t like mayonnaise)
• Large tortilla
• Lettuce or baby spinach
• Sliced deli meat of your choice
• Sliced cheese of your choice
• Gherkin pickles (P doesn’t like pickles, so we used baby cucumbers)
• Carrot sticks

Instructions

1. Trim the rounded edges of the tortilla to make it square, then spread on mayo or dressing
2. Layer on the lettuce or spinach, then the meat and cheese, and roll it up tightly.
3. With the seam on the bottom, slice the tortilla into 2-inch-wide pinwheels. For the snail’s heads, cut a pickle (or cucumber) in half at an angle. Poke two small holes in the uncut ends and stick pieces of carrots for antennae.
4. Slip each pickle (or cucumber) half under the edge of a pinwheel, securing them together with a toothpick, if necessary.
5. Makes 4 to 6 pinwheel sandwiches.

Second Course… Butterflies

Ingredients

• Nut butter
• Apple
• Celery

Instructions

Simply make a nut-butter sandwich using apple slices, cut it into quarters, arrange the pieces as shown, and add a trimmed celery stick. I saw a lot of options for this online, so you can sub out any foods that your kid doesn’t like.

I lost P’s interest for awhile after making the peanut butter, so she played tag with my husband, Mark while I whipped us up some butterflies. Once they were done, she informed me that she doesn’t like apples. HA. So, I gave her some pears with peanut butter and she was happy.

And for dessert… Spiders

Ingredients

• Double Stuf Oreos
• Icing (homemade or pre-packaged)
• Mini chocolate chips
• Pretzel sticks
• Ziploc bag

Instructions

Stick the pretzel sticks into the cookie. (They fit better in double stuf  oreos than in the regular size). Put frosting in a small ziploc bag. Snip a small hole in the corner and squeeze out 2 dots on top of the oreo for the eyeballs. Press a mini chocolate chip in each circle. P insisted we give the spider a smile, so we did

Voila! Bugs for dinner. Now, I admit, it was a rookie mistake not consulting with her first about the foods that she likes, so we had to make some on-the-fly adaptations, but I think overall, it was a success!

Embracing tradition in our gardens

It’s May, and there’s no getting around it.  My garden is beckoning.

Let me start by saying I am often relieved to live in a place where the snow buries my garden for nearly half the year.  As much as I like my routines in spring of visiting garden centres and finding ways to add green to our yard, often by September I’ve quite had enough of it all.

Admit it, you have too.  Spring is heavily romantic, all full of promise and green buds but oh, the heartbreak of a bedraggled, dry garden at the end of fall.  Somehow the watering gets away from us, or the weeds overtake that one far off bed, or the tomatoes get spots…the end of every growing season finds me secretly pleased to clean out beds, toss what didn’t grow and get ready to ignore things for a few months.

The snow is nature’s way of ensuring I never grow tired of the garden.

But the warmer weather lures me outside. The first green buds, the brave bursts of perennials – how could I resist?  And then begins the shopping.  It only takes one or two trips to the garden centre to realize how deep you can fall into garden spending, and how quickly.

One replacement tool, some soil and peat moss, baby plants, pots – just a few – and suddenly your cart is full and the cashier would like your two hundred dollars, please.  And that’s before you get sucked into buying the half dozen hanging baskets you buy every spring.  Once you get home, you look at all the space you have yet to plant and realize, once again, your garden will be an expensive hobby.

But does it have to be?  When did we decide that we had to buy everything new, every year?  Is this how our grandmothers gardened?  I’m willing to bet that it’s not.  I think of the giant columbines that grew in my grandmother’s garden every year and remember how the constancy of some things is a comfort.

So now I look for ways to garden more simply.  I look for perennials that I can divide and move to new homes around the garden.  I try to distinguish volunteer plants from the weeds so I don’t pull them prematurely.  And I think before I dig or plant.

What do I want to grow?  I want trees, shrubs, hardy flowers, herbs, and edibles.  When I can, I buy a perennial, knowing it will return year after year, saving me time, energy, and money.

If we consider gardening like the generations before did, everything becomes simpler.  We plant hardy plants in places where they are likely to flourish.  We collect seeds, share plants and accept plants from others gratefully.  We fix our tools that need repairing, or we borrow a rarely used one from a neighbour.

We accept the work done by trees and vines, and other vertical plantings and stop trying to grow delicate, wilting specimens.  We grow ferns in the shade, and nod at tiny bells on nearby lily of the valley and save our petunias for the sun.

There are always ways to enjoy a garden, no matter your budget.  If you want to keep costs down or simplify your projects, watch for people getting rid of things you can use in your own garden.  It is common to find people selling or giving away gardening supplies like landscaping bricks, decorative rock, flower pots, mulch, and even plants.  Watch for garden sales in your neighbourhood, and ask anyone you know who has been gardening a couple of decades to keep you in mind as they divide and clear their yard each spring and fall.  With a little luck and some neighbourly help, you can be well on your way to a green retreat that won’t have you reaching for your wallet over and over.

What came up all on its own in your garden this spring?  What have you added to your yard that cost you nothing or very little?  Do you have any ideas of ways you can bring a little tradition back into your garden?

DIY Upcycled Vases

“Upcycling,” the process of taking waste materials and turning them into better quality products, isn’t exactly a new term, but it sure is trendy to say these days. And I’m glad. A big part of my environmental education has to do with the importance of upcycling instead of consuming a new product when possible.

Today I’m going to demonstrate a fun way to create upcycled vases from garbage.

What you need

• Empty cylinders such as soup cans, juice canisters, etc.

• Spray paint

• Scraps of ribbon

• Dried flowers or other decorations

What you do

• Wash and dry all containers

• Spray paint containers allow to dry completely (according to directions on spray paint, approximately 12 hours)

• Decorate as desired

When you first look at empty soup cans, scraps of ribbon, and old, dried out flowers it doesn’t seem like much. But with a little spray paint, trash is suddenly upcycled into something you can both admire and brag about. This project inspires me to look with new eyes at what other perfectly usable items I’m overlooking. I’m sure I have a long way to go!

Apartment Living: Balcony Crafts

Last week I shared some intimate secrets about my double life as Winona Ryder, my non-existent cleaning habits and my apartment lifestyle. My mission, already accepted, was to create an outside living space using recycled, upcycled and used goods. Already I have a Mad Mat made of 98% recycled plastic and I have some vinegar. (I am yet to ‘get on my hands and knees and scrub that floor’).

If you have seen a dark figure hovering by your garbage of late, chances are it was me. Yep, it was the 1st of the month this week and we all know that’s when people start chucking things to the curbside as they realise they have 1000,000 more glasses, trinkets, books and random pieces of furniture than they ever anticipated! This is the moment  I step in.

First up, I snagged myself a wicker sorting basket. After mulling over the idea of making my son a sensory toy – water in one compartment, sand in another and an array of stones and shells et al in the smaller ones, I eventually decided to use it as a pot for herbs.

First I threaded some fishing wire through the box so that I could secure it to my balcony without screws (or any sort of elegance). Then I lined the box with an old plastic bag and cardboard.  I planted Italian oregano, stevia, peppermint and cilantro. (One of the funniest newspaper personal ads I ever read was in Monday Magazine’s “You Pissed Me Off
column: Cilantro, I hate you, stay out of my salad, you taste of soap.)

My sorting box herb planter

With my eyes ever peeled for curbside treats, I hit up one of my favourite thrift store for trinkets, tins and random kitchen knick-knacks that would work well outside. Here, I got my hands on some pretty tin containers and lots of purple candles all for .39c each. Score!

It is so easy to recycle candles:

• Set up a double boiler – saucepan with a few inches of boiling water and another heat proof bowl that will rest perfectly on top.
• Put old candles into bowl and let water in saucepan boil.
• Candles will melt.  As they do, carefully (I used an old chopstick) fish out the wicks and discard (or reuse for new candles if you can).
• Once wax is melted, pour into your cleaned up tins
• If the wax is deep enough you should be able to place a wick in the wax and it will stand but if not, you will need to spend a few minutes holding the wick in the wax until the wax has hardened.
• Put to one side to harden.

Recycling candles and old tins

This week I will be making some shell candles in a similar way.

Sea Shell Candles from CountryLiving.com

I will also be making some wind chimes which I will provide a tutorial for another time. But quickly, another purchase I found this week which was a steal at $12, but unfortunately not a recycled product unless you count the fact that it RECYCLES THE SUN is this beautiful little outdoor solar powered lantern, from Homesense. After a day in the sun, this lantern will automatically start to glow once the sun goes down for about 8 hours! Love it!

Solar Powered Lantern

What’s hiding in your house? 5 Bizarre Spring Cleaning Discoveries

I found enough junk in my house to fill our entire downstairs suite!

For the last two weeks I have made it my goal to search in every cupboard, drawer, closet and shelf in my house in order to clean out items that we no longer need or use.  This is necessary now that we have a son as we need to start making room for all of his things (which there is a ton of already and he’s not even a year old yet!!) Plus, we are heading back east next month so I thought we could maybe make a little extra cash selling all this stuff at a garage sale.

One important truth I have discovered is that the more places you have to store stuff, the more stuff you end up storing. The old adage “out of sight, out of mind” is very true and becomes dangerous as you end up hiding away all this useless junk that just sits there collecting dust and cluttering up your living space. I’m not saying I’m ready to be a guest star on Hoarders yet or anything but after finding some ridiculous things, I am realizing I may have some trouble letting things go.

Now in the past, I admit that I’ve been TOO lenient with these items, making excuses as to why I need to keep them. The main reasons I’ve wound up keeping things is because I’ve convinced myself that I’ll need them someday or that they hold a special memory.  Here are some of the stranger things I uncovered while searching my house, the possible reasons I kept them in the past and why I don’t need them now! (I just realized how this sounds…like something a therapist would tell a hoarder!  Lol. I promise I came up with this all on my own without any professional help!)

1.  A Giant Martini Glass: I brought this back from Vegas four years ago except when I bought it, it was filled with 10 ounces of liquor! I wound up finishing it that night, so really I can’t use the excuse that I’m keeping it because I have any memories of it!  I previously kept it because I thought that someday I may want to have a second go at trying to finish a 10 ounce drink, but now that I have a baby, that idea sounds both painful and wrong!

2. A Make Your Own Bath and Beauty Supply Kit:  This may not seem like such a strange item except that I remember my parents giving this to me as a birthday present when I was SIXTEEN years old.  With each move, I have lugged this kit along with me with the intention of one day opening it up and making myself some bath salts and lotions. The problem is, since it’s now sixteen years old, I’m guessing the all natural products are probably rotten or would burn when they touched my skin. This may just have to go in the trash rather than be donated or sold…I don’t want to harm anyone or be sued!

3. A Leopard Print Hat Box:  I believe this was given to be about 10 years ago and I thought I should keep it as it was a funky box that could be used to store more stuff!  But with my new goal in mind, obviously keeping this item defeats the purpose of trying to stop placing things in boxes and forgetting them for years! So, bye-bye funky box!

4. A Neon Unicorn:  I mean who doesn’t need one of these in their house? I recall that this was won for me at a local fair by a boy when I was around 22 and I kept it as a memento while we were dating.  Once we broke up I recall crying and cursing his name as I threw it in a box, no longer being able to look at it (But to be honest, can you even really look at it now? It’s so ugly!!!)  Another “out of sight, out of mind” discovery that needs to be sent away…I do hear that neon is back in style now so maybe someone will buy it as an accessory and carry it around like a purse!

5. Heart-Printed Toilet Paper:  Huh??? Who in their right mind would purchase such an item or keep in their house for five years? Um, that would be me!  I recall that I bought this as a stocking stuffer for my hubbie as a joke telling him that everytime he used it, he would think of his love for me…I know, I really didn’t think that one through, did I?” Anyways, I thought I should keep it just in case we ever ran out of toilet paper and this could be our reserve roll…not a bad idea except I’m guessing the dye from the hearts would transfer.  Looks like I’ll have to flush this one down the toilet too…hahahahahaha…sorry I couldn’t resist!

I challenge all of you to take a couple of hours this week and really dig deep into your homes to pull out all the junk you no longer use. Purge your house and I promise you will feel like a weight as been lifted…literally as you won’t have to lug around 100 pounds of junk next time you decide to move!  I’d love to hear what strange things you uncover!

Coupon tip of the week:  Each store has their own set of rules regarding what types of coupons they accept and if they allow stacking. I highly recommend reading up on their policies before going to the store as this will save you alot of headaches and possibly arguements. As well, it’s a good idea to print off the policies and bring them with you just in case you are dealing with a newer employee who may not know all the rules yet.

Creative re-use of antique doors

We’ve spent the last year planning a massive renovation to our home and it’s finally happening. In fact, our garage and back porch are being torn down this week (while we’re living here!), and we’re set to move out at the end of the month. In the meantime we’ve been very busy sorting, purging, and packing.

My husband and I have spent 13 years dreaming about this reno. We live in a war-time home (also called post-war home, or victory home), which is common to many parts of Canada. According to the CMHC, more than one million of these kind of houses were built across the country between 1945 and 1960, and many of them only had a finished floor area of less than 1,200 sq. ft.. Space, or lack thereof, has been one of our biggest challenges, but space issues aside, our home has a great personality and we want to make sure that we don’t lose sight of it during this process.

For example: we want to keep all of our antique interior doors. (I have a thing about old doors. Remember one of my fantastic finds?) They’re solid wood right down to the core. They’re kinda creaky but totally amazing. They even have their original knobs and keyholes… which are unfortunately blocked up (which is too bad because I might have a key that fits somewhere in my collection):

Anyway, yes, our doors. I a-DOOR them. (Ha ha.) And I think if we find a place for our old doors in our new reno it’ll help preserve the character of our old home and maintain some of its historical character.

I didn’t have to work too hard to convince our construction manager to reuse our doors, but there are three extra doors I’m not sure what to do with. One is in the rafters of the garage and requires investigating, the second is our drafty old back door, and the third is another back door. The latter two have glass panes in the top half and would require some elbow grease. I’ve been trying to figure out how we can use these doors in a creative and useful way – and then present the idea to my husband and the construction manager. It goes without saying that it needs to be the kind of project that doesn’t make me sound like a crazy lady or someone who belongs in an episode of hoarders.  AND it needs to be something I can do myself more or less.

Here are a few things I’ve earmarked:

• You can take an old hinged door and turn it into a slider with the addition of a rail 
• You can make a really interesting corner shelf out of it
• You can turn it around and put it on the wall; here’s an old door made into a memo/chalk board
• You can make a table out of it. Here’s a coffee table on coasters (!)
• Here’s another take on the coffee table idea and another one 
• A porch swing
• And this is one of my favourites, a hanging table (outdoors no less)!

New Geo-search Feature: Find it faster.

We’ve recently rolled out a new way to search for things on the Used sites! This new feature is an advanced search option that lets you to find ads that are within a certain distance of the postal code you enter. So, now you can search for ad close to home, close to work, etc & so on.

You can find it by clicking on “Advanced” next to the search bar at the top right of the homepage…

…or as an advanced search option when you’re searching a category.
 

 
Enter your info and watch your search get oh, so much more refined. We hope helps you find what you’re looking for!

Seven Tips for Getting Sold Fast: Make Your Used Item Stand Out in the Crowd

It’s spring, and I have clutter.

You know what that means: time to sort, organize, and list! UsedPEI, I have the motherlode coming your way.

The great thing about sell & swap sites and services – whatever your local and preferred flavour may be – is that they enable you to minimize the clutter in your living space while also making money. One person’s trash is another’s treasure, so the saying goes.

But the truth is, if you’re really trying to sell trash – or if you treat your potential treasures like trash in your listings – you may be selling yourself short.

Listing items on a used site is easy. It really is. However, you can drastically improve your chances of selling by taking just a few minutes to actually show your treasures off properly.

Below, friends, my hard-won wisdom from months trolling the boards. Here’s how to maximize what you sell in the minimum of time: seven tips for making the selling used process as efficient and successful as it possibly can be.

1. Sell quality
Decide what you actually want money for, and what you simply want to get out of your house.

The fact that something may no longer be of use to you doesn’t make it garbage: UsedPEI and the UsedEverywhere family of sites pride ourselves on helping keep things out of the landfill. But, that said, the profit margin on many things is rather tiny, and the lower the value of the item, the more intense the haggling. If you simply want to get rid of something quickly, but aren’t sure whether it actually has monetary value, consider listing it under our Free headings: stuff tends to disappear faster there.

Or if something’s in decent shape and you’re able to afford to simply give it away, consider donating small items to places where they’ll be appreciated.

2. Know your market
Once you’ve sorted out what you want to sell, take a few minutes to consider what it might be worth, and to whom.

Is this a niche item? The older something is, or the more unusual, the more likely you are to have a real treasure on your hands, in the eyes of somebody. If that’s the case, make sure you target your ad with relevant key words.

If you’re selling Aunt Edna’s ancient lamp, take two minutes to do a google search for what era the lamp belonged to. Then title your ad appropriately. Many buyers search the site by keyword, not by simply scrolling through everything available.

3. Know your value 
While you’re checking out what era Aunt Edna’s lamp came from, take an extra minute to see what they currently cost and whether or not there are any already on the site. Consider the shape yours is in, and price accordingly.

Pick a price: don’t take the easy way out of “best offer” or $12345. If you want to sell, looking like you know the value of what you’re offering is a surprisingly big part of making people want to pay it.

That said, be reasonable rather than aspirational if you want to sell fast. If you hold out for absolute top dollar, you may be holding out for a long time. And if you’re firm on your price and not at all open to dickering back and forth, say so in the ad.

4. Be descriptive
While nobody’s going to win a Pulitzer for their used ad, being moderately interesting does help to engage potential buyers. Use clear descriptive terms to market your item, and market it: make it evident what it’s for and why someone would want it.

“It’s spring: need a good, gently-used, rust-free kids’ bike? Orange 20 inch, $50″ targets readers’ attention both to your item and to why your item might be useful to them in a way that “Bike for sale” does not. It often doesn’t take a whole lot of description to distinguish yourself from the competition: a mere modicum of effort can make all the difference.

5. Take DECENT photos
Again, you don’t need to be a professional to stand out from the crowd in this department. But it’s probably the one that makes the biggest difference to overall sales.

The Internet is a visual medium. People scan sites by keyword, but they click on what they can see. Include photos. Even if what you’re selling is as ugly as the day is long, let the world see the ugliness with its own eyes. Don’t surprise buyers at your door.

Top tips: Include a few photos from a few angles. Take the thirty seconds necessary to wipe the dust off the piano, for instance, and remove the thirty-three family pictures cluttering all the attractive woodworking details on the damn thing. Better, especially if you have outdoor items to sell, pick a sunny late afternoon and photograph them all. I squandered all of last week’s sunshine and am now stuck trying to get decent pictures of children’s play items in the pouring rain. Boo.

This is my pizza oven. It’s a great, flat toaster oven, about three years old. Unfortunately, since we moved, we no longer have space on top of our fridge for it. We also stopped eating a lot of pizza, hence…time to sell.

I dusted it. Nobody wants to buy a dirty-looking kitchen appliance.

I put it in a place in my kitchen where it would be well lit. I wiped the surface it was sitting on. And I opened the door for one of the shots: it’s important to show potential buyers what a piece can do.

I also removed most of the extraneous kitchen junk from the frame. I am not selling my kitchen: I am selling the pizza oven. You will notice that all sales-oriented photography is minimalist: it focuses attention on the item.

This all took approximately 45 seconds. Hey, I’m asking $30 for the thing. $30 for 45 seconds extra work? Good deal, IMO.

Last photo tip: PLEASE, people. PLEASE. Rotate your photos before uploading them. Don’t make me hurt my neck craning to see if yours is the piano – or the pizza oven – for me.

6. Spellcheck
I saw an ad for a clock the other day. Unfortunately, it wasn’t spelled that way. Some buyer is going to be VERY disappointed.

7. Be honest
Chances are what you’re selling will be useful and desirable to somebody. But don’t oversell, and never NEVER make overt claims that aren’t true. Mutton dressed as lamb doesn’t smell so good when the buyer is holding it in his or her hands, and – especially in small communities – your reputation as an honest seller will go far further in the long run than the extra $10 you might think you’ll get right now by pretending Aunt Edna’s lamp actually works. If you’re selling something for parts, say so.

In the end, selling used can be a great way to both keep your living space under control and make some extra cash. But like any thing that pays, the rewards tend to equal the effort expended. If you put the absolute minimum into your listings, you’ll likely get the absolute minimum out. If you have decent things to sell, take ten whole minutes and list them right: you may see up to hundreds of dollars in speedy return. That’s profit worth working for, I think.