Garage Sale Madness

Noah930 · Noah930's Garage

Why do people go crazy over garage/tag sales? I went for a walk, today. 7 am is pretty sleepy early in LA for a Sunday morning. A house down the street had a garage sale. And several cars were parked out front of the house. I use the term "parked" somewhat loosely. Rather, they looked like they were poised for a round of NASCAR pitstops. Kinda pulled over to the curb, but left all cattywompus. One van pulled over to the side of the road, and I'm half surprised the guy came to a complete stop before turning off the motor and jumping out.

What's up with this madness? Are people really this cheap?

stomachmonkey · 07:21 AM

Some of it is about cheap but there really are good deals to be had.

The ones you see at the crack of dawn are dealers that are looking for resalable/profitable items.

Worked with a guy who was into old toys, tins, advertising materials etc...

It was a hobby for him and he would regularly find items worth 10x's what he paid for them.

Brought one of my guys down to TX from NY last year.

There was a community wide sale going on. We set him up with pots/pans/ furniture, all kinds of stuff for under $100. One item was a brand new never used coffee maker in box for $5.00

I needed a craft table for my 8 year old. Found one right down the block. Nice all wood tilting top, cost me $25.00. Far nicer than stuff I was seeing in stores for $100.00

URY914 · URY914's Garage

We had one a few months ago to get rid of some old crap. My wife and daughter handle it, I stay in the garage. We had this old guy in a car drive up and pull over to the curb and yells out the window, "YOU GOT ANY OLD TOY TRAINS???". My wife yells. "nope". He waved and sped off. Cracked me up!

bell · bell's Garage

it's a compulsive disorder, these people do this 4 days a week, are surely packrats and have way too much crap then they could ever possibly need.....
the only exception are the dealers and the old dudes who hit the sales to buy and refinish old furniture to keep themselves busy......
when we had our moving sale i was setup by 8 am, and probably had 20 people come through in an hour (lived in an ohio suburb).......i had 4 old guys come through and left their numbers should some of our old cherry tables cabinets didn't sell and i wanted to unload them cheap, i would've called them but sold them cheap to a friend who just bought a big house

all the crap that didn't sell went to the curb (the city was making a special garbage pickup in the early am for us) through the night the pickers were so bad the cops made regular runs down our street.......

stomachmonkey · 08:18 AM

Here's a funny story.

Where I live they have community wide garage sales twice a year.

There are 3,000 homes in the community so you can imagine it gets pretty crazy.

Well my buddy John down the block decided to rearrange his garage one weekend forgetting that was the official garage sale day.

He had the contents of his 3 car garage on the driveway and you can imagine how the rest of his day went.

legion · 08-02-2009, 07:51 AM

I have a friend who sells old video games on eBay. He makes between $5,000 and $20,000 a year in extra income doing this.

His source for the games? Pawn shops and garage sales. He knows what just about every game is worth and will buy it if he can turn a profit. There are certain games that are rare and worth a lot, and those are rarely recognized by pawn brokers or garage salers...

74-911 · 08-02-2009, 08:17 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Noah930

What's up with this madness? Are people really this cheap?

A lot of this stuff ends up in flea markets and junktique stores.

Rick Lee · Rick Lee's Garage

Garage sales are a religion on the island where my folks live. There are really some smoking deals out there.

Tidybuoy · 08-02-2009, 09:55 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Noah930

Why do people go crazy over garage/tag sales?

About 10 years ago, I stopped at a garage sale and bought a cigar box full of foreign coins & paper money for $10. When I got home, I discovered 5 1/10th oz gold kruggerands in the mix (worth about $500).

I'm not a nut case about garage sales, but I like going to them if I'm passing by and it looks like a lot of good stuff. You never know what you will find.

I've also picked up about 5 or 6 Porsche coffee table books over the years.

To me, it's more like treasure hunting vs. being cheap.

tabs · 08-02-2009, 10:46 AM

It is literally treasure hunting.

For $10 you can buy an old box of picture frames and find a nice little Granville Redmond in that box that was so dirty that you could hardly tell what the scene was...turned out that painting sold for $8900.00....It was found in San Gaberial, CA

WolfeMacleod · 08-02-2009, 10:59 AM

the girl that lived with me for a short time bought a jewelry box and it's contents at a garage sale for 50 cents. Inside? A diamond ring.

I've know people who've walked away with vintage guitars for stupid cheap. "Grandpa died and we found this beat up thing under his bed" really does happen.

stomachmonkey · 08-02-2009, 10:59 AM

Was at our cabin one weekend and cruised by one on my way to the grocery store. Out of the corner of my eye I catch what looks to be a very early Les Paul. I was really moving so figured I'd stop on the way back.

20 minutes later and it was gone.

tabs · 08-02-2009, 11:29 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by stomachmonkey

Was at our cabin one weekend and cruised by one on my way to the grocery store. Out of the corner of my eye I catch what looks to be a very early Les Paul. I was really moving so figured I'd stop on the way back.

20 minutes later and it was gone.

I learned a long time ago you snooze you lose. If in doubt buy.

A friends wife runs estate sales down in Sun City, CA. One day they called and asked if I wanted to buy some ammo...

1000 rounds of 223 Lake City Green Tip and a 1000 rounds of 45 Acp....$200

tabs · 11:47 AM

Even on the Live Auctions you can score....I bought a Rex Brandt guach for $160. The signature was fuzzy so they marked it American School. I knew the artists style and said YEAH...

Brandts WC's when they come up go for about 10K in the size I purchased. A Guach could go for considerably more, as they are rarer.

What was funny was that Brandt had a penchant of painting Balboa Yatch Club...there are several paintings including one that I have, that used this very composition.

tabs · 08-02-2009, 11:48 AM

Late one night I was crusing E-bay paintings...while doing so I was looking at an article in American Art Review on Fredrick Mulhaupt...when I saw a painting that was a dead ringer for his style, it was in a period frame and someone thought well enough of it conserve it by relining the canvass. There is a partial signature that could be construed as being "Mul....NA"

I asked the seller about it, he bought it at an estate auction in NY, and didn't know a thing about Mulhaupt.

So for $500 I bought it..

Paintings by Mulhaupt in that size would go for 15K to 20K.

tabs · 08-02-2009, 11:56 AM

Another time on Ebay band camp...I saw a small CA Plein Aire, no signature, unframed. On the back was an artist supply store stamp that was in operation back in the 20's in downtown LA. The seller said he bought it for $5 at a Thrift Store in Fresno, CA. Bought that one for $107.00

The artists style and the fact that the artist supply store was in very close proximity to where this artist lived in Alhambra, CA leads me to believe it is an unsigned Sam Hyde Harris.

I would say about $1000 framed at auction.

An aquaintence of mine does all the conservation and restoration for the big auction houses and gallerys in LA. He told me he doesn't even look at the signatures to know who the artist is.

VINMAN · 08-02-2009, 12:02 PM

Funny, we had one yesterday, to get rid of some old stuff. Made a total of $18. About seven people came by the whole day. Total wate of time.

Had one last fall, made about $600.

Yeah, the people that go to these things are a whole subculture of their own.

Tidybuoy · 08-02-2009, 12:56 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by VINMAN

Funny, we had one yesterday, to get rid of some old stuff. Made a total of $18.
Yeah, the people that go to these things are a whole subculture of their own.

Of course, there are always the ocasional garage sale that has nothing but junk that should just be thrown away.

84CAB · 08-02-2009, 01:01 PM

Here people will run over you with their vehicle to get to a yardsale. They stop in the middle of the street, do u-turns in front of you, you name it. "Must buy those plastic flowers for my garden before someone else does"......

deanp · 08-02-2009, 01:02 PM

A friend does this stuff on the side - one of his favorites is storage center auctions. He's gotten lucky a few times. He had someone deliver a box of train stuff yesterday, they drove about 40miles to deliver it, he paid $50 for the box's contents. He figures he can sell the contents and net about $1000. His two favorite sites for looking are craigslist and auctionzip.com