Whether you know them as garage or yard sales, you can successfully sell your old items by dragging them onto your lawn and placing stickers on them. While that’s the simplified way that yard sales work, it’s not far from what really happens. There’s more research, marketing and planning that goes into a successful yard sale though.
Planning Stages
Before bringing all your items out onto your lawn or garage, you should be planning the date as well as bringing your neighbors in on the process. When you have more people selling items, you’re likely to attract more people to the yard sale.
Having a neighborhood sale is an event that will bring in tons of traffic. While some people might go to one or two yard sales on a Saturday, they’ll definitely check out yours if there’s a few on the same street.
Clean and Organise
Once you’ve decided on a weekend for your garage sale, start cleaning out your garage as well as your basement, attic, closets and under the bed. This is a time to really gather all the items that don’t bring you joy anymore.
Purging once a year is a great way to clear out all the clutter in the home as well as giving you money to bring in new items. If you have decorations, old appliances and furniture that you no longer want or need, this is great stock for your sale.
When you are ready to organise the items in your garage, have tables for display purposes. People should be able to see your items from the street. Organise the items to be inviting and noticeable. Many buyers don’t stop their cars if they don’t see anything interesting.
Pricing Strategies
After gathering up your items, do a search online to find comparable items. You don’t want to price your knick knacks for more than they cost in the store.
As a rule, you’ll want to price your items for a third of what they cost in the store. This is just a general rule of thumb for pricing your items. You’re free to price them as you see fit. Books don’t translate to a third of their store price, and others don’t follow the rule either. This is why research is vital. In the weeks leading up to your own yard sale, head out to some in the area to see what they’re doing for pricing strategies.
Marketing Your Garage Sale
One of the biggest things to worry about is getting people to the garage sale. This is why you invited the neighbors to sell with you. There are places online like Facebook groups for your area as well as other online marketplaces for your advertisements. Never throw up one sign and be finished with your marketing.
Once you’ve added the advertisement to online portals, get large pieces of paper or cardboard and print signs for your sale. Sign Rules:
- Large block letters
- Massive arrow pointing in the right direction
- More than one sign in the neighborhood
- Have kids help by waving signs in front of the house
Don’t allow children to create the signs. It’s vital that they are large and clearly marked, so they are readable from a distance. Scribbled signs are not effective.
Learning to Negotiate
Many people head off to garage sales to polish up on their negotiating skills. They want the best deal possible, and they’re not afraid to haggle over the price. Be prepared for people to ask for a better price than the one you have listed on the item.
At some garage sales, people are printing out flyers and advertisements from local department stores featuring the same item. For example, if you’re selling a baby stroller that is in the store for 3 times the price you’re asking, you can print the flying and attach it to the stroller. This lets the buyer know that they’re getting an incredible deal. Be prepared for the buyers to still want to negotiate though.
When you’re bargaining with buyers, you might not want to lower prices too much on the first day in the early morning of the sale. Tell the person that you’ll lower prices if things don’t sell. Invite them to come back if they walk away from the item.
An effective garage sale starts with planning and ends with good pricing and marketing strategies. Never toss your items onto the lawn or garage without a complete plan in place. In some areas, there are massive garage sales that include entire neighborhoods. See if you can get something like that started in your area.