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| Monday, December 17, 2007 |
| Garagey Goodness |
Last weekend we had our Last Garage Sale. We've had three in total. The first weekend in December we had garage sales on Saturday and Sunday, then a week off, and then just Saturday last weekend.
Mr Ata had done some research & discovered that many people recommend putting only your street name - not the number - in any garage sale advertising. This discourages people from turning up an hour before your advertised start time in the hopes of snagging a bargain early. It proved to be good advice. We advertised a start time of 7:30 am, and left the house at 7am to put boxes with signs on them out on the main roads (and pick up breakfast) - on both weekends we noted several cars cruising the street carefully inspecting every house for a suggestion of garage sale activity. We very deliberately ignored them. On the first day, we were 10 minutes late opening the door, and got reprimanded by a couple of enthusiastic garage sale goers. Last weekend, there were a few cars parked up & down the street when we got back from putting out the street signs, and as we got out of our car some people leaped out of their own vehicles & began following us down the driveway. I went around the back of the shed to go in the little door & open the big sliding door from the inside. The peg that holds the door shut is a little old & rusty and took a bit of fiddling with to get it to lift, so I was still scowling at the bottom of the door as I slid it back... and then looked up to the sight of about 20 people stampeding down the driveway. I stood there openmouthed for a heartbeat, until it occurred to me I was about to get trampled, and I got shouldered aside by a few people as I tried to get out of their way. A warning to anyone contemplating a garage sale - don't mess about with those people. They're like buffalo: cranky, unpredictable, and particularly dangerous in herds.
While I took the bargain-hunting hordes pawing through the accumulated detritus of our lives with good grace most of the time, there was one woman who particularly annoyed me. She came on the first Saturday, and browsed through everything making little comments just loud enough for me to hear - "Ooh, that's ugly. Mmph - cheap. Look at that." Then she would offer me a fraction of what I was asking, as if making sure I knew how crappy my possessions were would make me more inclined to let her buy them for fifty cents. She was particularly interested in a blockmounted poster of Jeff Buckley (that I had stickered at $10, knowing full well I probably wouldn't get it, but I figured it was worth a try) She came back to it several times, making comments about it - "Oh, my son likes him. He might like it. I don't know. Probably he wouldn't. Maybe I'll get it for my son." She asked how much I wanted. I said $10. She said, "Oh, no, that's too much. I just thought my son might like it. I'll give you a dollar." I said no. She poked at the blockmounting and said, "Oh, that's just cheap. No. I'll give you $2." I said no again. She had a couple more goes at insulting the poster, and bought some other things instead.
Last Saturday, the same woman turned up again. She made a beeline for the Jeff Buckley poster, picked it up and said, "I'll give you a dollar." Without waiting for an answer, she put it down next to the table where I was taking money & went into the shed to pick out some other things. I called Mr Ata over & quietly asked him to take the poster inside, having already decided it'd be better Ebayed. When he came back, I asked him to do the money for a minute while I went inside - the very presence of that woman was putting my blood pressure up already, and I just couldn't bear the thought of listening to another litany of "Oh, that's tacky. No. Ugly. I'll give you fifty cents." By the time she left, I was muttering to myself that I didn't care if it only sold for a dollar on Ebay - I'd rather it went to someone else even if I had to give the thing away.
I listed the poster on Ebay last night, at a starting price of $0.99 and with postage of $15. By this morning, I had six watchers, two questions, and one bid. Obviously SOMEONE thinks it's worth paying at least $15.99 for.
So, garage sales are over and done with, and all up I think we made about enough to buy ourselves a new mobile phone each. We also sold my car to a guy who, after learning we were moving overseas, seemed keen to offer us money for just about anything he laid his eyes on - including the house. We are quite determined to hang on to the house, however, and signed up with a real estate agent to manage the property for us while we are gone. They put an ad on the net last week, and apparently have had a huge response. The property market is very tight in Adelaide at the moment - there's not a lot available to buy OR rent. Tomorrow afternoon we are having an open inspection - "How long do you want the property for?" I asked the property manager. "Oh," she said casually, "about 15 minutes." I am now envisioning a scene similar to Saturday's garage sale, where people come stampeding up the driveway as soon as the doors are opened. We will not be here to witness this one, though. At least a 15-minute open doesn't really give people much time to steal stuff. |
posted by Ata @ 11:42 am  |
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