How to kill a Saturday morning: Garage Sale!

Yes, those dreaded two words. But you HAVE to do it! There are tons of household items that I used to donate to charity. That was back when I had the "luxury" to do it and take the tax write off. I have SO MUCH loss roll over that I'm not going to need those tax write offs for a very long time!

So, I apologize to those charities and to those who are worse off than me, but I've GOT to try to sell it!

We have been going through closets and drawers and cupboards and the garage and just finding all kinds of things that we aren't using and don't "need". So many kitchen items, and things that were given to me as gifts that, I'm sorry, I will never use!

My community has two big community garage sales every year and one of them is coming up, and we are going to be ready!!

We've got it all planned out:

• We've already started pulling stuff out and putting them in boxes in the spare bedroom and the garage so that we aren't scrambling last minute.
• As time gets closer, I'll contact my HOA to get parking passes so that we can park on the street for the week proceeding and make sure that the garage is READY so we can just open the door that morning and GO! (we aren't allowed to park on the street outside of our homes - long story!)
• I'll advertise on my facebook account for everyone to tell their friends. It's free and why not? I'm not telling them how broke I am just by announcing a garage sale!
• And I'll enlist my neighbors to share the facebook posts. They like me (at least, I believe they do! lol) and will want to help.
• I'll do an ad on Craig's List. Not sure if it's free or not. But I know that posting for a job is only $25 so if it's even that much, I'd be fine with it.
• I'll put a few flyers around - including one at the Starbucks up the street.

Now, here's something else I'm planning...

• Buy water bottles at Costco and sell them for a small profit. It will help my bottom line; it will make my garage sale a little more "friendly"; and everything that I buy at Costco, because I have the executive membership, I get 2% back annually.
• We're going to borrow a popcorn machine from a friend. It's one of those "old fashioned stand up ones" that Costco had a few years back. Popcorn is CHEAP and it's easy to make. We'll sell that for a quarter a bag. Or maybe give that for free, but sell the water (if you have one, you have to have the other!). Again, set our garage sale apart from the rest.
• ALSO, I'm going to take an "interest" list for people who liked my garage sale. Remember, the community is having two of them. And I actually will be moving out of town in probably a year when I get married, so I'll "need" to have another one. It's easy to email a large group of people and say, "Hey, remember me? You liked the last one and I'm having another!" I'll put a disclaimer at the bottom of the sheet that the email address will not be sold and will be used for notifying of another future garage sale. But hey, it's worth a shot! I have a BUNCH of good stuff up for grabs!

Btw, if you are interested in coming to my garage sale, shoot me and email and I'll make sure to tell you when it is! :)