Merikay was recently lamenting about selling her stuff on the likes of EBay and Craigslist so I thought I would share some of our experiences. We sold a few items on EBay but they were specialty items such as vintage camera bodies and lenses. As Merikay said, once we researched the prices and bids on EBay for items similar to what we had we decided we would try craigslist for selling the rest of the stuff.
Craigslist is the best place to sell items that you want to get a fair price for. Now the way we started using Craigslist was to place only the items we wanted to get rid of early on the web at a fair and reasonable price. We started doing this nearly a year in advance of our planned departure. We would then repost the item frequently to generate interest. Reposting brings the item to the top of the list making it more likely to be seen.
As the time started getting closer to our departure (Yikes only 10 more days!) we had sold most of the items we really didn’t need but had (why we had these items we don’t know?). And in the last few months the remaining furniture and larger everyday items were listed. Again these items were posted at a fair and reasonable value and many of them sold leaving us with only a few less desirable or wanted items.
The strategy we used to get rid of the lesser desirable items has been to decrease our asking price bit by bit on each reposting and we have been able to sell nearly all the larger items we have listed. Only a few remaining items are left and if they don’t sell this week they will be added to our one last garage sale next weekend.
Now another strategy I used just recently (and should have tried earlier) was to post items on Craigslist in other large cities nearby. I have been trying to sell the car for a long time with very little interest but I posted it to the Houston Craigslist (about 100 miles away) and had four inquiries on the car yesterday with a fellow driving over in the morning to look at it. Why I didn’t think of this sooner is beyond me but I pass this on to you so you can learn from my mistakes.
You see the key here is to get rid of all your unneeded stuff but you still need to feel as if you were being fairly compensated. We all know you can sell everything in a garage sale but only for pennies on 
the dollar and let’s be real, garage sales are a pain in the a$*#. One final advantage of selling items on Criagslist that are sentimental to you or that you have a personal attachment to is that you get to meet the buyer and tell your story about the item. I found that for the most part the buyers of these items seemed as if they would truly care for them. It is nice to know the antiques we sold are going to good people who will enjoy them. I this also helps one adjust to the separation anxiety and makes it easier to be able to let go of these types of items…
Photos are some of the many items we sold on craigslist.
