So this last weekend rather than waste precious time on Saturday morning between the 8 and 10 o'clock hours looking for garage sales, I wanted to be more proactive in planning the night before. So on Friday night, with my trustee iPad in hand and the iGarage Sale Lite app, I searched for the most promising garage sales in my area. I picked the best sounding Craigslist posting at 8am, 8:30am, and 9am. Since I only chose one at each of these time slots, it allowed us time to roam around to nearby garage sales before the next one started.
Overall the strategy seemed to pay off. At the first garage sale there was a lot of neat antique furniture, but they weren't exactly great bargains, nor was it anything that I was looking for. Right before we left, I was looking through the $1 table and I found a Pampered Chef apple peeler and corer. I picked it up immediately as this is worth around $15 (going rate on eBay). Worst case scenario, if it didn't work, my wife being a Pampered Chef consultant could get a free replacement. This garage sale also had some comics from the 70s and 80s (Superman & Action Comics) but nothing of value.
The next garage sale at 8:30am had the best finds of the day. Everything was really poorly organized at the sale, so nothing caught my eye until I was about to leave. As I was walking away a guy my age pulled out a Gameboy Color with some games from a miscellaneous box of toys. I probably would have bought it had I seen it, but that wasn't that wonderful of a find. I did however search through the boxes of toys and discovered a Texas Instruments TI-83+ calculator and a BlueAnt ST3 Bluetooth speakerphone. The guy charged me $2 for both. The going rate on eBay for a used BlueAnt ST3 is about $28 and the TI-83 could net about $32. I was actually in the market for the Bluetooth speakerphone so I will keep it.
The reason I titled this post "almost a disaster" was because after I paid for my two great finds and went to my car I realized that my pocket no longer contained a loose $20 I had when I had arrived at the show. After searching around for about 5-10 minutes and talking to the host of the show about the missing money, someone overheard me and handed me my $20 bill. I said "THANK YOU!" to the lady, and said a prayer of thanks to God in my head. I vow never to keep money outside my wallet again...
The last sale we hit up we immediately knew the people were anxious to get rid of their stuff...and cheap. I was stoked to get a nice money clip that has a fold out knife and file for $1. I tried to find a value for it online, but nothing came up. They also had a brand new Casio fx-260 Solar calculator for $2 and my faithful wife got it for $1. eBay average for a new one is $16. And finally I wasted a buck on an old Nancy Drew first edition of "The Sign of the Twisted Candles". I thought since it was an original copy from 1933, it may be worth $10, but my searches didn't seem too promising.
All together it was a pretty good day. Now to list all this crap on eBay...
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