Planning and Organizing a Successful Yard Sale
A well-organized and well-planned yard sale is more appealing and makes it easier for shoppers to see what you have for sale. After you’ve sorted through your belongings and decided what you’re going to put in your yard sale, take a moment to sit down and think through how you want to organize your items.
Categorize your items, as it demonstrates your hard work and forethought in planning your sale. Keep a close eye on things throughout the course of the day, as you’ll need to resort and re-categorize your things as your items sell.
You can sort things into boxes when you’re doing your initial sorting and purging. You can find a variety of empty freight boxes at your local supermarket, liquor and discount stores and they’re usually free for the taking. Make sure you gather several sizes to accommodate different items.
If you have not already created a space filled with those items you plan to sell in your yard sale, grab a box and survey your house and your belongings, placing your unwanted items in the box until it’s full. Select a central location or room in your house to coordinate your sale items. Continue with this process until you’ve sorted through all your belongings in both your home and garage. Be sure to go through places like your drawers, closets, sheds, cupboards and your pantry. Don’t forget your attic or basement as well.
Once you’ve gathered all your sale items, sort them into categories to group them into for your sale. This can be done either by category or price. Periodically during your sale, move items that haven’t sold to another table or re-locate them on the same table. However, don’t do this during times when you have lots of traffic. If you notice certain categories of items are not selling as well as others, you might want to adjust your prices accordingly or move them to a faster moving area of your sale so people can see them first. Also make sure they are in a spot where they can be easily seen by those who drive by to capitalize on the impulse of locals.
Once your sale is over, decide what you are going to do with any items that have not sold. As a general rule (unless you plan to have another sale soon) never take the items back in your house. Contact your local rescue mission or charity thrift store and make arrangements to donate your items. Most places will be happy to arrange a pickup time to come by and haul your things away, and will give you a receipt you can use for a tax write-off.
A well planned yard sale will reap more rewards (and more cash in your pocket). Happy selling!
