One woman's trash...

By the end of this year we hope to be in a new home.  Well, new to us.  The building is actually quite old.  We've managed to find a place to save us a bit of rent.  The only problem?... its much smaller.

Every cloud has it's silver lining, in this case, an opportunity to de-clutter our lives and maybe earn a little moving money in the process.

So, this past weekend, we hauled all the trash we could find out of our wardrobe, bookshelves and cupboards and into the garage... GARAGE SALE!

After a few hours of standing around pointing out all the uses for my useless stuff we came out $400 over richer! 

There are several websites to help you organise or advertise your garage sale, I liked:

Simple Savings (Tipsheet download - "How to Host a Garage Sale")

Better Homes and Gardens Video

Street Garage Sales 

Here's how we did it: 

• place adds in local paper, listing some of the item you'll be selling, for the week leading up to the sale
• price everything, either with tags or coloured dots (each colour representing a standard price)
• write a sign for the coloured dot price list
• put a few signs out on the street
• lay out all the items in a logical and appealing manner (toys with toys, books with books, kitchenware ... etc.)
• have plenty of change and at least one helper to do the coffee run!

We also had some friends with stuff to get rid off so they went haves on the cost of the add and brought their things over and helped out with the sale too.  A great day was had by all!

However, the garage is still FULL! ... I know, I know we have A LOT of trash!  ... but we're going to give it one more shot at a local trash and treasure day in a few weeks time.

We it comes down to it we just want all this excess stuff gone so we'll be having each item at just $1 and anything that doesn't sell will be donated to a charity thrift store and books to the library or local book drive.

So if you're finding yourself a little over crowded and would like a little extra pocket money - dig out your trash and sell it to someone to treasure!