Rained Out Garage Sale... Get Ready for the Sunday Sale, help rywateska out!

[rywateska]

EDITREAD POST #22 FOR THE UPDATE

I will be setting up a garage sale within a larger neighborhood sale this upcoming Saturday. I leave for college in less than a month, therefore I would like to sell off everything that I don't want, videogame-wise, in the next month.

I was wondering if any Cag's would like to hand over some advice, as I have a few questions that I am just not sure about:
-How should my pricing go? Games, systems, guides, etc. . .
-Memorabelia shirts/swag, what's fair?
-Should I place up for sale some of my rarer, or harder to find games?
-Bundle up things such as a Game Gear with games, or just sell seperatley until offered?
-How can I best prevent theft of discs from jewel/dvd cases?

I have a SIGNIFICANT AMOUNT of games, consoles, guides, demos, accessories, new, used, DVD's, VHS, CD's and games from the DS to Atari to sell. I've gone ahead and posted up a mini-listing on a few free garage sale websites with a run down of what my specific sale will offer.

I am looking to move the stuff, but don't want to give my collection away at pennies to the dollar. I've had sales before and know all too well what everything is worth, the popularity, and how to haggle. I know I'll have more questions as things pop up but, for the time being, do you have any advice to offer?

[ajh2298]

Hey did you just post this on the Pittsburgh Craiglist, if I was around this weekend I was going to take a drive up there to check out what you have. Also will any of the other people have any video game related items for sale that you know of?

[megaseadramon]

-How should my pricing go? Games, systems, guides, etc. . .

I recently just had a garage sale and set common games at $10 and you wouldnt believe how many people bought them. And im talking crap like bmx xxx.

-Memorabelia shirts/swag, what's fair?
couldnt say

-Should I place up for sale some of my rarer, or harder to find games?
If they are super rare, I would ebay them. You can get way more money.

-Bundle up things such as a Game Gear with games, or just sell seperatley until offered?
I would say seperately, you would get more.

-How can I best prevent theft of discs from jewel/dvd cases?
maybe put tape on the cases

[rywateska]

Hey did you just post this on the Pittsburgh Craiglist, if I was around this weekend I was going to take a drive up there to check out what you have. Also will any of the other people have any video game related items for sale that you know of?

Yes, that was me. And, no I don't know of anyone else.

If any CAG's in the area would want to tell me at the sale who they are with their CAGname, I would be more than happy to start up a nice conversation.

Also, megaseadramon, thanks for the advice!

[GizmoGC]

Yes, that was me. And, no I don't know of anyone else.

If any CAG's in the area would want to tell me at the sale who they are with their CAGname, I would be more than happy to start up a nice conversation.

Also, megaseadramon, thanks for the advice!

People have a perception that a yard sale= good finds,cheap.
You would be surprised what people pay for absolute crap, especially games.
I would mark all youre PS2/GC/XBOX games at $10 a pop. People will try to get the price lower, take $8. Half the games I sold like that retail for $5 or less at EB. Hell, a great way to make a profit.

[rywateska]

People have a perception that a yard sale= good finds,cheap.
You would be surprised what people pay for absolute crap, especially games.
I would mark all youre PS2/GC/XBOX games at $10 a pop. People will try to get the price lower, take $8. Half the games I sold like that retail for $5 or less at EB. Hell, a great way to make a profit.

Interesting. What would you say for older generation games?

[GizmoGC]

$5 a pop. Sure, WE would never pay that, but idiots will.

[rywateska]

$5 a pop. Sure, WE would never pay that, but idiots will.

I think I'll mark things like that as fair as possible. I really don't think normal garage sale shoppers will be looking much into games so I may have to lower the base price on things to what I think is fair. I just can't morally tag Madden '92 for anything more than a dollar.

[PINKO]

Well heres a big Q are you looking to make money or get rid of stuff?

[rywateska]

Well heres a big Q are you looking to make money or get rid of stuff?

Sell the most while making the most. I'd rather sell more for less than less for more. But $5 for a used PS1 Madden, I mean, that's stretching things. I'd rather sell as much as possible off ebay than on, but, I don't want to use that as an excuse to sell off an entire collection for ten cents a game.

[Desiboi1992]

post the games you have

[rywateska]

Tenative on all those in the picture, as some games from those systems may not be put in yet. Also, 150+ individual guides have to be put in as well as SNES, Genesis, Game Gear, Gameboy Advance, Nintendo 64, NES, Atari, GB/GBC, (other random system xyz game), system consoles, schwag, dvd, vhs, & cd.

http://img144.imageshack.us/img144/79/snapshot20060718102837vk1.th.png (http://img144.imageshack.us/my.php?image=snapshot20060718102837vk1.png)

[IkilledLassic]

Tenative on all those in the picture, as some games from those systems may not be put in yet. Also, 150+ individual guides have to be put in as well as SNES, Genesis, Game Gear, Gameboy Advance, Nintendo 64, NES, Atari, GB/GBC, (other random system xyz game), system consoles, schwag, dvd, vhs, & cd.

http://img144.imageshack.us/img144/79/snapshot20060718102837vk1.th.png (http://img144.imageshack.us/my.php?image=snapshot20060718102837vk1.png)
There are a couple of games I'd take off you right now if I knew where the garage sale would be, notably, and you should probably ebay them: FF Tactics, SOTN, Samurai Showdown Sega CD, Marvel Vs Capcom 1.

[Pi573]

I've planned a few garage sales and I'm set to run my own shortly. Here are my thoughts:

I second that you should eBay SOTN. You'll get more than $10 off of it, and it'll be hard to explain to people why you can't haggle down on that particular game (because it would be a ripoff) You know SOTN's going to move one way or the other, so it should be in a way that will satisfy you.

As for prices, you can't do this as well since your sale seems to be one-day-only, but one tactic is to price items for profit at the beginning and to move at the end. You might try that anyway, pricing as high as you feel like going in the morning and as low as you can in the final hours, since you stated that your goals are to make the most AND move the most. As a buyer, getting to a booth first can be a blessing and a curse: the first visitor has the best run of stuff, but the worst position from which to haggle because you can say "Well, if you come back later it'll be half off-but I can't guarantee that someone else won't get it first..." So the first few hours are about access rights as much as what's actually being sold.

[rywateska]

Any final advice before tommorow out there?

[LaraCroftsLeftBoob]

i'd keep the games close to you. put them at the table or wherever you'll be sitting. that way you can keep a better eye on them to prevent theft. and make sure to keep them out of the sun. also make a big sign saying "video games" so that people who drive by can see it. video games would be hard to see from the road, so people who drive by checking out what you have can see it and maybe stop.

[rywateska]

i'd keep the games close to you. put them at the table or wherever you'll be sitting. that way you can keep a better eye on them to prevent theft. and make sure to keep them out of the sun. also make a big sign saying "video games" so that people who drive by can see it. video games would be hard to see from the road, so people who drive by checking out what you have can see it and maybe stop.

Nice ideas, I'll be sure to use them. The only shitty thing of note right now is scattered storms all day tommorow. It starts at 20% chance of rain at 6am and goes up to 50% by noon. Not exactly a complete wast, yet, so who knows how bad that forecast will stunt people from showing up.

[Visc]

does Samurai Showdown for Sega CD go for a lot? I may want to buy it if its complete

[Eviltude]

Yeah don't sell your rare games at a yard sale, not to mention everything is likely to be picked up and handled by anyone and everyone. If you don't want people to touch, don't put it out there.

[LaraCroftsLeftBoob]

Nice ideas, I'll be sure to use them. The only shitty thing of note right now is scattered storms all day tommorow. It starts at 20% chance of rain at 6am and goes up to 50% by noon. Not exactly a complete wast, yet, so who knows how bad that forecast will stunt people from showing up.


a chance of rain probably won't keep many people away. if it actually does rain then they'll stay away. (although there are alway a few hardcore yard saler's who won't stop short of a hurricane/tornado/armageddon.) you may also want to have some tarps or plastic sheets handy. if it's only supposed to be a shower, just cover your stuff up and wait for it to pass. but if its going to rain for most of the day go ahead and pack it in.

[slidecage]

whatever you do DO NOT TRY TO DO A SWAP.


few years back my friends set up a yard sale with a video game swap in it.


they put up a sign 15 bucks per game or 3 bucks when you swap a game


few hours later a cop stop by saying they needed a licence to be swapping games (they said they concider that a business) they were told they could sell the games but were not allowed to charge a price to swap out games


i though that was total BS

depends on how many people come as price range goes

over at papermill they were selling gamecube games for 2 bucks and all went within seconds. then again another person were selling games fo 7 to 9 bucks an not one sold

[rywateska]

So the sale came and went today with barely ANY traffic. Rain killed it. I ended up making $190.50 (compared to $5.50 of neighbors) so overall not terrible.

We ended up deciding (4 houses) to have an *unscheduled Sunday (tommorow) rain day. To promote,I placed a sign in front of a nearby church that will see 4 different masses exit. I also placed 2 seperate posts on Craigslist about the sale tommorow and was wondering if anyone had any last minute advice on how to spread the word about this? Any other sites to use? I'd like to post this as many places as possible, but can't think of any directly free ones at the moment!

[megaseadramon]

So what did you sell?

[rywateska]

So what did you sell?

Mostly games. Some DVD's. A few consoles. I was able to shed off nearly all of the SNES games, but other than that, traffic was incredibly slow.

EDIT: Here's a picture with what's gone from my previous post picture, not a lot, really.

http://img73.imageshack.us/img73/9232/snapshot20060722150147mu4.th.png (http://img73.imageshack.us/my.php?image=snapshot20060722150147mu4.png)

[Kapwanil]

I know it won't help much since most of them are gone but I'd try and get someone who goes to CMU to help you post an ad on misc.market. It probably won't do too much since it's summer but, during the school year, a post like that would usually drive plenty of people out over there to raid you as if video games were going out of style.

Otherwise, keep us posted. I can't think of much else that you aren't doing right already. Good luck!

[rywateska]

Well, overall bummer day on Sunday. The asap listings helped out a bit, but not enough. I managed to make a little more so I guess it was worth it. Overall, I was able to pull in $224.10, which is more than I had on Friday night.

Thanks to everyone who helped me out in posting up, I really appreciate the advice and I was sure to use it as best I could this weekend!