It appears that once again I’m playing catch-up, having to report the results from two weeks to be caught up with this years Challenge. This report will cover both week 20 and week 21.

The number of garage sales in Grand Forks the last few weeks has declined significantly resulting in a decreased number of listings. This smaller number of items found has also led to smaller dollar amounts in sales.

Because of this, last Saturday I chose to get up early and drive to Barnesville, Minnesota for their annual City Wide Garage Sale Extravaganza. It will likely turn out to be a good decision. I went to 54 garage sales in Barnesville. Those sales resulted in 40 new items that are currently listed on eBay.

If I had stayed in Grand Forks I would have gone to 14 fresh sales on Saturday. While it’s impossible to know what I might have bought, no regulars that I’ve talked to reported buying anything of any significance, so it’s unlikely I would have either.

All that said, here’s how things look at the end of week 20. You will notice that my mileage expense for last week was up significantly. That is due to the 220 mile round trip I made to Barnesville.

There are forty-one qualifying items listed on eBay this week. One is a re-list two people have asked me to list again. The other forty are all new items, most of which were purchased in Barnesville on Saturday. Here’s what they are:

• Audubon Society Birds Of North America videos - a re-list
• 2 vintage opaque lamp shades - paid $.50
• 5 Taste Of Home Recipe Annuals - paid $3.75
• Nyal Lullit aspirin tin - paid $3.00
• 7 California Raisin figures - paid $1.75
• Mark Of The Lion 3 volume set books - paid $1.50
• Newpointe 911 5 volume set books - paid $2.50
• 290 plastic canvas patterns in 3 ring binder - paid $5.00
• 88 plastic canvas magazines - paid $2.00
• 22 Decorative Crochet magazines - paid $5.50
• 1975 Reader’s Digest songbook - paid $1.00
• Neilsville Minnesota Centennial Book - paid $1.00
• 12 volume set 1949 Childcraft books - paid $20.00
• 15 Heritage Press books (each listed individually) - paid $40.00
• Tales Told In Holland - paid $1.00
• Little Pictures From Japan - paid $1.00
• Nursery Friends From France - paid $1.00
• Plastic canvas fashion doll living room furniture booklet - paid $.10
• Sunbonnet Sue All Through The Year - paid $.50
• Make A Quilt In A Day Log Cabin Pattern book - paid $.50
• Set of Royal Albert flower of the month cups and saucers - paid $20.00
• Aladdin alacite lamp - paid $1.00
• Creative Knitting Magazines - paid $2.50
• Knit ‘N Style magazines - paid $1.25
• Knitter’s magazines - paid $2.25
• Interweave Knits magazine - paid $.25

In addition, I purchased the following books for Amazon during the last week.

• Foundations For Healing – Paperback - paid $.50
• Foundations For Healing – hardcover - paid $.50
• Detoxification - paid $.25
• Occupation: Nazi Hunter - paid $.25
• Women’s Health - paid $.50
• Rapid Interpretation Of EKG’s - paid $.50
• Doyle Brunson’s Super System: A Course In Power Poker - paid $1.00
• Kids (cookbook) - paid $.50
• The Image Of God – Gender Models In Judaeo-Christian Tradition - paid $1.00
• Basic Infection Control For Health Care Providers - paid $.50
• Marketing And Selling Your Homemade Jewelry - paid $.50

I am really behind in updating so I’m updating for 5 weeks this time.  Our sales have all been on Amazon as we just haven’t been finding much to list on eBay.  I do have some lots of books and some china to list this weekend; but outside of that, everything to the end of the Challenge will probably be Amazon sales.

 We wish everyone the best as we wrap up the 2008 Garage Sale Challenge.  Larry and Kathy

Hey everyone

Due to my hospital stay I didn’t list anything until just recently. Although I did have a few sales from my ebay store, they were not challange related and don’t count. I will post new stats next week.  The challange is almost over, but I hope Gary does this again next year. I didn’t do very well with this challange, but I have learned so much and would like the opportunity to try again.  I will definately do somethings differently!

Hope everyone has a great week!

Rita

Once again a variety of things happened over the last two weeks and the results for week 18 of the 2008 Garage Sale Challenge never got posted. This leads to another catch-up post including both week 18 and week 19 which just ended.

The seventeenth week of the Challenge saw an upswing in the number of garage sales in Grand Forks (probably due to summer winding down) which resulted in a dramatic increase in purchases and the number of listings for week 18. I had 42 qualifying items listed and they resulted in sales of $914.03. In addition, Amazon also did quite well bringing in $273.19 in book sales.

There were very few garages sales during week 18 because of the long Labor Day weekend and people wanting to get out of town. I did have a fair amount of luck at the thrift stores however, and between the thrift stores and a few garage sales I picked up 20 qualifying items that ended Sunday evening. Seventeen of the twenty items sold bringing in $451.78. Amazon sales for the week were a dismal $55.46. This was a result of my having to be gone most of the week and having to put Amazon on vacation for the majority of the week.

The figures for both weeks are shown below.

Although there were, once again, quite a few garage sales in town last week, I was gone for most of them so most of the items listed this week came from one auction sale I was able to attend. Between my auction purchases and a few thrift store finds there are currently 22 qualifying items listed this week on eBay. These won’t actually be live until later tonight, but here’s what they are:

• Seven 1930s Cosmopolitan magazines listed individually - I paid $2.00 each
• A 1953 Tournament of Roses Program - I paid $1.00 for this
• 1952 Tournament of Roses Review - I paid $1.00 for this
• A 1942 Delta Gamma song book - I paid $.25 for this
• October 1926 Kappa Sigma magazine - I paid $.25 for this
• 1922 University Of Illinois yearbook - I paid $2.00 for this
• 1919 Sterling Homes kit catalog - This was inside the 1922 yearbook - no cost
• Understanding the Human Body DVD set - I paid $5.00 for this
• 2 different Nyal aspirin tins - these were part of a group of 7 aspirin tins I paid a total of $2.00 for
• Velvetina face powder box - I paid $2.00 for this
• A Rosemeade mouse figurine - I paid $.25 for this
• World Of Warcraft strategy guide - I paid $.50 for this
• Boxed set of The Chronicles Of Narnia - I paid $5.00 for this (likely too much)
• Betty Crocker Dinner For Two cook book - I paid $.50
• 125 issues of The Civil War Times Illustrated - I paid $12.50 for these

In addition I bought the following books that were put on Amazon:

• Physiology Of Behavior - I paid $2.00
• Children Moving - I paid $2.00
• Geosystems - I paid $.50
• World Politics In The 21st Century - I paid $2.00

One of my best sales from the challenge is “Bill the Cat.”  I bought him for $.99 at the thrift store and sold him for $99.99 out of my store.  Recent auctions for this plush have ranged from $30 to $67.   You can learn all about him if you type in his name in a Wikepedia search.  I think mine sold for higher than average because he is wearing the “For President” ribbon.

The auctions for items purchased during the sixteenth week of the 2008 Garage Sale Challenge ended Sunday evening with 29 of the original 65 items listed selling for a total of $422.69 and a sell-through rate of only 45%. Book sales on Amazon were productive this week with 17 books selling for a total of $492.56. This was due, in part, to the many books I purchased last week and the fact that several of the textbooks have already sold.

The low sell-through rate of only 45% was expected due to the number of pieces of railroad ephemera I had listed. Normally I would have put them directly into my eBay store, but decided to run them all through the auction format one time to see what happened. I was a little surprised at what a few of those that sold brought. One piece, going for $26.00 covered my cost for all of it, making the remainder all profit.

There were no auctions that really stood out this week so we’ll just take a look at how things stand after seventeen weeks.

This week there are 42 qualifying items on eBay consisting of ten items that didn’t sell previously and are being re-listed and thirty-two fresh items purchased at garage sales last week. Due the the three-day Labor Day weekend, these auctions will run from Monday to Monday rather than my normal Sunday to Sunday schedule. Here’s what they are and what I paid for each:

• 1955 Phi Alpha Delta Law fraternity directory - a re-list
• Enesco creamer, sugar, salt and pepper set - a re-list
• Sharples Cream Separator advertising song book - a re-list
• 1940 Fifth Avenue Modes woman’s modes fashion catalog - a re-list
• 1940 Summer Berth Roberts fashion catalog - a re-list
• 1940 Spring Berth Roberts fashion catalog - a re-list
• July 1940 Berth Roberts fashion catalog - a re-list
• 1964 CAPP-Home house plan catalog - a re-list
• 1961 National Plan Service house plan catalog - a re-list
• Woodsmith magazine vol. 17 - a re-list
• Set of 9 Little House On The Prairie books - paid $2.50
• Creating Radiant Flowers In Colored Pencil book - paid $.25
• Teaching Center Great Courses World War II History 1-3 - paid $10.00
• Teaching Center Great Courses Chemistry 1-3 - paid $10.00
• 1997 Cook’s Illustrated annual - paid $1.00
• 2000 Cook’s Illustrated annual - paid $1.00
• Anchor Hocking Patio Snack set - paid $2.00
• 12 Magic Crochet magazines - paid $1.20
• The Mage Winds Trilogy - paid $.75
• The House Of Windsor series 27 books - paid $6.75
• Red River Of The North Series - paid $.60
• The Mitford Years boxed set - paid $.40
• 10 Cornerstones Of Freedom books - paid $1.00
• 7 Terry Johnstone paperback westerns - paid $1.75
• 8 Ralph Compton paperback westerns - paid $2.00
• 14 William Johnstone paperback westerns - paid $3.50
• 25 Help Me Be Good books - paid $2.50
• P. Buckley Moss Atlanta print - paid $5.00
• P. Buckley Moss Joyful Gathering print - paid $10.00
• Mega Bloks Harley Davidson set - paid $3.00
• Mega Bloks space shuttle set - paid $3.00
• A.C. Gilbert Polar Club electric hair dryer - paid $5.00
• Leaf TV lamp - paid $.50
• Aladdin Lincoln Drape lamp bowl - paid $5.00
• Texas Instrument TI-83 Plus calculator - paid $1.00
• 3 Johnny Hart BC books - paid $.30
• 19 Mad magazine books - paid $1.90
• Big Game In North Dakota book - paid $.50
• Audubon Society Birds Of North America VHS set - paid $2.50
• 10 issues The Raven magazine - paid $1.00
• Alice In Bibleland 28 book set - paid $7.00
• Supernatural - The Complete 1st Season - paid $2.00

In addition, I purchased the following books and placed them on Amazon.

• Tomi – A Childhood Under The Nazis - paid $.50
• Instrument Commercial Manual - paid $3.00
• Students Who Drive You Crazy - paid $.25
• Theories Of Human Development - paid $.50
• An Introduction To Theories Of Personalities - paid $.50
• Gems Of The & Color Rays - paid $.25
• Cognition – Theory And Application - paid $1.00
• Culinaria Italy - paid $1.00
• Offenbach – The Tales Of Hoffmann CD set - paid $1.00
• How To Run A Theater - paid $.50
• Reading The Bible From The Margins - paid $.25
• The Dialogic Imagination - paid $.50
• The Lesbian And Gay Studies Reader - paid $.50
• Queer Space – Architecture and Same Sex Drive - paid $.50
• My Name Is Mr. Ryan - paid $.10
• The Horse In Blackfoot Indian Culture - paid $.10
• On Understanding Japanese Religion - paid $.10
• Management Of Organizational Behavior - paid $.10
• Social Psychology - paid $.10
• Compensation Management In A Knowledge-Based World - paid $.10
• Human Resource Management (I bought 2 of these) - paid $.20
• Secret Origins Of The Bible - paid $.10
• The Bedford Companion To Shakespeare - paid $.25
• Haynes Mercedes Benz Diesel 123 Series Repair Manual - paid $.50
• Haynes Saab 99 Repair Manual - paid $.50
• Race And Manifest Destiny - paid $.50
• Germany In Central America - paid $.25

Good morning

I spent the past few days pondering all the ebay changes that have been coming our way and as usual, just in time for the holiday selling season, everyone wants to make sure they get their piece of the pie, just wish they would leave some for me! I was angry at first, went in and deleted my “about me” page and thought “enough is enough”! I spent a lot of time on line trying to find another selling venue that might suit my needs, but nothing really reached out and grabbed me.I don’t sell a lot of books or items that might work on Amazon, seems like Yahoo and MSN auctions are no longer with us, have looked at a few others, but lets face it, ebay is the place to sell, at least for me at the present time. I will “bite the bullet” once again until I can hopefully get rid of all of some of this inventory I have in the basement. I haven’t been buying for the challange, but did pick up a few things for my personal collections. I’m going to sort through a lot of boxes and what can’t be put on e