Yard Sale Tips and Ideas

Yard sales that are interrupted by snow, wind or rain are often held on a porch, in a garage or in a basement so you could often also see porch sales, garage sales or basement sales going on during other times of the year when yard sales are not often going on.

What To Sell
Walking through your house you can pick out things that are not useful any longer.  For example, if you have three hair dryers, two toasters, four coffee pots, four pairs of snow pants and five unopened gallons of paint, you can use these items in your yard sale. You can also put the extra pots and pans, pictures, posters, roller skates, tools and other household items in the yard sale.

Often clothing is not going to be a big seller unless you are located in the middle of town so you will need other items that will help you pull in a few bucks at the same time.  Walking around your home, if you find that you haven’t used something or worn something in over two years, you don’t need it and it should be in the yard sale.

Courtesy to Visitors
When you have people that are stopping by at your yard sale it is custom that you be nice and courteous.  You don’t want to have your kids running all over the yard, you won’t want your dog out in the yard pestering buyers, and you your set up to be easy to look at so that buyers can search for items that they need or want without having to dig through boxes of ‘stuff’.

Having Change on Hand
Setting up for your yard sale is a chore that can take a few hours.  Yard sales often start early in the morning so you will need to go to the bank or store and get some change for your yard sale.  If you have lots of items that will be 25 cents or 50 cents, you will need to keep lots of quarters on hand.  If you have many items that are $1 you will need to keep lots of $1 bills on hand for change.  Having about $40 in change should get you through your day easily.

Bags and Packaging
You will have customers that are going to purchase just one item but want a bag or a box.  You also will have customers at your yard sale that are going to buy sixteen things and need a box or bag to get their items home.  Having assorted boxes and bags available for these needs are going to help your yard sale customers feel much better about their purchase from your sale. 

You can save up bags from the grocery store, get boxes from your local grocery store often for free, or you can check around your house and find bags and boxes that are not being used.  Often a collection of bags from your shopping excursions will provide enough for your entire day.  Ask friends, family and neighbors if you can have a few bags if they are known to save them, having extra is always better than running out.

Planning a Yard Sale
Planning for a yard sale will take a few weeks.  The first few weeks you are going to go through your home – from top to bottom and find all the ‘stuff’ that you want to sell. You should go through the entire house, putting things in the yard sale pile, and then after you have been through the house, wait a few days and go back and do it again.  Even on the second trip through you are going to find more stuff that you realize you don’t need to hold on to and can get rid of.

Plan on having enough blankets or tables to hold all of your items that are for sale.  Gathering up the tables ahead of time will make everything much easier later.  You are also going to need some type of cash box so that you can keep your change all in one place.

If you are going to have a yard sale with another person you also need to have stickers with your names and prices so that you can split up who sold what later.  A notebook with a pen will be needed to track who has sold what during the yard sale as well.

Best Advertising
Advertising in small town newspapers will get your yard sale noticed.  If you are having a sale on Friday and Saturday, you need to advertise Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday in order to get the number of people that you want at your yard sale.  Most often yard sales are held on Friday and Saturday. 

Signs put on the corners of the block where you live and in places around town where the traffic is highest on the days of your yard sale will also pull buyers to your yard sale.  Advertising in the newspapers and putting signs up around your neighborhood your customers will come to your sale. 

Price Matters
The purpose have having a yard sale is to clean out your home for the stuff that you don’t use, need or want, while making a few bucks for your pocket as well.  When putting price stickers on items be sure to keep prices low so people will opt to buying them.  If you are having problems selling anything during the first few hours of your yard sale, be sure to go back and remark your items as a lower price so your customers will start buying!