Lorraine Picket was 78 when she sold her house in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, and she was certain the things inside were worth $40,000. The estate sale ran three days. The check was $6,212.
“Nobody wants your stuff,” says Margaret Ashford, who says she spent 30 years walking into living rooms and watched this play out in close to 300 homes, most belonging to people over 60.
The Most Expensive Thing Lorraine Owned Was Sitting In A 10×10 Storage Unit
It was not the dining set, the good dishes or the piano. For 11 years Lorraine had kept her late husband’s workshop things and the furniture from her mother’s house in a unit across town, because nobody was ready to decide.
Margaret says a 10×10 unit averaged about $119 a month nationally this past September. Eleven years at that rate is more than $15,000, which is more than twice her entire estate sale check.
When the door finally rolled up, nobody in the family wanted what was inside. Her son found his father’s old level and a box of his own baseball cards, and everything else went to a building materials resale shop or the landfill. “A unit feels like a pause button,” Margaret says. It lets you move without deciding, but every month the bill makes deciding harder.
A $5 Shoe Box Behind The Vacuum Beat The China And Crystal Put Together
In Lorraine’s hall closet sat a battered shoe box the sale crew had priced at $5. Margaret asked them to take the sticker off. Inside was her mother’s sterling silver flatware wrapped in a tea towel.
Sterling is 92.5% silver and can be sold by weight at that day’s metal price, she says, and buyers often pay 60% to 80% of the metal’s value. That box brought in more than the china and crystal combined.
Her tip: look for the word “sterling” or the number 925 on the back of every spoon. Silver plate is not the same thing.
“Not One Offer” On Mom’s Encyclopedia Set
Margaret says encyclopedia sets from the 1960s onward usually have low resale value unless complete, and they are heavy to ship. She tells of Mike in Rochester, Minnesota, who spent two weekends listing his mother’s set and got no offers, then found the library did not need it either.
Before anything leaves, she suggests opening every volume and shaking it. She says she has found pressed flowers, report cards, a ration book and a letter from a soldier folded inside the letter W.
Framed Prints And Collector Plates Have Fallen Hard
Ordinary decorative framed art goes for around $20 to $40, Margaret says, so the frame often cost more than the picture. Turn it over and check the bottom margin for a pencil signature with a fraction like 12 over 200, which can mean a real work on paper. Otherwise, put a family photo in the frame.
Collectibles have softened too. She says an auction house reported a Hummel Umbrella Girl averaged $700 to $800 in 2000 and about $100 by 2015. Single collector plates can go for as little as $1, and a full box set of 12 may bring a little over $100.
For a curio cabinet, she tells families to have each person choose one piece they remember and photograph the whole shelf before anything moves.
A Mink Coat That “Costs More Than My First Car” May Bring $300 To $750
Helen in Asheville, North Carolina, had her mother’s full-length mink, and said it cost more than her first car. One resale guide, Margaret says, puts the average used mink at about $300 to $750.
A furrier can remake a coat into a collar, vest or pillows for grandchildren, and charity shops can use furs. Formal dresses may find a home with a community theater or a high school drama department.
Treadmills, Pianos And Good China Are Moving Problems More Than Selling Problems
- A fitness reviewer’s rule of thumb is that used equipment sells for about 55% of the price of a new machine. Frank in Tucson listed his treadmill for a month, and the only messages asked if he would deliver it. His rowing machine went to his grandson’s high school team.
- Moving a piano typically costs around $400, so many people will not take one even free. Bev in Toledo had a technician check hers, then offered to share the moving cost with her old elementary school, where it now stands in the lobby with a brass plate bearing her parents’ names.
- One consumer guide puts most china at $5 to $20 a plate. A Lenox poppies on blue dinner plate is listed at $119.95 at a replacement service, but those services pay less than their list price.
Her advice on china is warm: use it on a Tuesday for scrambled eggs, and if your daughter does not want twelve place settings, ask if she’d take four.
What People Still Pay For And How To Protect Yourself
Estate sale companies usually keep 30% to 50% of what a sale brings in, she says. The items that sell best are artwork, fine jewelry and watches, quality or vintage instruments, good tools, designer clothing, sterling and mid-century furniture.
She also advises having valuables looked at by someone who does not plan to buy them, and paying by the hour or the piece, “never as a share of what it sells for.”
If you already have a storage unit, put a date on it and go with a family member. Open every box once and sort on the spot into four piles: sell, give to family, donate, let go. Do not carry a box home to sort later.
Lorraine told Margaret she would have started two years earlier. Her suggestion for anyone with years before a move: let go of three to five things a week. “Five things a week is 260 things a year, and not one of them needs a buyer.”
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