Thursday, June 26, 2014

Storage unit crap

It’s been several years since I bought my first and only storage unit.  It was huge and full of crap. On Saturday, I bought another unit.  It was smaller, and, unfortunately, full of crap.

To be fair, it looked like crap from the outside, but it did have two nice looking portable display cases, the kind that you see at estate sales in which the proprietors display their jewelry. Other than that, there were boxes, and two wooden end tables without their glass tops.

There was no “wow factor” that I could see.

However, I surprised Ella, and myself, actually, by bidding and winning at $80.  The fact that it started to rain just as the auctioneer said sold should have been my first clue that it was a waste of money.  After paying our bill, we braved the sprinkles to check out the contents.  Much to my display, it seemed to be mostly Christmas decorations.  By then, the sky had opened up, so we decided to clean it out on Sunday.

Late Sunday afternoon, I decided that we had procrastinated long enough, so we made the short drive to the storage unit and got to work.    We performed triage on the unit, with one pile for stuff to keep, one pile for stuff to trash, and one pile for stuff to donate.  Thankfully, the trash pile stayed relatively small, but the donate pile kept getting bigger and bigger and bigger.  The keep pile wasn’t as big as I would have wanted, but it made for easy storage, and we just walked the stuff around the corner to our actual storage unit for which we pay monthly.

Beside the two display cases, we kept some camping gear (lanterns, flashlights, cook stove, etc.); some vintage Christmas crap for our antique booth; and assorted odds and ends that Ella deemed worthy. 

We then loaded the rest of the stuff in the truck; donation crap went in first, followed by the real crap. I then found a dumpster to offload the real crap, then dropped the donation crap at Goodwill.  Since it was after 6 p.m., I just put it out beside their donation door.

The two tables without their glass went to the curb in front of our house.  Even though the tables were rained on for two days, some kind crafty type person finally picked them up.

The whole process, from digging through the small unit, to disposing of the trash and donations, took approximately three hours in the late afternoon sun.  Thankfully, there were no surprises, other than the leather satchel that contained medical items, including a broken stethoscope, and assorted blood collection vials.  I was glad that I had put on my gloves before pawing through that bag.

Was it worth the effort?  Probably not, although the two display cases are nice.  The vintage Christmas ornaments might bring a little in our antique booth, and the camping items probably will just sit until I find a way use them (I’ve only been camping once in my life).  

While loading and unloading the truck in the heat, I remembered why I don’t buy storage units very often.  It ain’t like they show it on TV.

Elsewhere in the land of Barry’s Books, I’ve made a concerted effort to declutter the house.  I started by sending six boxes of toys to Amazon (FBA) this week.  I am also donating five totes of religious books to the hospice thrift store today.  The books were part of the pastor’s library that I purchased, and, while truly nice, aren’t worth much more than a penny each on the Amazon marketplace.  I kept trying to figure out some return on investment for them, but decided that I was tired of bumping into the totes.  So, off they go.

I also made good on my promise last week of not thrifting on Saturday, and have been determined to follow suit this weekend.  Unfortunately, a plethora of sales, including several church and estate sales, are tempting me to fall off the proverbial wagon.

It's hard to be strong when there are bargains to be had.

Have a great and productive weekend everyone.

11 comments:

  1. I have almost 100 lbs from a recent trip to the GO and I purchased the leftovers from a yard sale, totally filled the bed of our Toyota pick up. So what did I do yesterday when I went to the Scrap Exchange to get packing peanuts? Yep, went to the thrift store. It's not my fault. The truck just headed that way "automatically". I feel your pain!!

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    1. Thanks for the empathy. I also like to buy "leftovers," as well as large lots. My storage options are dwindling, though, and I am determined to bring order to the chaos just to keep my sanity.

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  2. It seems like a lot of us are dumping our unsellables one way or another. I just added two more bags to my fail pile and called to reserve a spot at an outdoor flea market. They offer free spots on the first Saturday of each month, but you have to reserve and they get taken quickly. They'll call next week to confirm and let me know my spot number. I hope it doesn't rain, but it probably will. That was great that you donated those religious books to the hospice thrift store. A win/win for sure!

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    1. The hospice thrift store is my new favorite. It's clean and well run. They get all my good stuff. Goodwill gets the junk.

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  3. bummer on the locker. It is tons of work but we usually do ok (we only buy them in the winter :D ) I just jumped in and send 15 boxes to Amazon FBA! I LOVE the sales and no shipping. I just bought about 6 more boxes worth of stuff for FBA (Target is having their semi annual toys and babies clearance)

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    1. I've dabbled in retail arbitrage, but lately can't seem to find items at enough of a bargain to make it worthwhile. For example, K-Mart often puts their clearance toys at 50 percent off, but even at that discount, there's not enough meat on the bone, so to speak, to make it worth my while buy/flip it.

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    2. I haven't been happy with my profit margins but I figure as long as I'm not losing its an easy place to start. I did notice how much Amazon prices tend to fluctuate.

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  4. I've watched the show but never bought a storage unit. I'm worried I will end up with too much junk to dispose of!

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  5. Sorry to hear it was a bust. Like Grace, I usually get one in late fall to help with winter inventory. I hope you guys do well with what you've decided to sell. Also, in case you hadn't heard, I'm not Cray Cray for eBay anymore. The new blog name is Garage Sale Heaven and the url is http://garagesaleheaven.blogspot.com/

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  6. Thanks for sharing this. Watching Storage Wars makes it tempting to give storage auctions a try; but after reading your post, it doesn't sound too exciting. Church and estate sales are my favorites. I don't know that I would be able to pass them up, thinking of all the great stuff they probably have. Hope you do well with all your sales!

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  7. It's fun to dig through the units, provided it's not 100 degrees outside. Getting rid of the trash and junk is the hard part.

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