Out with the Old

We have reached a point in the moving process where I feel like we are as good as it is going to get without spending any cash.  Yes, I hate the bright red futon we're using as a couch in the living room - but unless a free couch drops out of the sky, it'll do until we can save up some dough.  The boyfriend and I have been working very hard at paring down our belongings even further than we did before everything went into storage.  Basically, unless it has a use to us right now - it's out the door.  When you rent, I think it is easy to get into the habit of saving furniture pieces that you like even if they don't work well in your current house - because they might work well in the next one.  But I'm over that.  Most of our pieces are free or thrifted - so there's no real reason to hang on to them like they're family heirlooms.  Plus - one of the only joys of moving is the chance to redecorate.  Right?

We had a garage sale a couple of weekends ago to clean out the garage.  The boyfriend is very excited about turning the garage into a "golf room" so its main function can't be storage.  I am happy to report we did really well - $250 in a couple of hours.  We actually didn't sell most of the extra furniture we had out.  Instead, most of the profit was made selling clothes for a quarter a piece - go figure.

Without the big pieces selling, I decided to relist two pieces I had put on Craigslist before the move but hadn't found buyers for.  The first was an Ikea wardrobe we had used for my son's clothes at the last (closet-less) place.  The boyfriend had gotten it for free from his work and it was in great condition for a used Ikea piece.




Ours was birch.


Since the new one sells for $99.99 at the store, I listed it for $50.  The other piece I listed was the Land of Nod bed I scored for free off of Craigslist last year.  I loved the bed, but because we downsized to a two bedroom house, we don't have a place for it anymore.  I put $100 on it.

Surprisingly, both items sold within a few hours for full asking price!  That's my ideal situation - getting something for free, getting my use out of it, and then selling it for a profit.  I wish I could do that every time.

I am very tempted to start selling a few clothes on Ebay.  I follow a great blog called My Dear Trash which is very inspiring.  Although I've bought lots of things off of Ebay, I've never used it to sell so I'm a little worried about the fees and shipping costs.