Has anyone had success selling your parents' stuff on Ebay or Etsy?

So glad my mom gave me a few things before she and dad moved into a care facility (and then memory care) that had a story attached to them for me. Things can get emotionally ugly with a big dynamic family. When my mother in law passed, I made her silver spoons into Christmas ornaments for her grandkids. She had a painting , that years after her death, I found out who painted it ( a local man) and thanks to technology, I found a family member (grandkid) of the artist who was so happy to have it!

When we had an estate sale, they assured us we had enough to make a profit. Well, we did make a small profit - just barely. We had it on a lovely weekend in early summer, when 10 million other houses (and whole neighborhoods) were having garage sales at the same time. Ended up giving a lot of stuff away, donating to charity, or just hauling it out to the curb for trash pickup.

I tried to get someone to do an Estate sale, but in my neck of the woods, the house would have needed to have been filled with high quality furniture and/or high quality antiques before an Estate sale company would even preview the items.

Be sure to give Estate Sales, Tag Sales and Auctioneers plenty of time...they are usually pretty booked up and can't do things at the last minute. That's what I found when it came time to deal with my father's home. Since I was in from out of state and only had a couple weeks, I discovered all these options were out of the question.

Another idea is to have an estate sale. It's akin to what plzdnr is pointing out.

One other suggestion is to consult with a local auctioneer. They will give you an estimate for what he/she thinks can get, but they charge 35-40%. They also take what many may consider "junk" and if is really is so, you'll only get a few bucks- or cents. Auctioneers have a knack for selling anything, but some things will only go for a quarter. There are auctioneers who deal with higher end stuff and those who deal with just about anything. Go to auctionzip.com to check out their listings, many of which are have photos of upcoming items. An added benefit is the auctioneer will pick up. Some are more reputable than others. Also, a local antique dealer may be interested in some of your items.

Then there's Craigslist. I know there's been some horror stories involving Craigslist, but there's horror stories involving everyplace on the net. The net is no different then the real world...good and bad. Be cautious in both.

Craigslist was a godsend when it came to emptying out my Dad's house...he was a borderline hoarder.. not he worst of them, but pretty bad. My brother had come and taken what he and dad wanted to take with him when he moved and headed off to my Brother's home in Texas. 6 months later, when it was clear Dad would not be able to live by himself anymore, I flew in from out of state and stayed at Dad's for 2 weeks. With the help of my best friend from high school (she lived close), and Craigslist, his house was cleaned out and on the market inside of that time.

We first advertised a few things on Craigslist first week while we were cleaning up the house and making more isles to get ready for a sale. Then we ran a Craigslist adin the Estate sale section that Read:

"HUGE SALE..DAD'S MOVING TO LIVE WITH BROTHER OUT OF STATE AND EVERYTHING MUST GO! 3 floors filled with stuff, boxes of stuff... nothing is priced...just come, dig, make a pile and we'll dicker with ya...and we're very easy to dicker with cause, did I happen to mention EVERYTHING MUST GO!?"

We ran that sale starting on Wednesday of the 2nd week and a crowd formed outside the door in the morning and they never stopped coming. "On Saturday we changed to ad to read EVERYTHING HALF OFF what you dicker it down to". On Sunday the ad said.."EVERYTHING FREE, All we ask is that you grab any black trash bag you see that's tied and toss it into the dumpster." Many of those great folks who had already been there came back, and not necessarily to get free stuff, but just to help us carry bags of trash up from the basement and down fromt upstairs and toss them into the dumpster. It was enough to make me cry...

There was even an ad in the Estate Sale section of Craigslist after the first day about how great our sale was and how we "two little ladies" were so friendly and that everyone should check it out as we had a big job ahead of us and could use all the help we could get.

After the weekend we had a Realtor come out and put the home on the market and my girlfriend and I bought a bottle of wine and celebrated! It had been hectic but we'd had fun, Dad's old house was taken care of and the money made was enough to pay my expenses for the two weeks and for my the plane ticket, cover dumpster rental (we got the largest they had and filled it to the brim) pay my girlfriend (she hadn't asked for anything but she earned every penny and more) and give dad a bit of gambling money. We probably sold some thing cheaper then they were worth, but considering most of it was really not worth anything, we were thrilled with how it all turned out! And all thanks to Craigslist and a single sign in the yard. A daunting task became manageable...we most likely would have had to pay someone to clean it all up and cart stuff off, on top of the dumpster and my expenses. It was certainly a Win for everyone involved!

So don't overlook Craigslist, is all I'm saying...

When my dear grandmother passed on, she had a LOT of antiques. This was pre-internet. My parents, also, wanted to just get rid of everything. They sold everything to an antiques dealer for what I am sure was peanuts, if they had researched stuff and held onto some of it, they would have gotten $$$$. But no, 'get it over with' was their thinking. Kicked themselves later, of course. But that was before eBay, where they could at least have gotten an idea of how much things were worth. (Note: I did recently sell my mom's old sewing machine, her ancient refrigerator, and some vintage clothing on eBay. These days, anything dear to the heart of the baby boomer, even unlikely things like an old metal fan, old lamps, embroidered linens, aprons, aluminum tumblers, can bring in some money. Anything marked 'made in the USA'. New, cheaper made-in-China junk? Not so much.)

Such a sore subject! We had an antiques dealer stop in to give us a free estimate of whatever valuables my mother had. Every family seems to have something worth at least a couple hundred dollars. But you know, it was just ME (and a brother who came up for a weekend) to dispose of everything. It was boiling hot, I'm over 60, I was worn out, I just wanted it all DONE AND OVER. We had an estate sale which made very little, but those few antiques did bring in a bit. The rest, I donated to charity, gave away, or threw away and I don't want to go back and think about "I-shoulda-coulda-woulda" - all water under the bridge.

You can also open a store on Etsy and sell everything as a lot. I think it costs ten cents per listing---you can group a bunch of jewelry or similar items to sell together and list it for under $1.00. Some people will purchase stuff in lots.
You would be surprised at what sells. I love vintage things. Some people even collect old handwritten letters and photographs.

For instance I'm trying to sell a child's tea set that I got from my mom. I believe it belonged to my grandmother when she was a little girl. The transfer ware on it is a little boy with a bear, and it says Buddy Tucker. So I researched Buddy Tucker on the net, found out he was a character in the old Buster Brown comic strip, and learned about his creator, who is considered one of the early pioneers of the comic strip, fore runner to comic books. All this information went into my description of the auction.

I also searched Ebay for Buddy Tucker and found a cup/saucer from this set had sold for 25.00 awhile back. So I started my auction at that price...though I'm selling a Tea Pot and 5 Cups on Saucers. Anything I make will be above and beyond what I have now and I'll find a good home for this nice antique (1905) tea set. So the internet can be a big help for info and Ebay can be a BIG help for both info and for selling items quickly.

You can search for what you're thinking of selling on Ebay. Say you have an old duck decoy that your father treasured and you remember being around for all your life. Search vintage duck decoy and once there, scroll half way down the page till in the far left column you get a choice to sort by and choose "sold" items (that would be sold duck decoys since that was your search). Then on the sold page, above the right of the auctions you'll find a drop down menu that allows you to sort by the most recent, the latest, what sold for the least amount, what sold for the highest... I like to see what sold for the highest...and the lowest and then try to judge how the item I'm trying to sell fits into all this. It's a lot of research, but it's fun and you learn while doing it... That coin was worth a lot of money...the Mexican bird feather pics not so much I'm sure they found out. Checking what's sold on Ebay and what it sold for is a valuable tool if you've got the time to use it.

The one guy who picked up a LOT of my late Mother's items in Massachusetts didn't make us lift ANYTHING! He got free items for his store at the beach and he was a real Godsend!

Some charity groups want you to bring the items up from the basement or down from the upstairs before they will pick up... some want the items in front of the house for pickups.

Oh dear, I can just see two 70 year olds trying to carry a triple dresser down a flight of stairs. All our friends are in our age group, so gone are the days where one can bribe someone to help with pizza and beer :P

I was able to give away my Dad's tools to a handy man who helps around my office building. I had hired him to do some odd jobs around my parent's house and around my house. When he saw the tools my Dad had, he worked out a win-win deal... the tools would be payment for the work he is doing. Glad those items will be going to a good home :)

I recall that one of the charity organizations will not move large objects out of the basement so I would check if you are storing furniture or heavy objects in the basement. I'm surprised at how long Goodwill is taking to pickup. I donated some furniture once and they picked it up within two weeks. I guess it depends on the region.

I checked the Goodwill website in my area and they will do pickups... only thing is that you need to give them 2 months advanced notice. That's fine and dandy if you can plan that far ahead, but with elders, the next day could be a life changing moment.

Also, search places that accept and have second hand furniture stores in your various locations. They may and sometimes do (as in our case) come to your home for pickup. I did share some of my late mother's possessions with dear friends. She lived in Massachusetts. I live in Maryland, so we could not haul an entire household worth of possessions home in one vehicle.

I routinely donate to Sarah's House, an organization run by the Catholic Charities that houses people, including families who are down on their luck. It is situated on Fort Meade, Maryland. They take virtually anything and everything, including food. I have witnessed firsthand the benefits of charitable contributions when one time, upon putting a box of food on the floor, a young boy with his father came in. The young boy said "Daddy, can I have one of those jellos?" Really rewarding, not to mention a tax donation!

Jessie, you are correct, it had to do with the Salvation Army insurance... apparently moving large objects around a corner on the stairs is a bit tricky.... which makes sense. It's like why on earth did my parents put a large cedar closet upstairs instead of in the walk-out basement. Plus a large very heavy futon type of sofa that got rarely used over the past 50 years :P

Anyway, I found on-line a local group called 123Junk that will take items to be donated on my behalf, plus haul anyway junk... so I will give them a call.

If you are in a higher tax bracket it may pay to donate. Be sure to itemize on a list and appraise your items. You can use recent sales online as appraisal or there are ranges of values of common items available online. I had beautiful furniture I ended up donating. One was a 28 year old solid oak breakfront with beveled glass doors, mirrored back and built in lights. To buy today would easily cost $2000 or more, but I couldn't get $300 for it, so now I will give it a $950 value and probably end up with more than the $300 I tried to sell it for.

I live on a funky little street that is only one mile long and we have a pretty active home owners association. I just got a flyer announcing the annual street wide garage sale. I've never participated in this in the past as I abhor conducting garage sales but this thread has got me thinking about needing to really start doing something will all the stuff I've accumulated in the seven years I've been here - both mine and my parents. If I price things low enough...? As for the reply that mentioned a possible run up on the price of silver - all mom's silverware and other sterling things - it's been sitting in my basement storage room for almost six years now - another year won't hurt.

Rats. If you had known that, ff, you could have paid someone to bring the upstairs things down before they got there. Maybe they will come back if you get the things brought down. If it's not one thing, it's another. It must have something to do with the difficulty and their insurance.

Just had the Salvation Army out to take the rest of my parents furniture.... but unfortunately the fellows aren't allowed to carry furniture down from the second floor if the stairs are U shape. Oh dear. Anyway, they did take the dining room set and numerous pieces of furniture that we placed out in the garage back when the carpets were cleaned.

Now onto Plan B, C, and probably D. I know I could call in the 1800Junk vendors but the furniture upstairs is too good to trash :(

Amy, that is a wonderful idea. I once read that one person took books from the library of his father, who had passed, and asked guests at his memorial service to take a book from his father's library in memory of his Dad. I guess you can use that idea to dispose of other sentimental or meaningful items.

E-bay was such a great idea when if first started. With shipping rates so high, sometimes it cost more to ship than the actual cost of an item, its put a big dent in the "home" sellers market and has put me off using it or buying through it.

Mom had a large collection of ceramic elephants (nothing very expensive) but many very cute. My sister, niece and I each took one and several "junk" ones I gave to the charity shop. The rest I took to Mom's memorial lunch. I set them out on a table and invited guests to take one in memory of Mom. After that I only had a couple of pieces left which went to the charity shop.

Avon items are generally not considered vintage. Supply and demand is really the answer. The antique dealer I dealt with just had so much glassware that wasn't moving in her shop. That's just one example. She couldn't take any more because she was just swamped with the stuff!

In case you have not heard, silver is poised for a dramatic run-up in price in the
commodities market. You might be wise to hold on to all sterling silver items for
a year or so to take advantage of this predicted opportunity to make some good money.

There was so much Avon stuff made. Everyone bought it and saved it, thinking one day it would be worth something. The market is swamped with it. A lot of people are surprised to learn that you can't even give most of it away.

My mother was an "Avon Lady" for a couple of decades. When she died, I took all her Avon stuff and intended to sell it on EBay. Well, I'm sure you know the results. It was WAY not worth the time or the trouble for what I would have made. A friend at work recommended a local auction house, I made some money, but not the near-fortune I had envisioned. And please be careful on Craig's list- there is a lot of fraud , thievery and unsavory people fishing for victims on there.