Archive - 2013

It’s SUMMER!

Kids are out of school and home for three months.

No homework. No set time to wake up. No-thing productive for them to do for three long, long, l-o-n-g months.

If your kids are not into sports, dance, or take any type of class, what do you do to keep them off the couch playing video games all day?

Buy a storage unit online as a family!

Think about it. You want your kids to LEARN the value of a DOLLAR.

But you can’t seem to squeeze that information into their heads.

They have to experience it!

Your children are too young to legally work so they expect hand-outs. Lemon-aid stands are a thing of the past. Time to get those young ones to understand hard work without letting them know they are working.

Get everyone involved, each child including the parents. The whole family can surf through VirtualStorageAuction.com for a storage unit together.

Find a storage unit everyone likes and one you can afford. Bid. Win.

Go as a family to CLEAN OUT that locker. That’s right. Give every child a broom or dustpan and as a family clean the unit. Everyone helps load the merchandise onto a truck. Kids can do the small stuff.

Bring the stuff home and get everyone involved in sorting through the merchandise.

So, what’s in it for the kids?

A share in the profits. Don’t grimace. This isn’t about a side business or a supplement to your income. This is about teaching your children the process of work and reward.

Now it’s possible and probable your kids might find items inside that locker they want to keep for themselves. You may allow each of them to keep “one” item. The rest of the merchandise is up for sale.

Host a YARD SALE!

Each child, under supervision of course, must help with the yard sale. If your children like flea markets, that’s a venue you may use as well. Depends on the age of your kids and what they can handle or are willing to handle.

The kids can help put signs up throughout the neighborhood while you post the yard sale on Craigslist.

This is a fun family project for the summer.

What if you don’t make a profit? Then split what you do make with the kids just the same. Let them know there wasn’t a profit, but each may take an equal share in what you did earn in reselling the merchandise.

If you can’t afford a summer vacation trip, then create your own summer vacation fun.

Your children will learn a life lesson, the value of a dollar and that it takes time and effort to make a buck.

This cannot be taught, only experienced. You want your kids to have fun this summer? You want to teach them that money does not grow on trees? (I can’t believe I just used that old tired phrase, but it works here.)

Have your own summer vacation trip by buying a storage unit online. Your kids will have something unique to talk about when they go back to school in the fall.

“How I spent my summer — my family bought a storage unit, like on Storage Wars!”

Please leave your creative thoughts in the comment box below.

Stay-at-home-Moms work twenty-four-hours a day, seven days a week with zero time off.

You would think as the kids are home from school on weekends, life would get easier, but no, it does not.

There’s soccer practice then soccer games to attend. Little league baseball practice then little league games to cheer.

Oh, and don’t forget it’s your turn to bring the snacks and drinks.

• Errands
• Homework
• Sports
• Music lessons
• Gymnastics
• Dance classes

The “needs” of the family are like a long laundry list with a price tag at the end of each item. A little extra cash would go a long way to pay for gas, equipment, lessons, and more.

But you’re at home unable to work at a part-time job; most likely because you may have children not old enough to attend school. What can you do to earn a little extra $$?

Buy a storage unit online.

Stay with me, let me explain.

Trying to start any new business takes money. Buying storage units online will cost you only as much as you can presently afford to spend. Plus side is that you buy in bulk.

That’s key – bulk.

You can start with a small storage unit and make arrangements to haul the merchandise back home to a workspace or to your garage. Sort out what you can resell online through Facebook, eBay and Craigslist. Make sure you have a good camera to take photos of your items.

Bet you’re thinking that’s a lot of work.

Stay with me.

It takes just a few minutes to take a photo of the item you want to list. Write a short but truthful description of the item (you don’t need to oversell). Then post it online.

For one item, less then 10-minutes, tops.

If you don’t want to ship anything, use Craigslist and/or host yard or garage sales. Bring the customers to you.

You could easily double or triple your money on every unit. Great way to pay for uniforms, classes, music lessons, etc.

Buying storage units online is an amazing new opportunity to supplement your income without leaving your home.

Once the merchandise from the storage unit is hauled back to your workspace or garage, you’re still a stay-at-home-Mom, but now with a unique at-home part-time job to earn a little extra cash for her family.

Please leave your creative opinions in the comment box.

Auctions are a fun, easy way to earn money for an important cause. It’s a simple fundraiser to run: You simply have to gather items for resale and auction them off to interested bidders.

Since most people have unwanted extra items sitting around their homes, it’s easy to get donations of various goods for your auction.

And with shows like Auction Hunters gaining so much popularity, lots of buyers are looking for hidden treasures, and a storage auction appeals to that sense of adventure.

There are several ways to run a charity auction, but one of the most common new formats is a storage auction. This can be a very convenient solution as the auction itself is held on the storage facility’s premises, which saves you from needing to find another venue.

It also appeals to the treasure hunters who are looking for an authentic-feeling Storage Wars experience. Since the donated items in your charity auction are likely to be much higher quality than what would be found in a regular locker, you’ll be rewarding your buyers while earning money for your cause.

When putting together your charity storage auction, you might want to consider posting the auction online. An online auction is an easy and convenient way for you to attract a wider audience of bidders, and it’s completely free if you use OnlineStorageAuctions.com.

Posting the auction online is easy. You just need to take some photographs of the unit that you’re selling, then post those on the site along with a description and starting bid.

Once the auction ends, we’ll get you in contact with the winning bidder so you can collect your money. This way, you can run the auction completely online without worrying about the expense of an auctioneer or time spent moderating an event.

If you’d rather reach the widest possible audience, though, you can run your online auction in conjunction with a live storage auction. Just explain in the posting and any other advertisements that the online bidding will open the stage for the live auction.

Wrap up the online auction a few hours before the live auction begins, and use the high bid as a starting point for the live bidding. Doing this is a proven way to earn 20 to 100% more from an auction, and it’s a great way to get as many bids as possible on your charity storage auction.

Please leave your insightful opinion in the comment box below.

Sealed bid storage auctions are one way to sell off a storage unit without having to hire an auctioneer and running a live auction.

It’s an especially helpful method in the event that you have only one or two units to sell and you want something simple. It’s no surprise, then, that sealed bid auctions are a preferred method for some storage facilities.

There are plenty of reasons to like sealed auction bids. They’re quite simple to run: You simply show the unit to interested bidders, then collect a handwritten and sealed bid from each bidder.

After the auction’s time runs out, all you have to do is open the bids and give the unit to the person with the highest figure. You can run the auction for as short or long a duration as you want, and you don’t have to worry about big crowds milling around your facility.

The problem with a sealed bid auction is that it can be time-consuming. Every time a bidder arrives, he has to be shown the unit and given time to look it over before writing down and submitting his bid.

If a unit has generated a lot of interest, this can leave you spending far too much time showing off storage units. That’s valuable time that could be used doing other things for your business. Wouldn’t it be better to streamline that process?

This is one place where OnlineStorageAuctions.com can really help save you time and effort. Instead of having your employees show each unit to every interested bidder that arrives at the facility, you can simply take a few photos and post the units online.

This allows bidders to spend as much time as they’d like examining the units without taking up your time to do it. Once the auction is posted online, you can request that sealed bids get dropped off at your facility, or you can just accept high bids from the website.

Either way, you get rid of the delinquent unit without spending any more money on it than necessary.

Setting up an auction on OnlineStorageAuctions.com is fast and free. When you run the notice for the sale, just mention that the auction is listed online and explain any bidding preferences you have, like whether bids can be dropped off at the facility.

Depending on your state, you might be able to hold the auction completely online without worrying about the in-person bids. Either way, once the auction is won, the winner comes forward and pays you for the unit.

If you’re currently using a sealed bids auction method, consider utilizing the free services of OnlineStorageAuctions.com to help you maximize your efficiency.

Please leave your creative comments in the box below.

Storage units go into default for many reasons, and a lot of them aren’t really the tenant’s fault.

When that happens, it can be difficult for a facility manager to handle the situation. On the one hand, you need to get compensated for the unpaid rent and get the unit emptied so you can start renting it out again.

On the other hand, you don’t want to be seen as the bad guy or put a loyal patron into a bind.

This is the perfect opportunity to introduce your tenant to virtual storage auctions. In many cases, your delinquent tenants are having financial difficulties due to an illness or job loss.

Other tenants may have moved, and traveling back to retrieve their items isn’t always the easiest thing. For these people, selling their storage units online can be a great way to get out from under them while still getting some money for their belongings.

In other cases, offering an online auction instead of going through a lien sale can save you time and the tenant some heartache. The tenant can remove any personal items and sell the rest to make money that can be used to pay you back for any late rent and close out the rental contract.

Any extra cash earned from the sale could go directly into their pocket without any messy paperwork or hassles on your end. Best of all, since the sale isn’t a lien sale, you don’t have to worry about satisfying any state laws regarding the sale, so a live auction becomes unnecessary.

OnlineStorageAuctions.com allows individuals, storage facilities and auctioneers to post storage units for auction. The service is completely free, so a struggling tenant doesn’t need to worry about paying anything to get the process started.

Once the unit is sold, the winner will pay the tenant directly or make arrangements with you to hold the payment, so there are no go-betweens to worry about.

It’s not possible to contact every delinquent tenant about the possibility of holding his own online auction, but it’s certainly an offer you can extend to many of your customers. This helps improve your efficiency and help out a struggling tenant without being the bad guy who had to evict him and sell his belongings.

Overall, it’s a win-win situation.

Please leave your insightful thoughts and opinions in the comment box below.