I found this auctioneers website today. Right in his speel on the site he says the tv show is a lie, you mostly find crap household items. He also posts the names of people no longer welcome at auctions because they don't clean units or dont pay...

If you have found this website and want to come to an auction because of the new tv shows, please read the following. The answers to all your questions about procedures and such are  in the following.
We are seeing a large increase in attendance of these auctions due to the TV shows Storage Wars and Auction Hunters.  These TV programs are not showing the truth about buying lockers. The real REALITY is that when purchasing a locker you obtain A LOT of household, normal, everyday run-of-the-mill stuff.  You will be over run in clothes, misc. dishes/glasses, pots, pans, clothes, old VCR tapes, knick-knacks, clothes, linens, blankets.... All the general items you find at any yard sale.  Oh yeah, did I mention clothes??  It is always amazing that people will also store food not only in boxes, but still in the refrigerator.  Yes, in the refrigerator and no, there is no electric to keep that refrigerator going.  You are still responsible for removal and cleaning this unit out, no matter how disgusting it is.  You also need to be aware that you may bring home roaches and mice.  The storage facilities do their best at keeping pest at bay, but when you have people who store food, it makes that job more difficult. It is also a wonder how a couch doesn't make it with all the cushions or why the dresser is missing a couple of drawers. The above mention is more the "norm" than what the TV shows have led you to believe.

Yes, you do find "goodies" however, you will not find them as often as the TV shows claim these people do.  After all, they are selling their TV show and if it doesn't look like they are making a killing at this, it wouldn't interest you. If you only want a few items to put on Craigslist or Ebay, consider this.  Buying lockers can be a huge endeavor and if you are not equipped with a sorting location or even a means to haul, it can be very costly.
 
Below you will find a schedule for the months auctions.   We have deliquent locker auctions every month for most of the companies.   On the days when there are several auctions, we start at the specified time at the first location and then travel to the rest as we finish each address.  When we have multiple auctions in a day, it is a long day.  Be prepared to be patient and have any necessary supplies with you for the long day.  Due to paperwork, I'm always later than bidders getting to the next location for auction.  Coming straight in after an auction and paying for unit(s) purchased will help me shorten the time from auction to auction.   If you are planning at catching up with us later in the day, please realize the time it takes to get from facility to facility.  The larger the attendence, the longer it will take to conclude each auction.
    Auctions can cancel last minute because the owner of the lockers for auction can pay for their locker right up to auction time.  If an auction has only one or two lockers for auction, you are best to keep checking the web site or call me for any changes.   You will need cash for the auction and a good, powerful flashlight to see into some lockers. 




KEEP AN EYE ON THE WEBSITE!
As soon as I hear from any managers that an auction has changed, I post it immediately here first.
EMAIL DOES NOT ALWAYS GO THRU, so please do not rely on it.

THE FOLLOWING NAME(S) ARE
NO LONGER WELCOME AT THE AUCTIONS.
Jamika Love, St. Louis, Mo.

Ebay doesn't seem to have any plan or direction for the company or any idea what people want.

Personally I think people liked ebay because you could find unique items and that your buying from other people and not a company.

If I wanna shop at a store I'll go to HomeDepot.Com, Walmart.Com, etc NOT ebay. Ebay cannot and shouldnt try to compete with real stores and no-one wants this chinese drop shipped crap that dominates ebay these days.

I search for mp3 player trying to find a nice used one and I gotta sort through 152 pages of the same factory pic of some cheap chinese mp3 player.

Had the day off today most units were far but one near my house. Wanted a day to actually relax so went and got my morning coffee and hit up the first one of the day.

Crowd wasn't bad, maybe 20-25 people but that's about half of what they have been in the past few weeks. 7 Units so a pretty good day in my area as well, we rarely have the 20-30 unit aucitons so 7 is good.

First unit was a 5x10 was stuffed to the door but had a painting tarp over everything. All you could see sticking out the bottom of the tarp was a gas can and a tote. I bid up to $300 almost won, guy did one of those "last chance, last chance, can I get $325, dragged it on for about 2 minuts and another dude finally bid $310, we went back and forth to $360 and I dumped it on him, I would have liked it up to $350, had a feeling willing to take a chance but not any hgher.

A unit 2 later turned out to be owned by the same one as that first one I mentioned and it was crap so hoping I made the right choice.

Another unit was full of liquore bottle boxes, packed wall to wall floor to ceiling but couldn't see a single item all in boxes. Coulda been liquor coulda been a house packed up.

Good idea, glad it's working for you. I considered doing the same thing but I'm sorta lazy and it seemed like too much work for the return.

It's tough to drive traffic to a site let alone to get someone to buy when they get there it just doesn't seem worth the return of time and money spent on it.

If your involved in the yahoo groups in niche groups like crafts or whatever your into and are part of a online community I can see it working though

Most of the facilities in my area now that crowds are out will open the gate and let people park in the facility. Only once did we have to park along a frontage road where cops actually showed up and started ticketing.

It was funny to watch as we all saw them pull up. We watched which end the cop started at, everyone parked at that end made a beeline for the exit, those of us on the other end waited as there were probably a good 50 cars before he got to ours.

Definately helped thin out the crowd lol although all the units wound up being garbage anywa

I don't know the backend of things well enough to know if this is plausible but facilities are realizing auctions are money makers as some are charging entrance fees and things like that.

Really waht would stop an owner from putting a bunch of empty boxes of electronics in a unit, auctioning it off and letting people pay $800 bucks for it?

I know facilities aren't supposed to profit aside from back rent and fees but assuming they have some fake paperwork to go along they could make a decent buck.

Movieman has a good point. Leaving no email to reply to not only cuts down on spam but personally I find people who call are serious people who email are not. People also are more comfortable offering stupid trades or low ball offers through email where its less personal than over the phone as well.

You'll be amazed how much it cuts down on the back and forth and how much more serious people are when you deal only on the phone.

I generally have people come to my house. I totally understand some people not wanting to and if i lived alone with my gf or something I would probably be the same way but I live with my roomate a buddy or mine, he's a bigger dude, we both got guns and I got a 100lbs dog so not really all that concerned about safety issues.

I try to find a day when I'm around the house doing yardwork, washing the car, etc and schedule everyone to come on those days. If you show up an hour late I don't care as I was busy anyway and wasn't just sitting around waiting for you.

I have a few boxes full of baseball, football basketball cards I found in a unit. I did't even really bother sorting through the cards as I did a rough sort through an nothing but mid 90's stuff and later.

I did however come across a few hundred pokemon cards. I remember a few years ago that stuff was really popular, is it still in the right market or with the right circles or is that totally done?

I checked on ebay stuff seems to be listed for decent prices but looks like little if any is selling