@ Movieman,

Thanks for the quick response! The furniture I sold was an oak oval dining/breakfast type table with six wooden chairs. They say they are selling a similar table but with a tile top and only four chairs. I first thought it was someone re-selling the furniture I had sold to them, but it's not. I guess I don't mind folks using photos from furniture I have already sold, but I would have a problem if they are using my photos to compete with me on similar items. Then again, kinda lazy using my photos, and I am not in the business to help my competitors. Friends in the business and people on forums like this I will help; random sellers or hostile competitors:can't let them use my time and labor to compete against me. If it becomes a habit I guess I will photo protect.

Just wondering what everyones organizational size is. I am guessing most people are one and two man(woman) crews, but I'd like to know if anyone is running a larger operation, and if so how many employees/partners do you have and what responsibilities do you keep for yourself and what do you delegate out to your employees/partners.

My advice for not letting a unit get away is to always bring more money then you will possibly need to when the "jackpot" unit that comes along every so often. I realize many people starting out have limited money to spend at auction but I pretty much always take enough money to win every unit if I wanted to. I don't brag about having deep pockets to the crowd, and I don't run up people for the hell of it. I am pretty conservative and don't mind losing units I just don't think will be a good return on investment.

I remember one unit I lost, a 10 x 10 about 1/2 full. Visible from the door were two floor jacks, a set of American Racing rims in the boxes, a diamond plate truck bed tool box, one of those gas tanks they use to fill race cars during races (think Nascar), a rolling tool box, and a lot of duffle bags and suitcases full of who knows what, also there was a table saw in two pieces at different ends of the unit. To make a long story short, the local whale did not want me to have the unit, I could tell they really were not interested in the unit because he and his wife kept debating what to do every time I raised the bid. Finally the raised to $825.00 and I would
have to raise to $850.00 to keep going. At that point I no longer was worried about losing the unit, I was worried about WINNING the unit. Sure those bags could have been filled with tools and racing memorabilia, or they could have been filled with dirty clothes and rags. Since it was only a 10 x 10 1/2 full, I let it go.

Oh Brother!...

Meanwhile, I am selling $20 Italian made stainless steel corkscrews for $1 a pop at the local flea market. I guess its what they say, Location, Location, Location!

Jedi, this one is for you my friend.

The Newbies Strike Back

In our continuing saga of Storage Wars the two to three week cycle of newbies attacking the auction circuit seems to persist. The newbies really took it to the regulars and their own wallets today. Unfortunately, they are unaware of "The Revenge of Buyers Remorse" when they get the contents of thier lockers home. For instance, one newbie paid $800 for a facility build up unit with supposedly all the good stuff up front no less. Good stuff like a broken sewing machine missing parts, an old table saw, a radio with tape deck, etc. Good luck gettin' your money out of that one. Another newbie bought a locker with about 20 bags of Wal-Mart clothes (some of the bags were open so you could see what kind of clothes they were) for $300. Lets see, at $0.50 a piece at the flea market, he better hope there are about 1200 sellable pieces of clothes in those bags!

This is such a strange cycle, one day at the auctions almost no newbies, the next day a hoard dropping ridiculous money on lockers!

Hey Johnny, first off, welcome to the boards.

I read your post and probably like many others did not reply because I have no idea what 80s Levi's corduroys are worth or the best place to sell them. I would probably research Ebay and see if there is a market for them, if not then it is off to the flea market. Some members have complained about people posting messages to threads that either don't answer the thread or don't add any value to the thread. In light of this, I thought it best not to respond to so many posts.

Good luck out there!

Murphy's Law number 1.

 Anything you discard in the garbage can or dumpster that you later realize you actually need will naturally migrate to the very bottom of the garbage can or dumpster.

Please add your Murphy's Laws of Storage Auctions. 

It looks like the euphoria from the TV shows might be fading in my area. The auctions yesterday were mostly regulars, and new regulars (if there is such a term) and a few newbies. None of the newbies seemed to bid on anything. Prices still seemed to be just a little to high. I would like to see them come down by another 20%, but that might be too optimistic. I won 2 units and I am pretty happy with the amount I spent on them (compared to what some of the other units sold for that day).

On a side note. I told a friend (not close) that my wife and I were doing storage auctions, and told him about some of my better finds, of course I cleary mentioned all the hard work, garbage, rat poop, etc. involved as well, but he is determined to get into the business now and is going to the auctions next week. Me and my BIG mouth!!