For those of you who sell at flea markets.....how often do you run into this?

Fellow comes up, spends a minute or two looking at a small item and then asks how much it is.
When told a dollar, he looks a few more minutes (how much looking does a brass water nozzle take?) and then says he'll take it. Do I have a bag? Sure. I get a bag put it in the bag and he takes out his wallet, pulls out a $100 bill.

No thank you; even if I have the change I won't do it. This is just plain dumb behavior on anyone's part (the $100 bill).

Subsequently, most of the time now (unless I know the buyer) I won't pull out a bag until payment has been made. Seeing me not move, they sometimes ask "do you have a bag?" to which I reply "Sure I'll get that for you in just a minute" and I wait for them to produce the cash. Sometimes a $20 will come out for a $1 item, sometimes a $50. The fifty is a no-no.

The other take on this money exchange is the person who buys a $5 item and commences to retreive a plastic baggy full of loose change.  Quarters, not so bad, but $3 in dimes and nickels. Sometimes I tell them no. I don't sell anything for less than a dollar and I have no need for loose change. If I ask $2 and someone offers me $1, I will sometimes counter with $1.50, but "only if you have change, because I don't have any coins."

May sound petty, but hey, working for dimes and nickels....I don't need the money THAT badly.

Partial quote from above:

The following Saturday, the DCR had no auctions listed. Our service had 10. Just food for thought. 

Yep, we'll chew on that...or at least the newbies will.

It's always a good idea to completely empty out the contents of a unit you buy. I have spoken with a few people who have purchased large units with nothing but trash in them. They chose to rent the unit,  then let it go back into foreclosure. I don' recommend this but I'm just throwing it out there. If you don't empty out the storage unit completely, you might be barred from attending auctions at that facility. On the other hand, if you rented the unit, you technically became a tenant and it may not ever fall back on you.   

Good Grief Travis !

If anyone in my area bought a locker, didn't clean it out, rented the locker, let it default under his name, the following would happen:

1) That buyer would never attend any more auctions by that auctioneer and probably by the other auctioneers either.
2) The defaulted locker (by that auction buyer) would go on his credit record as a person who doesn't pay his bills.
     The property mangers would be sending him registered letters and making phone calls to him, both of which I
     assume would go unanswered. The locker with the trash in it would be tied up as non-rentable for 2 or 3 months.
     That auction buyer's name and lkr number would be in the legal notices as well. Any reputation left ?

How in the world is this any kind of viable option for getting rid of unwanted trash? 

Only posting this because, as far as I can tell, there have been no posts for more than 24 hours in ANY thread!

Must be a record of some kind some where.  

OK, April is here and I have to say while I am usually optimistic, the auctions in March didn't bode well for April.
I am beginning to think it will be next fall before things begin to return to SOME KIND of normalcy...will never be like it was before the tv shows.

I say this for two reasons:

1) The newbies (in my area) are starting to actually buy, AND some of them are getting smarter, bidding what a locker is worth, (or maybe a little more) so there is room for profit.

2) The newbies KEEP COMING...and I mean NEW newbies. These are folks I haven't seen before. There are so many watching the TV shows, they just have to come out thinking it's all greenbacks and goldbars. So, the crowd condition still exists AND some of them are actually learning.

Nope, in my opinion we're in for a bit of a wait as the spring/summer weather increases their desire to make a buck just as it does for us.

YoungGun....take a look at the video in reply #19 just above.

Looks like Darrell made a mistake selling it at a $200 loss. At end of video it shows how much they made.


Good job....follow him around each time and you'll be set !

Not from Texas, but welcome to the forums. There are Texans here, but I don't recall anyone from Austin. I have seen Dallas, Houston for sure.

Hey Gravell...

Thanks for the good report on your auction experience somewhere in Central CA. Sounds like the whole
crowd was disappointed with the quality more than anything else. Good prices are no good if the lkrs are junk!

But, as someone told me years ago....there's always more auctions...and he was right...they just keep coming.