I'll have to search out the advice of a tax attorney i guess.. What you're saying makes sense, but I don't know how something like that is traceable. If I buy a shirt on clearance for $2 and I wear it for 2 years, how can I possibly be expected to remember what I paid for it when I donate it?

Where do you see that you can only write off the amount of the locker? I can't find that info.

I think you are limited to what you paid for the stuff in the first place. Obviously if you value it too high it will raise a flag. Say you are claiming $200 expense for storage units and $250 deduction for donated stuff....not ok.

And to Travis.....seriously?  Did you have to bring this up already. I Hate tax time! No fun! In past years I have used TurboTax and definitely recommend it. Worth every penny. Took over a large family business in 2012 (Not related to storage unit purchases) and was definitely in over my head so paid a professional to do my taxes last year and will do so again.

Not quite. The IRS has no idea what you're donating. As an individual, you are limited to donating 50% of your AGI (Adjusted Gross Income). So if you say you donate $50,000 a year but only make $40,000 a year, you will only get credit for $20,000 a year AND you raise a red flag.

Many people spread out donations over multiple years. You have 5 years to claim a donation. So if you donate a vehicle, for example, you can claim it once in the next 5 calendar years, or with help of an accountant, you can spread that over the next 5 years if you choose.

I've got...

Mr. Fancy Pants - he always wears shiny dress pants with a crappy shirt..
Redneck Willy Wonka - he looks like Willy Wonka and typically wears flannel..
Mr. Lazy - never buys a locker he can't move in one trip with his S10..
Preppy Steve - he dresses like he's going to the country club..
Black Kenny - his name is Ken and he's black. He's also the 2nd regular whose name is Ken.
Sexual Chocolate - this is a black couple.. They are always embraced with his hand(s) on her butt while we're waiting for the auction to start. Whenever i see them, I yell out "Sexual Chocolate" like Eddie Murphy in "Coming To America".

Since Christmas has been okay. Did better than breakeven in the store for last week. Add ebay sales to that and I'm able to catch up for December's bills. But January will still run late. Hopefully the trend continues and I can catch up Jan in time to make Feb on time.

I'm not so gentle.. What's the line from Goodfellas? "Business bad? ...F U, pay me. - Oh, you had a fire? ...F U, pay me. -  Place got hit by lightning, huh? ...F U, pay me.

I would agree it would be very time consuming to load the items into the software, but how would you account for the COGS ??

I don't see the need to track the cost of goods sold that intently. Because when you buy a locker, you're buying ALL the contents. So how can you say a dresser cost you $100, when there was more furniture in that space? It's more important, to me, to track the cost of locker, or other type of purchase and use an identifier on your price tag to correlate that item with the purchase date. I use an alphabet system. A-Z than AA-ZZ or numbers/dates if you wish. I used to use dates, customers confused that with a hold tag.

I have a spreadsheet that a friend made up for me in Excel. I just log prices into after the sale, it tallies each column.

As long as I know which locker the items come from, that's all I need. Once I'm profiting from a locker, all the smalls go half price. I use a color coding system on my tag to indicate 25-50-75% off.

Absolutely right! But I've done several sales this month and almost all tracking numbers through USPS didn't work until after the item was delivered.