lol !
I have always had a lot of Halloween costumes from storage units and from being thrown in my wholesale purchases. I absolutely hate selling them because they can go for sale at those pop-up stores so cheap and when they have masks its a nightmare to ship ( which is 95% of my business) so a couple years ago I noticed that after Christmas a lot of people stocked up on discounted decorations and then noticed after a lot of holidays people did the same, so I ended up putting all my costumes in one lot and pricing it at what I would have ended up with by selling in by the each and without fail last year and this I made more money waiting to sell a day or two after Halloween !!

its all about timing I guess on when is the best time to sell anything. hot today...cold tomorrow

yesterday I went to a auction that had 5 units up.It was cold in my neck of the woods yesterday (25 degrees) but a a whole boatload of people showed up ( around 45 ) usually we get like 20-25.

I did bid but I started at 25 on the first one and the auctioneer just looked at me and said "I will keep that in mind" and then started at 300 ! it was a 5x10 that had some low end household goods in it ! I laughed to my self and then....people started bidding it up ! it went for almost 400. the next ones were just as bad till we got to the last one. that one I looked and looked and I saw possibly $100 in items I could see and very little possible profit that I couldn't ( based on the quality and type of items I could.) so for the hell of it to get back in the game after roach locker I bid 25 and was willing to go to 75 for the hell of it..........ya it was bid up to over 500. this is not typical of the auctions here and I did see a lot of people I don't normally see but what the hell. it was cold and these people overpaid for everything.

it seems to me the colder or harder it rains the more people come out to auctions. in the good beautiful days here I see half the people who show up in the crappy days !

anyway, I will need to wait till I get back in the saddle till next month. its a good thing I have a ridiculous amount of stock to work with already ( I could work off my inventory for 3 months alone )

You see, I don't view doing this as being in the "trash business". I know some units are much better than others but all the units that go up for sale at one point was someone's "stuff" and it was worth it to them to pay to store. I don't think anyone starts to store just to have a place to keep trash.

I understand that we do this as a business and that alone and if need be we need to squeeze as much as possible out of what you get ( trying to make lemonade out of rocks ) but there should be a line. there needs to be a .......I don't know how to say what I mean, but rat **** and roaches should mean that its a dead deal, cut your losses and just move on. there are so many opportunities to get up to bat with another locker that , well we shouldn't move dirty nasty **** to another person that if they knew where or what it came from would have chosen to pass on it. cleaned or not. we don't know for a fact its 100% clean

I know I sound like a ass....im reading what im writing and I think I sound like a uppity ass but....its how I feel.

I guess im judging based on what I am seeing only and not as a whole.
well to give you a better idea of my point of view:

in my area we do not get the tv show prices for lockers. I have seen a few go near a grand but those had obvious value right in front, but the majority of my lockers I purchase go for less than 200 and maybe half of them , less than 100.

I buy in 2 general areas. 1 is straight middleclass and other is lower income area ( that is 2 different lower income with the roach unit being in the lower of the 2 )

my middle income area has a lot of general items ( my bread and butter ) in decent to great shape mostly
my low income produces a lot of low to above decent general items with always a couple gems inside
my lowest income area always produces low decent items with some above decent items and the once a month gem

I don't even try to sell furniture or mattress or to be honest I don't sell anything bigger than a microwave.bedside flat screen TV's
I do sell washers and dryers but I always price them to move real quick ( usually within a day or two)

my units usually fall in a ration of 50-60 % sellable for middleclass area 30-40% low income and 20-30% for lowest income

we get a average of 40 units per month of units for sale within a 30 min drive from my house and I do see about 8-10 "regulars" that have their "type" of locker that they go for and I only have to compete really with 2-3 of them so I end up with 4-5 lockers a month on average

im re-reading this tread and I have to say, Im surprised that so many people would have kept going regardless........why?

is it because theres no choice (you have to put food on the table) and you only get a locker or two

is it because the majority of your locker finds are tainted by roaches or rats so no choice

is it because, well......you just don't care?

im really curious. I have to be honest. the thought of selling any of this stuff was in my head for all of 60 seconds only

oh ya , I toss it. if I wouldn't want it in my house because of roaches or rats then I toss. to be honest.....I cant imagine someone going through and cleaning that sort of stuff. its trash, that stuff has reached the end of the line and now needs to make that last journey to the dump.

purchased my first huge unit, 10 by 30 and it was a complete bust ! I almost always like the small hit and runs 5x5 or 5x10 's and have been doing well for over a year. occasionally if I get a decent feeling and price I will go a little bigger but this was my first big one. it looked fantastic at the door with well packed boxes and organized in sections stacked well. it went for a great price and I paid what I felt I could sell what I saw easily.

after the auction went to my unit to start sorting. opened the first box and I saw dead roaches.... I threw that box to the side and moved to different area of locker and picked up a box and opened......yup dead roaches. the whole unit was like that. I cant resell any of that to anyone! thank god there were no live ones !

long story short , it took me days to fill back of truck and go straight to the dump. my only saving grace was I did pull some scrap metal and find a jewelry box that had enough gold that I managed to only lose 100 bucks and about 20 hours of labor.

never again will I purchase from that particular location ( in very low income city ) and it will be a long time before I even think of anything that large again!