Publicly traded storage companies are treated as REITs as far as investing is concerned. A REIT is a Real Estate Investment Trust and covers companies like malls and apartment rental firms.

By definition, a REIT must pay out 90% of its earnings to shareholders in the form of dividends, so really you are investing more for dividend income than for share price growth.

Public Storage (PSA) currently trades around $140/share and pays an annual dividend of $4.40/share, paid quarterly. The truly impressive thing about Public Storage is the dividend growth, having doubled since 2009.

Frankly, Public Storage the stock has been on my radar much longer than storage auctions have and I'm glad this thread prompted me to look it up again. I won't financially be able to buy shares right now, but I will be adding it to my watch list.

The one thing I can say is that the auctions have such a small impact on the bottom line that it is almost meaningless. The true advantage is getting the space clear to have a new and, hopefully, paying tenant.

Please don't read this and go running to buy shares. If you're interested, great, but do your own research as this really is just a cursory 5-minute analysis.

That said, I'm glad this thread came along. It got my investing juices flowing again!

Matches: True. Though I'd assumed that the staging, casting, etc. was done by all the shows. Are you thinking not?

I think they may slip cool stuff into their lockers, but as for "casting," they don't have the "local whale" villain for each episode the way Auction Hunters does.

As a long-time poker player, I decided a few years back to apply some gambling math theory to the world of the lottery.

What I discovered was that when the jackpot gets big enough, the odds actually justify playing.

I don't recall the exact numbers, but for sake of argument:

If the odds of matching all the numbers are 1 in 230 million
AND
The top prize is greater than $230 million
AND
The ticket price is $1
THEN
The odds favor playing.

This is actually a favorable situation because it does not consider the secondary prizes for matching some of the numbers.

There is one thing that blows a hole into my entire analysis... TAXES!!!

Once you consider the tax liability associated with a large win, the odds are skewed in a truly adverse manner.

My conclusion was ultimately that it is still not worth playing, but not nearly as stupid as most people make it out to be.

Food for thought.

Some states don't require a unit to be disposed of by auction at all, so if the facility doesn't get a high enough bid, they may see it in their best interests to take possession of the contents themselves.

Like many of these issues, a lot of it will come down to the details of a state's lien laws.

Short answer... yes.

Happy to give you a chuckle, money.   

lol

Thanks.
Glad I can at least amuse you all with my antics.     

Unlike money, I wasn't thinking about the entertainment value, but I suppose we all know how mean she can get.