Want some stuff?
I don't even know if this is a mini-rant or a plea for assistance...
I'm a pack rat (there, I said it). AND an artist. This means that not only have I accumulated a huge amount of STUFF in the non-public areas of my house, but that all of it has some potential value (to me at least), from slightly shabby furniture to boxes of colorful scraps. Which means I can't really tell the dreck from stuff that is worth money, or discern the stuff that other artists or other folk might want from the obvious crap. Add in my convictions not to throw out anything that can be recycled, upcycled, repurposed or reused, and you can understand why I am drowning. So I am about to embark on a major downsizing before the collection starts creeping into the public areas of my house.
The problem is, while I have no trouble deciding what I no longer need or want to keep, I don't know where to go after I pack up the castoffs. Anything good enough to donate could potentially get money from eBay or a garage sale. But both venues are generally more trouble than profit, unless you have some expertise with these options (I don't), and so it's hard to know when lightning will strike and somebody will bid lots of money for something.
Much that is not good/classy enough to donate or sell is still usable. (Even I have no trouble throwing out the obvious trash, the completely ugly/unusable/unsalvageable stuff, but anything that is potentially usable just hangs around, mocking me.) I keep hoping that the little disposal fairies will come over to my house and separate the castoffs into piles: this is for eBay, this is for Goodwill, this is for your free-to-a-good-home pile, this is just outright junk. I have a hard time doing that by myself. Because I have been to garage sales, I have been to eBay, and I know that the most horrendous stuff will fetch real cash. I have watched my mixed-media artist friends paw excitedly through boxes of stuff that can politely be called rubble and happily carry off piles of half-used art supplies, rusted metal and bits of material. And I'd rather have my stuff go to a good home than to the dumpster; on many occasions I have brought a box full of goodies to my art groups for picking over, and they have been appreciated. But one of the groups is defunct, and the other is now less a group of artists and more like a monthly adult-daycare craft day, so I rarely attend anymore. (The final blow came when, after I had bugged the leader of the still-meeting group for a solid year about organizing some way for members to swap and/or sell unwanted supplies (and yes, I offered to help work it out), she finally scheduled "tailgate swap meets" -- twice -- without ever checking to see if I could attend either session. I was out of town both times.)
So, seriously, does anybody know some junk fairies? Is there some kind of service that will help people make these kinds of decisions? Or is it just some version of "donate it all and let the charities sort it out"?
I don't even know what I'm looking for as an answer. I've already donated a ton of stuff. If it goes to friends, I'm happy that they're happy. If it goes to charity, I enjoy the tax write-off. But the rest of it just sits in Limbo (read: basement), sneering at me and making me feel... well... not good. I tried a local auction house once, but they are now out of business. (It may have something to do with the fact that the only thing of real value I gave them to sell mysteriously disappeared without compensation; I can't be the only person to whom that happened.) I have little patience for organizing garage sales; been there, done that, pain in the ass, and I don't live in an area that gets a lot of traffic. We tried the local flea market once: bigger pain in the ass. I have very little knowledge of or experience with places like Craigslist or eBay, and no friends to tutor me. So, what's an indecisive pack rat to do? Just give away the good stuff and throw away the rest?
I'm a pack rat (there, I said it). AND an artist. This means that not only have I accumulated a huge amount of STUFF in the non-public areas of my house, but that all of it has some potential value (to me at least), from slightly shabby furniture to boxes of colorful scraps. Which means I can't really tell the dreck from stuff that is worth money, or discern the stuff that other artists or other folk might want from the obvious crap. Add in my convictions not to throw out anything that can be recycled, upcycled, repurposed or reused, and you can understand why I am drowning. So I am about to embark on a major downsizing before the collection starts creeping into the public areas of my house.
The problem is, while I have no trouble deciding what I no longer need or want to keep, I don't know where to go after I pack up the castoffs. Anything good enough to donate could potentially get money from eBay or a garage sale. But both venues are generally more trouble than profit, unless you have some expertise with these options (I don't), and so it's hard to know when lightning will strike and somebody will bid lots of money for something.
Much that is not good/classy enough to donate or sell is still usable. (Even I have no trouble throwing out the obvious trash, the completely ugly/unusable/unsalvageable stuff, but anything that is potentially usable just hangs around, mocking me.) I keep hoping that the little disposal fairies will come over to my house and separate the castoffs into piles: this is for eBay, this is for Goodwill, this is for your free-to-a-good-home pile, this is just outright junk. I have a hard time doing that by myself. Because I have been to garage sales, I have been to eBay, and I know that the most horrendous stuff will fetch real cash. I have watched my mixed-media artist friends paw excitedly through boxes of stuff that can politely be called rubble and happily carry off piles of half-used art supplies, rusted metal and bits of material. And I'd rather have my stuff go to a good home than to the dumpster; on many occasions I have brought a box full of goodies to my art groups for picking over, and they have been appreciated. But one of the groups is defunct, and the other is now less a group of artists and more like a monthly adult-daycare craft day, so I rarely attend anymore. (The final blow came when, after I had bugged the leader of the still-meeting group for a solid year about organizing some way for members to swap and/or sell unwanted supplies (and yes, I offered to help work it out), she finally scheduled "tailgate swap meets" -- twice -- without ever checking to see if I could attend either session. I was out of town both times.)
So, seriously, does anybody know some junk fairies? Is there some kind of service that will help people make these kinds of decisions? Or is it just some version of "donate it all and let the charities sort it out"?
I don't even know what I'm looking for as an answer. I've already donated a ton of stuff. If it goes to friends, I'm happy that they're happy. If it goes to charity, I enjoy the tax write-off. But the rest of it just sits in Limbo (read: basement), sneering at me and making me feel... well... not good. I tried a local auction house once, but they are now out of business. (It may have something to do with the fact that the only thing of real value I gave them to sell mysteriously disappeared without compensation; I can't be the only person to whom that happened.) I have little patience for organizing garage sales; been there, done that, pain in the ass, and I don't live in an area that gets a lot of traffic. We tried the local flea market once: bigger pain in the ass. I have very little knowledge of or experience with places like Craigslist or eBay, and no friends to tutor me. So, what's an indecisive pack rat to do? Just give away the good stuff and throw away the rest?