Diary of a Lazy Furniture Flipper
by Katy on September 10, 2024 · 19 comments
I sold them in under 24 hours for sixty bucks!
Then I sold that curb picked Patrick Nagel framed print for another $65.
S’up sexy?
Tomorrow someone is supposedly coming by to buy that curb picked drafting table for another $40. I’m not worried that I’m counting my chickens before they hatch, as I have a couple of backup buyers.
Edit: Sold for $40!
I just now listed this classic and sturdy office chair for a budget friendly twenty dollars, which should help it to sell in a timely manner.
Of course I gave it a bit of a scrub before taking my photos!
Look at this chair and ottoman set that I curb picked back in June. It was a bit grubby, but I took a soapy towel to the fabric and it cleaned up perfectly. The pair then sold within hours of listing for $75.
Better, yes?
You’ll notice that all these items have one thing in common — all they needed was a quick scrub, a “glow up” if you will. I’m not looking to scrape paint and upcycle finicky old furniture. I’m just looking to clean and list on Facebook Marketplace as quickly as possible. Also note that I’m not lugging home enormous unwieldy hunks of furniture that require a buyer to rent a truck.
Another thing that I do to keep the reselling as simple as possible is to set the furniture out on my covered front porch for buyers to pick up at their convenience. I direct buyers to put cash in my locked mailbox or I’ll send them a link to my Venmo, which keeps me from being tied down to the house. I’ve sold hundreds of items through the years and have yet to be burned.
Keeping it simple. Simple like a fox.
Katy Wolk-Stanley
“Use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without.”
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{ 19 comments… read them below or add one }
I’m a fellow reseller and it’s becoming increasingly popular for buyers to prepay via Venmo then porch pickup at their convenience. Literally 50% of my sales are done this way now. I love this trust that is more apparent than it used to be.
Thanks for the update. Good to see my favorite blogger is making some $$$ from selling and added to that is the fact that these items are seeing a second, third and beyond life and staying out of landfills. Very satisfying to me even from thousands of miles away!
You get major points as a seller for making sure stuff is clean and in good working order. The effort you put in shows in the returns you get. Way to go, Katy!
What a fun way to earn extra cash. I haven’t opened a Venmo account. How do you and anyone else feel about the safety of this option?
I have used Venmo for years and years, and so do my adult children and many of my peers. It does not pay out immediately unless you pay a fee; I always opt for the free option, which takes 2-3 days to hit my bank account.
No issues with it except that there is a daily limit (maybe $2500?), and you might not be affected by that if you’re using it for furniture resale anyway.
Best of luck! And I echo all the sentiments about Katy being a rock star … and front porches FTW!!
I recently did a bread sale fundraiser for next years back to school drive and did porch pick up and had people pay digitally or leave money hidden somewhere out front like under a plant pot. It worked out really well.
@Ashley Bananas – what, pray tell, is a ‘bread sale’?
A cardinal rule of garage saling–and, by extension, any form of reselling–is that “Clean stuff sells better than dirty stuff.” Katy, yet again, demonstrates this principle for us.
And I’m ashamed to admit that the “before” picture of the desk chair looks more like my current desk chair than it should. 🙁
Perhaps you’ll take a few minutes to clean yours now, and if not . . . who cares?
Mwah, love you and your grotty chair!
Elbow grease investments almost always pay off! Over the years, I’ve made a tidy little profit off of someone else’s dirty “thing.” Thanks for the inspiration 🙂
Wow, what a tidy profit from your efforts, and saved from the landfill as a wonderful bonus.
This is impressive! Turning free stuff into cash. I’m a tad jealous!!
While I understand the “lure” of Venmo, all the other “real time” payment options, and debit cards, there is no such thing as a free lunch. That $2.32 transaction? Yeah, the financial institutions have to store it for 18-24 months. Soon it won’t be free to you. You’ll pay front-end or back-end aka fees. Retail businesses have it built in to their prices (giving a cash discount some times).
Don’t get me started on security of said devices/systems involved.
Bur kudos for not sending perfectly good items to the landfill. Says the person sitting on her been in the family 100+ years. It has been recovered (likely more than once).
I always choose the 1-3 day transaction which means there’s no transaction fee.
@Katy – enjoy fee free while you can.
Isn’t paying income taxes on the money received required now. I know Pay pal mentioned it
The sending of 1099-MISC are on hold for the time being. Fine line between selling a few items here and there versus making a living. Really no different than garage sales – some folks buy at other sales to garage sale multiple times a season/year.
I bet those folks who put the stuff on the curb are kicking themselves now, or at least they would if they knew you made a quick profit on their discards! Congrats on making a quick $165! Does your state charge you sales tax?
Congrats on those great sales! I’ve had a great week so,far. Sold 12 trash picked Coleman propane camping canisters for $60, a kids free pile thermos $8, and a few more things I got cheap at the pay by the pound store. I have a coach bag listed for $80 that I paid $3 for at the pay by the pound store. It needed a cleaning on the outside but the lining was pristine.