There are lots of other possibilities for sales. Once you actively start looking, you’ll be surprised at what opportunities present themselves. For example, restaurant equipment...
Or medical equipment ...
Then there are all the other expensive items that folks may need to sell such as jewelry, antiques, art, furs or expensive furniture. This $18,000 bracelet would certainly get the blood pumping...
Include the following in your search for miscellaneous items... 1) Local specialty magazines -- We already discussed magazines such as the “Trader” and “Advertiser,” and pointed out that they are great places to buy merchandise at bargain prices. However, they are also superb if you want to find expensive merchandise to sell for other people.
The Atlanta “Advertiser” recently had multiple items in the following categories... Medical equipment, Farm equipment, Office and business equipment, Office furniture, Businesses for sale and Jewelry of all kinds.
Often the sellers in these magazines are in a tight spot and need to get rid of the merchandise. I read one once that said, “Assume notes on heavy duty trailer (+$1000).” Another deal in this same paper offered a $23,000 mobile home for $12,995. Someone snatched up that deal the first day the magazine appeared.
Be creative. Make money from these magazines by turning the situation around. Find objects, rather than sell them.
There is a gentleman who collects Lionel trains and has an ad in every issue of the magazine. Whenever I see these trains on auction sites, I send him a fax, asking if he is interested, and what he is willing to pay for them. I then keep my bid below what he is willing to pay so that I can make a profit. For example, if someone is willing to pay $200 for an object and you want to make $40 in profit, don’t bid above $160.
What if I win the bid, and my buyer doesn’t follow through with the money? In that case, I am faced with two choices...i) I renege on my bid (which I would never do.)
ii) I am “stuck” with the item.
Understand something about the merchandise before you bid. I have a Lionel train book in my house, supplied by my buyer. I can check prices and know approximately what something is worth. I’m not going to be stuck with an overpriced item.
And I would never bid on something really expensive -- unless the money was escrowed. I might make an exception if I knew my dealer really well and had done business with him many times.
2) Rural Newspapers -- Newspapers in very small communities are a great resource. Subscribe to them.
There are so many items that don’t sell locally because the demand just isn’t large enough. It‘s a great opportunity to offer your selling services and eliminate the frustration problem.
3) Estates -- Several years ago I purchased a course on how to buy real estate through probate. A probate is the legal procedure that heirs must often go through to claim property of deceased relatives. Not all wills are probated but many are.
I never did buy any houses this way but I am aware of the gold mine potential. There are students of this business approach who made more money with the contents of the house than on the property itself. One gentleman founded three pawn shops with this method.
How do you find probate properties? There are two main ways... The first is through a legal newspaper. Every county or province has one, and it is a simple matter to find it. If someone probates a will (i.e., it is filed with the court), a probate notice must be in the legal papers for a certain period of time. In my county, it must be listed for three weeks in a row.
The second and better way is to familiarize yourself with your county or provincial courthouse. A probate is public record so anyone can access the records. By searching the records, you will know about probates before the general public who only read about it through the newspapers. You can then contact the executor who is in charge of the estate and get more details.
This is a fantastic method because almost no one knows about it. The few who do are looking for property rather than auctionable goods. And it’s surprisingly time efficient once you get used to the system.
When I first started, I spent lots of hours in the courthouse, understanding the system and reading all the probates. But now I can go once a week for thirty to sixty minutes and harvest the past week’s crop.
The final point about estates involves household content. Follow-up on situations where there are no surviving spouses or the heirs live out of town. In these cases, there are usually furnishings that no one wants. You can volunteer your kind “removal” services. One person I know even charges the heirs for “carting away” the property. I have never had the nerve to take advantage of people that way
Another way, although less effective, is to be in contact with local real estate investors who aren’t interested in the contents. There can be some incredibly valuable items in these estate houses. Conversely, there can also be a lot of real junk. There is no way of knowing until you are in the house.
