Is it Friday yet?

I like Fridays. Not just because it's the gateway to the weekend, although that's pretty good too. I really like Friday's for the garage sales.  There's something special about a Friday garage sale.  Because it's a work day, Friday garage sales have way less buyers. The competition typically consists of stay-at-home Moms, senior citizens and a few pickers who make it their "job" to go to garage sales. With so much less competition on Friday, there's more stuff to discover and buy! While I don't always have the time to check out Friday sales, when I do....it's GO time!

With all this promising potential, I eagerly stopped at a local neighborhood yard sale this past Friday. Each year in May, this particular development holds a Friday/Saturday garage sale on their street. It's a pretty righteous happening! The well kept neighborhood usually has a decent amount of houses selling quality stuff. Since it's a two-day affair, I always stop by both Friday and Saturday, finding completely different houses selling each day. But in the interest of efficiency, if a Friday seller is still selling on Saturday, I blow right by the house. I base this on my "all the good stuff is already gone" theory.

Anticipating good things, I pulled into the neighborhood and found eight homes participating-a nice substantial number for a Friday. I was slightly disappointed when I found the same houses seem to sell on Friday every year.  But I figure they've had a full year to reload on their stuff, so who knows what you'll find? With each house, I can also remember what I bought in previous years and hope to score similar deals. This is always hit or miss though and unfortunately, I was striking out this year. But with just a few to go, I walked up a driveway to find a lady in her Seventies carefully putting out some interesting looking stuff. Much of it was antique, knicky-knacky stuff that piqued my interest. I think I actually startled the nice lady, because I quietly walked up right behind her as she dug through her boxes. She jumped a bit when she realized I was there and I gave her a friendly hello, adding that it was a great morning for a yard sale.

Since the lady had a nice collection of older decorative stuff and I was running out of houses, I figured I should spend a little money. I bought a 5-piece wood doll furniture lot. I also discovered some old decorative, sparkly cardboard Christmas houses all for a buck.  Lastly, what I think could potentially could be my big home run...an old box of very feathery birds in the original box. The whole kit-n-caboodle came to six dollars!  But most importantly, for the entire ten minutes I was digging through her stuff not another soul came up the driveway to look. That's why I love Friday yard sales!

A Friday Score!

Here's another true-life example of a Friday garage sale find. Check out these Walkie-Talkies I bought a few years ago. These guys are not to be confused with some kiddie toy set. We're talking "big-boy" Citizen Band 40 channel portable radios made by General Electric. You may think the days of CB radio passed about the same time they canceled the Dukes of Hazards, but you'd be wrong. There is still a big market for these radios. Typical buyers are construction companies, farmers, hunters...anybody who needs to communicate "out in the field." (They also wear Carthartt coats-see my previous blog.) I spotted these hard-to-find radios at a Friday morning garage sale. They were barley used and came in the original boxes. Just like many Friday garage sales, I was the only lucky person standing in the driveway. The seller priced the radios at $10 for the set. I countered with $5 and we wheeled and dealed, finally settling at $8 for both. I think I can safely say that if these radios were at a Saturday yard sale, they would have been sold quickly. But since it was Friday, my competition was light and I snagged this set for a great price. 

When I have specific items I know will sell quick, it doesn't sit around getting dusty. I won't waste any time researching eBay to determine prices...I just post the auction and wait for the money to come in. These radios fell into that "sure-thing" category. In just seven days, I turned eight dollars into a final auction price of $63. Like I said, I love Friday garage sales!

I did pretty good with this Friday score-how about you? Have you ever beat the competition at a Friday garage sale?
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