Monetizing the Junk in Your Garage

If you’re waiting for spring cleaning season to get you motivated to get rid of the junk in your garage, chances are you won’t get too far in cleaning it up.

Like many people, I have too much stuff in my garage, and every time I enter it, I vow to do something about the clutter. I don’t consider myself a packrat — no one probably does — but I’ll admit my garage is a mess and needs to be cleaned out.

Craigslist a start for removing junk in your garage

Below are some ways to get some money out of the junk in your garage, though I have to admit I haven’t used any yet. Like many goals — they’re on my to-do list. I’m a fan of Craigslist and Freecycle, and most recently used Craigslist to sell my old car.

But the free Craigslist ad brought too many cheapskates to my door, or at least to my phone, as they tried to talk me down in price for a good, reliable car that I was already offering a deal on. If I can avoid Craigslist, I do for this reason.

Instead, here are some other online ways to monetize the junk in your garage. Again, note that I haven’t used them but they at least sound like smart ideas:

Everything But The House

This site is an online estate and consignment sale marketplace that specializes in offering a high-touch, full service approach aimed at downsizing boomers and retirees. It doesn’t necessarily sound like a way to get rid of the junk in your garage — unless it’s expensive junk.

Rather than go item-by-item, EBTH signs a contract with its sellers to sell their whole estate for them in exchange for a modest commission.

This site may not work for the typical stuff crammed into a garage, but if your garage or home has valuable items that you’d rather not have, EBTH could be a way to get some cash for it. More likely, however, is you’d need EBTH when a relative dies and you need to clear out their home quickly.

VarageSale

Shipping an old planter across the country doesn’t make sense for either party. Who wants to pay for shipping for an item they can buy at a local store, no matter how cheap the item is?

But find someone in your neighborhood who could pick it up, and you might have a deal.

VarageSale was founded by a wife-and-husband team and backed by Sequoia Capital, and is a social, local, mobile online marketplace for families who want to sell their unwanted items to people in their neighborhoods. The site is free to use and it has a mobile app.

Unfortunately for me, the closest VarageSale in my area was 25 miles away. That isn’t a deal breaker, but I’m unlikely to drive that far to buy a used toy for my kid.

Gemr

Gemr is a place where everyone from the curious to the collector can find a passionate community around objects of interest — from comics and sneakers to rare watches and antiques.

The site’s homepage focuses on unique toys that would probably be worth money no matter where you sell them online. If you have such collectibles in your garage, then you’ve got a better problem than most people who just have ordinary junk stashed away. Still, it looks like a smart place for such collectors to go.

Close5

Close5 is an app I’ve been meaning to use for months. You take a photo of the item you want to get rid of among the junk in your garage. You don’t even have to list a price or description. If an offer is made, you’re messaged privately and you arrange the sale in a public place.

It’s like a mobile garage sale without all of the hassles of setting up a garage sale. Photograph the things you want to move, wait for a reply, then arrange the sale.

Another great thing is that it tells how far away you are from the seller — with a map approximating where they are — so you can decide if it’s worth driving that far for.

Once I get motivated to use any of these, I’ll let you know how they work. Since I don’t have any expensive antiques waiting to be sold, it likely won’t be a huge cash haul. But when trying to get rid of the junk in your garage, money may not be the highest priority.