Step 7/ Estate Sales Day Strategies

A Ten Step Guide To Running Your Own Estate Sale

From setup to clean up- let a professional teach you how!

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Step 7/ Estate Sales Day Strategies

As soon as your Estate Sales ad hits the newspaper or Criagslist, you may find yourself inundated with people knocking on your door; these people are called early-birds. Our best advice is, Do Not Let Them In Early! They will only attempt to buy your best stuff, which will leave you with the rest, and besides that, word will get around; this could have a very negative effect on your over all sale.

“Remember: Let the best sell the rest.”

When you have properly organized the house’s contents, and you have advertised it well, you can expect to have 150-200 people attend your Estate Sale over the course of two or three days. If you plan on conducting a 3 day Estate Sale, you can expect at least 200-300 people.

Prepare yourself emotionally for the public.

Remember they have no relationship to the decedent, and their actions and questions may seem very disrespectful.

Estate Sales Morning Checklist

Place street signs directing the public to your Estate Sale.
Check your house and make any final adjustments.
Set up your cashier’s table.
Have clear paths to establish traffic patterns.
Make sure you have a single door that use both as an entrance and exit.
Lock all other doors, and place “No Exit” signs on them.
Centralize all of your Estate Sales packing supplies near the cashier, for easy check out.

Discount Strategies We Use For A Two Day Estate Sale

First day in the morning: No discounts.
First day in the afternoon: 25% off.
Second day in the morning: 30-35% off.
Second day in the afternoon: 50% off.

Estate Sales can be quite chaotic.

Decide before your Estate Sale, how many people you want to have in the house at any given time. We recommend no more than fifteen or twenty people at any given time.

The public may be in a rush, but that doesn’t mean that you have to be.

Set your own pace, and you will enjoy the experience so much more. Remember, if you are enjoying yourself you will make better decisions.

Here is another tip:

Keep an item by item sales log or a receipt book, this will serve two purposes.

Your Estate Sales logs, or receipt books, will help you later with the estate’s accounting.
It will also help you resolve any cost disputes that may arise with buyers.

Post Estate Sale:

After the crowds have come and gone from your Estate Sale, and everything that can be sold has been sold, there will be three types of personal property left over.