This Weekend Treasure Hunting

This morning my son Phil and I braved slick, snowy streets to attend Royal Oak's weekly flea market located in the Farmer's market. The flea market is very neat and orderly with booths selling everything from vintage jewelry, vintage clothing, toys, books, records among other things. The problem with trying to find things at flea markets as opposed to garage sales is at flea markets the prices are retail and above. The profit margin is very low, if any. I did find 2 David Bowie albums and a Nina Hagen album that I could probably sell for double if not three times what I paid. I picked up this flyer while I was there:

I will definitely attend this sale! I will let you know if I find any cool things in my blog the following week.

The same held true for an estate sale that I attended on Saturday afternoon. They were asking $3.00 for DVDs, CDs and hardcover books. I would have probably bought a bunch at half that price, but I can't see being able to resell these items for $3.00 to $4.00 each. I was also interested in some Breyer horses, but at $22.00 each I once again had to pass.

This week I am going to comb all the record stores I can find. Record stores usually all have dollar bins. I have found quite a few treasures in those bins.

Winter Doldrums

So as we are headed into another polar vortex, it looks as though I am going to be spending a lot of time indoors. This could be the perfect opportunity for me to organize my book and get them into some sort of order so they can be found easily. But this is easier said than done. I have so many that need to be listed and researched. But instead I seem to get sucked into my Netflix account and watching old episodes of “Chuck”.

I find I get stuck in the Winter doldrums, dreaming of spring when I can throw myself into scouting out new sales instead of concentrating on what I have and getting it organized. I sometimes feel overwhelmed with my disorganization but I'm working on it.

My copy of "Warman’s Jewelry and Price Guide" came recently and am going to start studying that. I am really excited about getting into the costume jewelry business.  I  got the idea when I went to the Royal Oak flea market about a month ago. I was really impressed by what I saw: lots of vintage jewelry, toys, comic books, antiques, etc. The flea markets can sometimes be very disorganized but this one is really nice. If I get caught up on my organizing I think I’ll go up there Sunday.

Bio

Hello, my name is Colleen Hirsch and I am the creator of "Colleen the Treasure Hunter" blog. This blog is all about finding treasures at garage sales, estate sales, rummage sales and flea markets as well as tips on how to resell items online by using Ebay.com and Amazon.com.

I started reselling in 2001 on Ebay.com. Back then I specialized mainly in books: first editions, pulp fiction paperbacks, as well as newer books. Back then books sold like wildfire and I was constantly struggling to keep inventory. Then with the release of e-readers such as Kindle and Nook, people were no longer interested in buying books. I stopped selling on Ebay and focused on other things like going back to school and working full time. I lost my full time job due to cutbacks and struggled to find a new one.  I was getting depressed and frustrated at not being able to find a job.

So my husband, Ben, sat me down and asked what I really wanted to do. “What is your passion?” he asked me.

“I really like selling stuff online.” I answered.

“Then just throw yourself into it. It won’t seem like work if you love it.”

That was about 6 months ago. I spent every weekend of the summer going to garage sales. It was hit or miss but I am slowly building up my inventory. I take my son Phil with me. He is 13 years old and an expert on which video games are the hot ones.

I am also looking forward to getting into the costume jewelry business and am currently learning about that.

I am looking forward to the day when I can finally quit my day job and focus on my business full time.