Garage Sales: best things you've ever found.

[zeroth404]

I thought this would make a great topic a few nights ago. Have fun with this one.

I once scored Quake 2: Quad Damage for 1 dollar.

I also scored about 400 Magic The Gathering cards for 8 bucks. among them were quite a few rares.

What kinds of sweet deals have YOU found at garage/yard sales?

[a12ctic]

nothing... NEVER EVER

[waltaja]

a killer selection of beer related items and a couple cool guitars

[budman7]

Garage/yard sales, my mother goes to those.
She gets all kinds of useless stuff.
I rarely ever go to them, I prefer the flea market. which is one really big garage sale.

[DougMills]

A friend of mine found one of those iMacs(you know, one of those green computer-inside-the-monitor things?) at a garage sale for like 30 bucks. I think he gave it to his daughter or something with linux on it.

[techieMoe]

My little brother bought an LP of The Beatles Abbey Road for 50 cents. Last we checked it's worth a couple hundred dollars.

[George Harrison]

My little brother bought an LP of The Beatles Abbey Road for 50 cents. Last we checked it's worth a couple hundred dollars.

/me screams inside.

I have Abbey Road on vinyl but it's a reprint. If that was one of the originals.. consider your brother to be very lucky.

Back on topic - I find garage sales to be too white trash for my liking so I do not participate in the event. Although if there are Beatles records.. it looks like I would be stuck having to go.

[TomX]

I thought this would make a great topic a few nights ago. Have fun with this one.

I once scored Quake 2: Quad Damage for 1 dollar.

I also scored about 400 Magic The Gathering cards for 8 bucks. among them were quite a few rares.

What kinds of sweet deals have YOU found at garage/yard sales?

I know multiple rares for which 400 cards includuing a few rares isn't worth $8 :P

[fingal]

Never really found anything of any great value at a sale like that, but I had the following fantasy earlier today. Please indulge me! I turn up at a sale and the following takes place:

Me: Hey, what's that over there?
Fella: That's a job lot! My son emigrated earlier this year and ... well, you know he couldn't take his Fender Strat and amp with him. Just too expensive to export. The Takamine couldn't go either.
Me: I'll give you £200 for the lot.
Fella: What!! You must think I'm an idiot mate. Those guitars are worth at least £450 each, and the amp is worth £220.
Me: Nah, the Strat is a cheap Mexican imitation... The amp looks tatty and that Takamine! More like a 'tacky meany' ... It's damaged.
Fella: I'll damage you if you don't shut ...
Me: I'm the reason your son emigrated!
Fella: I'll take £100.
Me: Very wise. Nice doing business with you.

Of course, such aggressive negotiations would never take place between me and anyone else, but what are fantasies for? And the one thing I really want is a Strat, a Takamine and an amp. I just need a spare GBP 1200. Thinking about them actually sends my heart-rate up ... can you believe it?

- fingal

[cosmicbrat]

A Conpaq 2880H notebook, without any damages... except for someone removed the modem, and it doesn't have a CD ROM...

And a collection of mint 45's, most of them in their original jackets.. 350 of the most valuable 1960's 45's... some worth $150 each to serious collectors.. all for 25 bucks... But that's not the best part of it.. The spooky coke head alkie, local bad guy, used records dealer, sharpydoo pawn shop owner.. arrived at the garage sale a couple seconds after I did.. and nearly dove at the records, while I asked, "Will you take 20 bucks for this stack of obsolete records?".. And while ole spooky was about to grab the box from me, she said "I'll take $25." OK says I", as I hands her the coin...
HotDam! was spooky ever PISSED!.. I could still hear him cussing and mumbling about it, a thousand feet away on his way to his car.. I'm bets he was just about to cry...

Another time I bought a tattered filthy baseball-card album for $1.50...
...Sale of three of the cards paid my $450 months rent... then I sent the album to my brother in Calgary... He kept the best card for his mantle, and sent me $545.. and made another $830 for himself selling the rest of the cards...

The very best deals are at those big city fleamarkets.. but you need to be real sharp and quick to get the super deals... I got so good at it, that a group of seasoned sellers approached me.. begging me to not come to the fleamarket the next weekend, so they could get in on some super deals too...

Biggest tip I can give you in dickering at a used stuff sale.. is, NEVER look a Christian in the eyes while you are dickering with it.. not even for a second!..

There was one time I watched three super slick sharpydoo horsetrader guys, each with two handfulls of valuable antique tools, that a young gentleman fellow was selling from his recently diceased father's top class workshop... The sharpies looked the Christian straight in the eyes and made their offers.. and all three got turned down flat... I waited till they moved a hundred feet away.. and approached the seller's table.. and pulled all the tools they had picked out into a pile infront of me.. and offered him half of what he would have got from them.. all the while holding my eyes to my knees.. and the guy thought, and thought.. and tried desperately to get me to look into his eyes, but to no avail.. and eventually said "OK"..
As I strutted away with my precious booty, the sharpies confronted me... "How did you get them, when we couldn't???, and you got it all for a quarter what we offered???"... They didn't know which way to look... They all seemed just about ready to cry...
I grinned proud.. and said, "The big secret is.. NEVER Ever look a Christian in the eyes when you are dickering with it!.. Christians are taught that they are gods.. and you Never look a god straight in the eyes.. EVER!"...