Author Topic: Sell clothes or just donate  (Read 4210 times)

apennysaved

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Sell clothes or just donate
« on: September 06, 2014, 01:38:05 PM »
I quit working in the fall of last year to be a SAHM with the birth of our second child.  Needless to say, I have gathered tons of clothes over my working career and seriously need to downsize my wardrobe. Most of these were purchases before stumbling across this blog.  Do you guys think it is worth the time to try to sell clothes on Ebay, Craigslist, or local facebook group?  I was thinking about selling my nicer work clothes (Jones New York, Ann Taylor, etc.) and maybe donating the less expensive, casual stuff (GAP, Old Navy, etc.).  My husband feels that it may be more beneficial for us to just take the tax deduction on everything and focus my time elsewhere on saving (i.e. we primarily cook from home, but I don't really meal plan based on sales/coupons; making more of our own baby food; make our own household cleaners, etc).  Actually looking around the house, I am just overwhelmed with the amount of clothes, books, nick nacks, random kitchenware, etc that we have gathered.  Now that the baby is older and our toddler is in preK, I have more time to focus on getting rid of stuff either by selling or donating.  What do you think?  Sell the more expensive items or just donate it all?

Calvawt

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Re: Sell clothes or just donate
« Reply #1 on: September 06, 2014, 02:01:41 PM »
I sold a bunch at a garage sale and then donated the rest.  If you have some pieces that might sell for more, you could try the online options first.  Also, selling baby stuff at garage sales can make a good bit of cash.  We made about $600 two weeks ago.

MoneyCat

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Re: Sell clothes or just donate
« Reply #2 on: September 06, 2014, 02:06:54 PM »
Use the donation calculator on the Salvation Army website to calculate whether you would make more money through a deduction on your taxes from donating than you would from a Garage Sale (also factoring in the "time cost" of operating a Garage Sale).  Donations generally make more sense if you itemize your deductions and if the clothes won't sell for more than the standard donation value (like through websites like Thred Up etc.)

ambimammular

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Re: Sell clothes or just donate
« Reply #3 on: September 06, 2014, 02:12:44 PM »
Is there a consignment store nearby? Usually they take a cut, but you'll still end up with more than you would selling at a garage sale.

Rebecca Stapler

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Re: Sell clothes or just donate
« Reply #4 on: September 06, 2014, 02:13:12 PM »
It sounds like you're ready to have a yard sale with stuff -- not just clothes. Do you think you'd be able to put together a yard sale in the next few weeks? I would start there. It'll take you a few hours to set up and a few hours of sitting in your driveway, haggling. But no one's going to take a cut of your profit ;)

For the items that you haven't sold, but are still possible re-sell items (children's stuff, nice clothes), you could look into these options:


stlbrah

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Re: Sell clothes or just donate
« Reply #5 on: September 06, 2014, 02:37:54 PM »
the only way i can make selling cheaper clothes worth it is selling them as a "LOT"

like "LOT OF 6 Dockers" when selling 1 pair of used $28 (when new) dockers for $4 isn't really worth selling

La Bibliotecaria Feroz

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Re: Sell clothes or just donate
« Reply #6 on: September 06, 2014, 03:52:49 PM »
I've had success using a consignment store for nicer pieces. Sometimes there is a minimum number of items--I think I had to start with 10, but I used a store that did both women's and children's, so it wasn't a problem.

But yes, you should do more meal planning, too :-). Mr. FP has abdicated his role as shopper and meal planner now that the school year has started (he's a teacher--his last job was a boarding school and we ate most dinners in the dining hall, so we weren't really in a shopping/cooking rhythm before), so I'm getting into this, too. I just checked out this book An Everlasting Meal by Adler that's supposed to be really good.

(FWIW, I don't find making one's own baby food to be that useful. Buy a few jars to make sure they don't have allergies, then just throw whatever you're eating in a mini food processor or whatever you have and mush it up for baby. My #2 baby was eating tiny pieces of ham, pork, and even steak by 6 months.)