Get Organized Pittsburgh

It’s nice and warm outside and you went to Kennyywood last weekend and want to find something different and fun to do this weekend?  Then why not join all the other frugalities and go on a bargain hunting expedition? Shopping at a yard sale can be a great way to find items that you wouldn’t be able to locate at a typical retail store like Target and the pricing is always rock bottom. This is because there is no tax and the goods are slightly used and if they don’t get sold at the sale than they will either be junked or donated to goodwill. There are always the stories of people finding rare artwork, jewelry, & silverware at a sale only to later discover that it’s worth 50 times what they purchased it for. The most famous being a Jackson Pollock purchased for $5.00 and after discovering its value was offered $9 million for the artwork. Knowing where to go in the Pittsburgh area for finding garage sales can be as easy as just hoping into your car and driving around neighborhoods early morning on Saturday and Sunday and finding the local bargains or you can save some money on gasoline and look through the Pittsburgh Post Gazette classifieds, the Pennysaver newspaper, and or you can go online to sites such as Oodle which syndicates it’s garage sale listings with a handful of other social networking websites and newspapers, as well as garage sales tracker’s Pittsburgh area garage sales section. If you are already on the road than no need to worry since there are iPhone applications for finding a local sale.  A service called EcoShop has created an app for .99 cents yard sale app that mines data from Craigslist to show you what local sales there are in your area. If you want a free app than garage sales tracker also has a free garage sale app in which you canplan  which sales in the area you want to go to that day and route accordingly. Now that you know how to find all of the sales here are some tips for holding a sale:

• Determine when to have the sale.  Summertime and Spring are naturally the best times and being an early bird pays off!  Winter is too cold but there are some indoor sales in the area just not a lot
• If you have a lot of stuff you may want to break the sale down into 2 days. Saturday and Sunday but if that’s too much than you can donate or give away everything after the first day   Arranging a charity to pick up the day after the sale will really help with clean up and make sure items just don’t get tossed in the trash.  You also get a receipt that will be helpful at tax time
• Advertising is very important utilizing the resources mentioned above as well as signage that you can pick up at any local hardware store or you can design your own sign just make sure that you put the address, arrows in the right direction, date of sale, time, and anything else that may seem enticing that you can fit onto the sign.
• Supplies such as balloons on the mail box, proper change, tables, tags for pricing, and cookies or brownies to get the children involved as well as enticing your visitors with a little something extra that another sale may not have.
• Placing the the parson in charge of the cashbox in the back of the sale makes people walk through the whole sale and increases the chance that they may buy something else as they make their way through.
• Make price tags big and place them on the top of the items.  You will be busy and the more obvious the price is, the less questions you will have to field.
• Have fun!

Rich of GarageSaleTracker.com

I must admit, I was the mess on graduation day.  I was really busy with work and had set aside the day to catch up on calls and emails and several projects that I really needed to do.  Typically when everyone else is busy and I can get busy, but on that day everyone was off and available and I was trying to work.  On another day that might have been fine, but it happened to be my son’s graduation day and I am looking at an empty nest in late August. I tried to plow through and I was stressing out because my heart was not in it.  I wasn’t able to concentrate and I kept getting less and less efficient.

It didn’t take long for my husband to notice I was upset and he had the wisdom to step in and give me permission to step away from the office and take the day off.  It sounds simple!  I make a living helping people find efficiency while aligning with their goals, values and needs but I didn’t see it.

Once I made that shift in perspective the whole weight was lifted and I moved through the rest of the day like a champ.  I had fun with my family goofing around with no agenda and enjoyed a memorable evening with family and friends.  Interestingly, when I returned to work I was refreshed and ready to go.

Lessons Learned:

1.   It is a privilege to work for myself and have flexibility and I need to step up and pay attention to that freedom and do what is important.

2.   Marry a smart man how can see what you need when you can’t!

It is as easy as flicking a switch in most cases. Stop immersing yourself in 24 hour news that is geared to be shocking and often disturbing. Be well informed and selective on how you want to receive information. Be mindful about spending more time with people and things that energize you and less time with those that are draining you.

Make sure to plan to do something FUN every day. Start your list or look over your week and make sure there are fun activities included. When you think about it, isn’t that what life is about! It simply works to insert MOTIVATION into your life.

The easiest way to do it is to simply start your daily to do list with the word FUN and don’t write another think until you fill in something beside that word that is fun! It works! Either you will add more fun to your life, or you will notice that you are already doing fun things and give yourself a pat on the back!