Selling Your “Stuff” Online

Our car garages usually become storage spaces for all of our “stuff.” If we need more space, many people choose to pay for a storage unit. There are over 23 Million storage units in the U.S., which equates to roughly one storage unit per 14 people! Instead of paying to keep “stuff” that we no longer use, why not sell it to someone else that will use it and get part of what you paid for it back?

This article will share my three favorite sites I use to sell the “stuff” we as a family no longer use. There are hundreds of sites available where you can sell your stuff online; these are the ones we use.

My Number 1 choice of where to sell our stuff online is eBay. We have used eBay for over a decade to sell our kid’s clothes once they grow out of them and gently used toys. eBay makes it very easy to post, sell, and ship whatever you want to sell.

On eBay, you can sell your stuff and ship it across the country or the globe a lot easier than you would imagine. For this reason, this is our favorite site to sell smaller, shippable items. Follow our “12 Simple Steps to Start Selling on eBay” to learn how.

OfferUp is an app that allows you to list everything and anything you want to sell locally. I mostly use it to sell items that would be too bulky or expensive to ship, for example, strollers and bigger kid’s toys, think train sets & dollhouses. With OfferUp, we sell things that people have to pick-up because shipping would make it too expensive. Since you are meeting the buyer in person, there is no need to set-up a payment app. The buyer usually pays in cash.

Facebook Marketplace is another one of our favorites to list items that we do not want to ship. If you are going to list items on Facebook Marketplace, you want to make sure to become a member of any local “Garage Sale” groups or local “Buy, Sell & Trade” groups BEFORE you list an item. You want to join the groups with the most members so that you have the biggest audience. I recommend limiting yourself to a 50-mile radius. You never know how far people are willing to drive, and in my experience, an hour is the limit for most.

If your items fall under a specific niche category, don’t be afraid to niche down when joining Facebook selling groups. Unless the group says explicitly it is for selling, make sure to read the rules about selling items so that you do not get kicked out! Most groups will allow you to post an item for sale here and there, but if all of a sudden, you are going to post ten different items, that might be a problem. Always check the group rules about posting items for sale.

You want to join the groups with the most members so that you have the biggest audience. I recommend limiting yourself to a 50-mile radius. You never know how far people are willing to drive, and in my experience, an hour is the limit for most.

Now let’s start looking at all the stuff you have around the house, in your garage, closet, kid’s closet, toys that they do not play with, and think about how you can sell all of it.