We bought this one in July about 2 days before we went to California. Because of that reason, we've never opened it... until now! We knew what the big stuff was, obviously, and had a pretty good idea of the valuables in the unit (we pulled the bone ivory out, for example)-- but we had zero idea of what was in the miscellaneous boxes. Until now.
We should also mention that we hadn't been to auction for about a month before this, because we were doing an estate, so when we showed up our friends squealed with delight and our enemies groaned, and everyone was really caught off guard and didn't bid against us, so we think that's why we were really able to get this one for super cheap. It was also the day before July 4th so while usually holidays are bad for us because of lots more looky loos than normal, this one I guess worked out because no one wanted to work that day! We bought this unit and one other that belonged to a former tenant, and it was a mess. You can read about THAT at StorageTreasures.com.
Anyways, back to this blog. For starters, here's what the unit looked like when the doors rolled open:
We liked the medical equipment-- medical equipment usually screams "estate" -- so we were banking on that. We bought the unit for $50, so with the bed and the chairs, we figured it was only up from there.
There's a twin mattress, a Queen bed, and 3 dining room chairs. See how old the suitcase is? Another sign of an estate. We still have the chairs and mattress (no idea why a twin mattress but a Queen sized bed, go figure)-- but we managed to sell the bed, which was in really nice shape, for $150. Here's another picture of the rails of the bed:
And another angle of the unit:
There were also a lot of miscellaneous boxes:
The box of ivory excited us, and while it's BONE ivory, which is a lesser desired type of ivory, it's still ivory. We have it on display in a retail setting for around $200-$250. Let's assume for the sake of adding things up that we'll get at least $50 for it. There was also a TON of costume jewelry. And some keys to a safe deposit box. Pity that that one didn't work out!
Lots and lots of Christmas decorations, but we'll get to that... it seemed to be a combination of toiletries / beauty products / and Christmas decorations. It was an elderly woman who passed away and the woman she lived with who was either her daughter or granddaughter. She was a business professional but had an alcohol problem and also a marriage problem. But she loved Santa, baby!
Tons of medical equipment-- oxygen tanks, which are VERY sought after from not only patients but also from handymen and people who do welding. There was also an invacare wheelchair, which is one of the top lines of wheelchair.
We sold the 8 oxygen tanks for $8 a piece, and the concentrator (pictured below) for $50. We have not yet sold the wheelchair but have an asking price of $125 on it.
There were three small TVs, which we will sell for $5 each, and a few blankets:
We ended up donating the blankets, as well as some of the medical equipment including the shower chair to an 84 year old man in Kenner, Louisiana who recently lost his home to a fire. He was asleep in the bedroom when a candle started burning his bedroom down, and he is disabled so barely was dragged out in time alive. The one thing he was able to grab and salvage out of his bedroom was his wife's urn. Poor guy. Here's a picture of his son and grandson accepting our donations:
We love being able to help! There's a reason we call ourselves HEROES. Back to the unit-- I was VERY excited to learn that they had lots of really really nice clothing, in my size! Tons of cocktail dresses, business suits, and other fancy attire. These dresses actually ended up being sold for around $15 to a friend but I did keep quite a lot of the stuff.
This little gem is currently in my closet! Too cute!
Another shot of the bed frame, once we got it out into the hallway.
There's a picture of the headboard (what the clothes are hanging off of)-- you can also see a better view of the chairs:
Again, the chairs-- they are nicely covered. A little dirty, but easily cleanable-- in good wooden shape, despite there being 3 of them. We will be able to sell as vanity chairs or to people who refinish furniture.
Closeup of the design on the seat:
A better picture of the concentrator:
And of the wheelchair:
We take a lot of these photographs as we're getting things out of the unit because it helps us to get the item on Craigslist straight away.
This printer was AMAZING. It was an HP LaserJet M1319f MFP and retailed new for over $600. It had printer, scanner, fax, everything-- and had never, ever been opened. I realized this when I tried to open it and started ripping off the letters on the cardboard with the tape. Factory sealed. I wanted to keep it but Brian convinced me we should sell it... and we did, to a lovely man, who is a teacher and a scientist, for $175. He's now an estate client and a reader of the blog!
A better shot of one of the TVs:
Another one of the printer:
See, you thought I was joking about the tape?
The pile of cut locks! I get questions from newbies all the time about how "suspicious" it looks that there are multiple cut locks in the unit-- not at all... it doesn't mean someone was rifling through the unit, it means the tenant defaulted- a LOT. Most of them do.
That concluded our digging at the facility.... we then moved everything and opened it up, well, today. (well, 1 month ago... I write sometimes pieces at a time!)
Here goes:
Lots of unopened, unused products. WIN WIN WIN. Don't sell these for $1, if it's something you use and will save you $3 or $4 later on, KEEP IT! The Sharpie is in our eBay packaging bag, the mascara and toothbrush are currently in my makeup bag, and the benadryl and aspirin are in Brian's glove box.
Sad to say that neither of us uses glo by J.Lo -- but I'm sure we will find a buyer on eBay! :)
We also found TONS of cosmetics. This lady has nice things and most of them were barely used. We found at least 3 - 4 bags of clinique cosmetics, that we are currently in the process of selling:
And one bag of skin care that made an excellent pre-wedding present for my cousin Beth:
Our girl loved getting all dolled up, in fact, that we were starting to run out of places to put the clothes and shoes!
There were also, in addition to Christmas decorations, Halloween decorations... a ton of them! unopened!
Be careful when digging through units, always. Do you see the glass in this box? Look carefully...
Do you see it now? Yeah, that almost got me REALLY good.
Oh joy... in one of the accessory bags, was... well... an ACCESSORY! We find them in almost every locker!
And here.. is a nice little novelty gift item called "Prisoner of Love" -- I had never seen this before and was quite confused by it.
Doesn't it look like something you'd use to tie something down in your truck?
Here's a video of me with the Prisoner of Love:
At this point I found an unlabeled home video tape- you better believe I am watching this the next time we get a VCR! It might be super unproductive and a waste of time, but I love watching people's videos and looking at their pictures on their phones and cameras. I just do. You obviously do too, because you're here. If Picklescoop ever lets us on his Podcast show again, we may bring some of these and do a Mystery Science Theatre 3000 with them, or something. Fun times.
Who cares about the plans for the month when you are GABBY?
This entire box is filled with brand new, never opened or used, tag still on them, Christmas items. We see this ALL THE TIME. Why buy stuff if you're never even going to use it? Just leave it in the store!
A close up of all of the items that were in the box.
We see this too, from people who hoard a specific type of thing-- that they'll even go to Goodwill to buy them, thinking they are cheap and worth it, and then never use it. It's only 95 cents but it's still 95 cents you wasted. They didn't even take the tag off!
What's this, another box? Marked Christmas? There's a surprise!
More stuff brand new, including some Christmas cards, stockings, and hats:
This one doesn't look like Christmas stuff, as it's in a fashion store bag...
WRONG AGAIN! Hey, SANTA, BABY!!!!! Not one, but TWO sexy Santa outfits. I mean, what girl DOESN"T need 2 of these?
Here's a box of books. They are all well kept in great condition.
You can learn a LOT about people judging from their book titles!
I always go through books to look through all of the paper / bookmarks / rabbit ears, etc. Sometimes you find cash, sometimes you find gift cards, sometimes it's just an ad or coupon like this one, but you still want to check!
More books that show us a little about our tenant.
We found over 20 books about either divorce, marriage counseling, or alcohol addiction. There were also quite a few about God, church, and born again Christianity. Our thoughts and prayers go out to the tenant-- we hope she found her way.
Se definitely was starting to make some projects -- maybe goal sheets or posters with cut outs from magazines:
More books. This one could SO be taken the wrong way:
And here are the divorce papers...
More books:
Apparently she was in sales as well:
SHOCKER! More Christmas stuff! I wonder if our tenant was Mrs. Clause? Or the former Mrs. Clause? :)
There's also some medical stuff in this box, which not only sells well, comes in handy because we get cut a lot. Did you not notice the gigantic shard of glass in the pictures above?
We'll definitely be keeping the gause, tape, medical scissors, and probably a few other things, and we'll sell the rest. Except the tubing we'll throw away because too many people use it to make drugs.
If you ever find medical equipment and cannot sell it, you can always look at the tags to see if you can return it to the place it was purchased/rented from-- there may be a deposit you can recover or a website where you can see what the stuff sells for. They may also hook you up with a customer who wants to buy used things for cheap.
Don't worry, we threw away the unknown lotions (after they got all over my fingers... eww)
Here's our cabinet in the warehouse that's loaded with things like tape guns, scissors, batteries, lightbulbs, and a whole first aid kit-- everything in here was from a storage unit.
ooh... this will DEFINITELY come in handy!
More thrift store stuff and brand new stuff with tags
Tags- even though it's clearance at Target, if you're never going to use it DONT BUY IT.
And don't photocopy your social security card and leave it in your storage unit! Although there were several of these so I'm kind of wondering who they all belonged to. We returned them, of course.
Every single box had some kind of alcohol advertisement on it-- I think at some point someone either worked for, or owned a bar. We also got some bar equipment, napkin holders, dart boards, light up signs, etc. Pretty cool.
This whole box contained tights, stockings, still in the packaging. All very fancy and either Victoria's secret or Frederick's of Hollywood. All different styles and colors. I will definitely be keeping most of these! (The less scandalous ones... and the others will do quite well selling them!) You can always use cute tights, especially with Fall here!
MORE CHRISTMAS!
FRAGILE --- anyone else picture a leg lamp here? We have tights to put on that bad boy all ready!
Oh, and this box is fragile, apparently because everything in it is also brand spanking new.
Another thing with hoarders is that they buy and buy and buy and end up doing it so much that they leave receipts and change in the bags, all the time. I'm wondering if our tenant saved this change and didn't buy half of this stuff, would she have kept her unit?
For the person who has everything and just needs more... its' a DVD that you can play... on your TV... to FEEL like you have a FIRE. I wish I was making this up.
And you get this... at the Dollar Store!
Time to play "What's in the Bag?"
Broken Glass:
Ooh, chocolates? From Santa?
Nailpolish! We sold most of this at yard sales:
PURSES!
Here's a video entitled: Purses and Booze, oh yeah!
Electronics... in the bathroom box. Because who doesn't need wires and cords and video games in their bathroom cabinet?
Trophies. Sigh. We find them in every unit. I have no idea why.
Here's my opinion of THIS trophy:
It's entitled ":What the crap is this trophy for, anyway?"
This leather box looked promising, but was empty.
Alright... Monster boxes and privacy tags! Time to party!
A lovely collection of DVDs... we sold these for about $15 on eBay
You can also learn a lot about a person through their DVDs...
This really cool hand drawn art was given to a friend as a gift:
We love finding stories and notes from little kids. I guess this tenant had a young son (and maybe a teenage son as well). I hope the little kid's not drinking Monster. HONEY BOO BOO CHILD!
Flashlights are another thing that are helpful for us to have. We'll add this to our stash!
A BOX full of office supplies. Some got wet but most is super useful or/and will be sold.
Pretty!
Looks like a box of trash, mostly is, it's basically everything that was clipped to the fridge. Found some awesome magnets though!
These are coming home with me!
OOH! Jewelry boxes are always super exciting to find!
Until they are empty. Santa Baby, can't you bring one little thing... A RING? haha.
More kitchen items. Love fun straws!
We find so many lottery tickets too. Everyone wants to be rich, no one wants to stop buying useless crap at the dollar store.
LOCKS! Many were cut in this unit, this one's still good and has 2 keys. We'll definitely be using this one! Disc locks are the hardest to break/cut.
And on THAT ending note... ONE boob implant! YAY!
So we didn't do too badly. We were pleasantly entertained, we got a lot of cool stuff, and we made a great profit. How big of a profit? Well... let's add it up, Storage Wars style:
Bed $150
Ivory $50
Christmas decor $100
Oxygen $64
Concentrator $50
Wheelchair $125
TVs $15
blanket and shower chair donated
dresses $15
other dresses - Rebecca
chairs $15
Printer $175
unused products - Brian and Rebecca
Clinique - some being sold, some as a wedding present
Stockings / suits - kept
Books - $63
Picture frames - $9
Signs $15
Halloween stuff - $23
Nail Polish $7
DVDs $15
Bottles $26 - there were boxes and boxes of wine, Patron, Jagermeister bottles, empty!
office supplies - sold some for $14, kept others
lock - saved us $5
dartboard $10
lightboard (Bar chalk board that lights up) $20
Bar stuff $40
We've still got a BUNCH OF STUFF left, but so far we've sold $996 -- our unit was $50 so that's $946 in profit... almost 19 times our original investment. Not too shabby! Looks like Santa came early this year!
Until next time,
We bring the fun to storage auction,
Storage Heroes
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