Thursday, June 26, 2014

Estate Sales In Gated Communities

Can Gated Communities be a good spot for a Tag or Estate Sale?

I have found some of the nicest items to sell in gated communities. Typically a gated community is an upscale, quality setting with residents having the ability to afford higher priced items. Their decor reflects input from interior designers and the furnishings are often newer and more stylish then many of the homes found on much of Long Island.

I just had two "by appointment only" sales in the past week. They are a lot of work since you can't print addresses nor directions and must field sometimes hundreds of phone calls. Each person requires that you provide the time and address and many are foreign language speaker so it can be difficult. I have started texting the address/time and that works much better!

This week we had a sale and only invited 25 people to attend over a 2 hour period.  The expenditure of each customer averaged spending $150.  That's pretty good for a two hour sale, don't you think?
These kinds of sales require much less staffing and the homeowners are sometimes a little more flexible about prices as they know that they have a limited audience.

My homeowner told the gate that she was having a party and we advised each client to ask for her by name and not, I repeat, NOT to mention the word Estate or Tag Sale.  It went really well. We didn't bother any neighbors, we kept traffic down to a reasonable flow and the homeowner was able to sell many of the things she no longer wanted. It was good for all!!

Happy Summer everyone.

Madeline