Sick of hearing your friends gloat about the couch they got
for $50 at an estate sale while all you ever seem to find
are crocheted potholders and mugs with racy sayings on them?
You'll have to do some skill-building. While scoring at garage
and rummage sales is about 75 percent luck, estate sales put
true expertise to the test.
Estate sales are almost always held when an older person
has died or is moving to a retirement home. Every single
thing in the house--from furniture and rugs to bottle openers
and wrapping paper--is for sale unless marked otherwise.
There won't be any extreme-sports equipment or CDs. There
will be old furniture, china, silver, tools, pots and pans
and vinyl records.
Start by scanning the classified ads in the newspaper.
If a company's name appears at the top of the ad, things
will be more expensive. Professional estate handlers not
only adjust for their take, but they know what items are
worth--or have the means to find out. "It's not what you
know, it's who you know," says Judy Kuhlman of Estate Assistance.
She hires experts to price glassware, china, rugs and any
other valuable items that she doesn't specialize in. She
also owns a library of books on antique pricing.
On the other hand, when a sale is run by a handler, at
least you know it's really an estate sale. These days many
people know the word "estate" brings in the crowds, and
they use it to advertise what the rest of us would call
a garage sale. Is there a "for sale" sign outside the house?
Do you get to go inside instead of rummaging though things
piled in the driveway? If not, this is probably just a tarted-up
yard sale.
Don't be fooled by location. I once drove all the way to
Oregon City for a sale at a "rustic farmhouse" that turned
out to be a collapsing '50s ranch house on a big lot. Instead
of finding an antique butter churn, I came home with a polyester
bowling shirt with "Lorayne" embroidered on it.
A better indicator of a sale is the description of the
stuff. Even if it doesn't list an item you're looking for,
it'll give you an idea about aesthetics. An ad that read
"artist's home, paintings, exotic collectibles" intrigued
me. I figured the art wouldn't be great, but I expected
a quirky home reflecting interesting taste in clothes and
decor. I was right on all counts and went home loaded down
with painted furniture, brightly colored sweaters and even
a pretty good drawing. I also came away with a great mental
image of a recently deceased woman named Beulah who liked
to paint still lifes of her favorite figurines.
Once you've got your ads selected, you're ready to set
out. Keep in mind that this is exhausting work. You may
start out with six sales circled in the newspaper and only
end up going to three. Don't waste your energy on a sale
that doesn't sound that great just because it's nearby;
start with whatever looks most promising and go from there.
In deciding when to arrive at a sale, ask yourself this:
Am I hoping for a fun excursion that might yield some interesting
loot, or am I willing to stop at nothing in acquiring the
perfect dining-room table? Showing up the minute a sale
opens, or earlier, may give you first shot at the quality
larger items, but it's not for the faint of heart. "The
[antique] dealers will come and line up outside," says Kuhlman.
"If it's going to be a really good sale, they'll even spend
the night in a van out front." Like many professional estate
handlers, Kuhlman has a sign-up list for early birds. Fifteen
minutes before the sale opens, she hands out numbers to
those on the list and lets them in 20 at a time. "People
who have not been to estate sales and don't realize how
aggressive some of the dealers can be are a little shocked,"
she says. "You've got to remember that this is their livelihood.
They go as quickly as they can to get as much as they can."
By going later, you'll not only avoid the hell-bent crowds,
but you might get better deals. Many sales cut prices in
half on the second day, and this is often the time to clean
up, especially on smaller items and clothes, which are sometimes
disregarded by handlers. One of my greatest estate-sale
scores wasn't a rocking chair or a four-poster bed but a
1960s Marlo Thomas-style red vinyl raincoat with matching
cap--$1.50 on day two of a sale.
When you enter a sale, don't judge it by the living room.
Items here, especially ones in a glass case, are not always
from the home you're in, so they don't tell you much. Estate-sale
handlers who also deal antiques sometimes buy up entire
estates: Whatever doesn't sell goes to their shop or to
the next sale. Kuhlman feels that this can be a disservice
to the client. "If you're doing an estate sale and you have
a shop, to me that's a conflict of interest because then
you tend to take things and put them in your own shop and
give yourself a good deal," she says. Kuhlman, who does
not buy estates, will sell items from other homes if she
has cleared it with the homeowner. "I get calls all the
time from people who have just a couple of items that they
want to sell," she says. "The more you have, and the more
variety you have, the larger the crowd you'll get. Sometimes
I'll have two or three people's things in one home." Make
a quick pass through the whole house to see what's there.
If you liked what you saw, go back and linger over the rooms
that look the most promising. If you don't like anything
at first glance, you probably won't find much else to your
taste, no matter how deep you dig.
The best thing and worst thing about estate sales are one
and the same: You're scavenging a person's life for the
scraps that made them interesting. When the antique dealers
start jostling each other for a place in line or you find
all the family photos and letters abandoned in a shoebox
in the garage, that realization can be disquieting. But
when a basement reveals a potter's studio or a fully outfitted
workshop, the chance to glimpse another human being's essence--a
passion for weaving, rock collecting or African art--is
positively life-affirming. It's usually after you develop
a taste for the process, and start estate saling for the
pure pleasure of it, that those $50 couches start showing
up.
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Willamette Week | originally
published July 28, 1999
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