Would you turn it down??

[Rick Potter]

Here I am trying to get rid of extra shop stuff, and the wife asks me to go to an estate sale to look at a bed she wants for the spare bedroom.

Well, we get there, and the garage is full of the usual stuff, plus some tools. It's the last day, and everything is half price and picked through. I immediately see a little Craftsman router table for a Dremel tool for $5, grab it, then see a never used Sorby 3/8" full size bowl gauge, a new 3/8" Benjamin best 3/8 half ring cutter (??), Great Neck 3/8 bowl gauge, a little HF compact router in the box, a box full of wooden toy parts, and pen blanks and arbors, a NIB Carter back up scrolling wheel for a band saw, and to top it off, a Dust Deputy with both pails and two hoses. All marked $5. Whew.

When we checked out it was almost closing and they just gave me all the above plus other small stuff for $20.

Would you turn it down??

I didn't buy the Craftsman TS and Delta 6" disc/1X30" belt sander both marked $50, but half price....or offer. I think I could have bought both for $25 total, but I don't need any of that stuff. I will probably give away a lot of it anyway.


PS: We also bought the bed. It was a King size which was actually two twins next to each other, because they both power articulated separately like a hospital bed. The actual mattresses were Serta Sleep Number air beds with automatic air pumps. We got it for $100. We are going to have a popular guest bedroom.

[Mark Gibney]

Sounds like you could have bought the whole house and grounds for under $100K :D

No I would not have turned those tools down. Score!

[Earl McLain]

They left you with no choice, had to. Nice score!
earl

[Carl Beckett]

This is how it works at the end of an auction. I sold a LOT of stuff from my late FIL for $1 (or rather the auction house did), including a sizeable pile of useable rough cut lumber.

If you do not buy it, they have to pay someone to haul it away.

What you do with it is up to you. Some people hang around at the end just to gather this type of stuff and resell. Whether you use the tools is another question - I have been parsing down my shop to smaller quantities and have appreciated less clutter. It can be liberating. Then you kick yourself because you threw away that $2 hardware you have hoarded for 25 years and now have to make a run to the store.... Goodluck finding the magic balance.

[Mike Kees]

Rick sounds like you were tempted beyond what any mere mortal could withstand. I too would have come home with stuff following me.:D

[Matt Day]

You can’t say no to that! My shop is pretty full too, so I kind of have a rule that any stuff I buy I move out something.

[Alan Rutherford]

About 40 years ago there was an estate sale about 3 houses away from mine. I bought a bunch of stuff near the end of the day and almost as an afterthought offered $100 for whatever was left. Gave them my number. About 3 days later they called back and I ended up with a few hundred pounds of hand tools, small parts, timers for hot water heaters, bearings, and nuts, bolts and washers in sizes I'd never heard of. Overall not a great bargain but not a bad one and I still have and use some of it. Recently was able to give someone who needed it a large box of excess hand tools and still have too many.

It feels a little personal accumulating things this way. He had made small storage bins from one-gallon steel rectangular cans like paint thinner comes in. Cut from top to bottom through the long sides and painted them with a flat green house paint. They're useful little bins on my shelf and every time I see them I wonder about the guy who made them.

[Mark Gibney]

Your story about the repurposed paint cans is from a different time. Hold onto those for sure.

[Bruce Wrenn]

Went to an estate sale last fall. Son has a DeWalt saw with broken handle, which costs over $60 to replace. Identical saw at sale was only $20. No Brainer to me. At estate sales, I find them to be over priced, or under priced, no middle ground. At above sale I could buy Craftsman socket sets for less than I paid in 1968. Just didn't need another set of sockets, as I have several sets.

[Zachary Hoyt]

It sounds like a good lot of useful things to me. I sometimes sell extra stuff here or on eBay or craigslist if I buy mixed lots at auctions and end up with things I don't need. I make a little money from them, and someone else gets something they can use for a reasonable price.

[Ken Fitzgerald]

You fleeced them. They made themselves available for shearing! Nicely done!

[Bernie Kopfer]

Don’t you hate it when common sense overrides good intentions?

[Bruce Wrenn]

Don’t you hate it when common sense overrides good intentions?


The road to where is paved with good intentions?

[mark mcfarlane]

... Then you kick yourself because you threw away that $2 hardware you have hoarded for 25 years and now have to make a run to the store.... Goodluck finding the magic balance.

I share this malady, but have weeded it down to one base cabinet of 'crap'.