Spring Cleaning Your Life #011

see a buddy of mine. He's a photographer friend who also likes scotch, which is nice and uh, because we're not only beer drinkers, we like some scotch on occasion. You in particular, man, Yeah, I enjoy in particularly a nice smoky Pete scotch. Anyway, his wife posted a picture of him with a case of one of my favorite scotches, Talisker. Oh yeah, you love that one. Not only Talisker, but it's a special version of it. I guess it's called Talisker Storm. And this is one that I've had before

and it's really good. So I was like, you gotta be kidding me. Why are they picking up a case of this stuff. Uh. They picked it up at the liquor store right up the street from us, the corner there. That's under thirty dollars a bottle. Do you had to buy a case or do they decide it's under thirty bucks a bottle? I'm Kate. Yeah, Basically it's like, this is such a good deal that you need to get

that much. I'm loading up to get enough Talisker that will last me like the next twelve years or you know, next six. But this, I mean, this is a dude, This is a Scotch that goes anywhere between like sixty and fifty I don't know about six, like fifty to seventy bucks maybe though. And I was, I mean I was sitting there, look you know per bottle. Uh listen that twenty something nine or whatever. And so it was like ten almost ten thirty at night. Kate was out.

But as soon as she got home, I was like, oh, by the way, I got ago, you put your pants on? Yeah, my pants are still on. I went ready forbid yet, hopped in the car and drove up there and bought me a case. Man. Yeah, when you see a deal, you pounce. It's true. And that's a great thing. Like you know when you saved money and the deal comes along and you're like, this is my jam, that's when you make the move. Yeah, it was such a good deal. So now basically you need me to come over a

lot more and help you drink the scotch. And do we actually need to change this podcasting to be in a scotch drinking podcast or I don't know, we could do a maybe like one week we might do a little scotch poor instead of beer, all right, or do a little nightcap at the end. You know what, we are poor, not poor. It doesn't say that we're poring a beer exactly. Man, we left the doors open. Those people don't remember be the wiser. Oh man. You know something else. I think I was influenced to you by

my buddy. He he just sent me a picture of his beer seller and he had just like bottles and bottles of stuff too, And I think that was sort of on my mind, and I thought, you know what, Scotch is definitely something that never goes bad. And I was like, if Tyler's got a shelf full of a bunch of a dog fish head worldwide stouts, maybe I can have some scotch. And how did your wife feel

about you purchasing a case of scotch? She supportive or now she was supportive, Okay, Yeah, she wasn't sure how much I should get because she was like, well, that's just a you know, that's up to you to decide. But given the budget, that's your money. So it's exactly well, so in the end she was just like, you know, it's up to you. And the way I was thinking about it though, is that I might give one of

those bottles away as like a gift. You know. Yeah, my brother in law's got a birthday coming up, and so we were kind of thinking. I was like, you know what, I think he might like to have a bottle of this, and and he's gonna be like, Matt's a big spending exactly basically, look good, he's got it, got himself an awesome scotch sitting there. And so once we do that, I get to just transfer it from our giving category back over to credit my account. Nice

like it super nerdy. Well, dude, I'm all about scoring a deal, and a deal on Booze is even better. It's the best kind of deal you can come, all right, I wanted to tell you real quick. I read this article today and I thought it was fascinating because I've never thought about this before. You and I were both into real estate. You can hear about that listeners. You can go back a few episodes and listen to our Rental Property Basics show where um, Matt and I are

kind of amateur landlords and super into it. But I've never thought about this apparently, So apparently people that are selling their homes are using their smart cameras and their Nest thermostats and they're listening devices in order to kind of get some inside information. They're kind of spying on potential homebuyers and their agents to kind of figure out what people are saying about the home. Isn't that amazing?

Like are they listening to them? Say? So? Let me read this this This couple lines from the article tis. As homes become smarter, real estate agents and homebuyers are increasingly finding there's an extra set of eyes and ears on them as the tour properties for sale. Real Estors describe everything from old fashioned security cameras to newer contraptions like Nest thermostats tracking their conversations and actions. Fascinating, right. There's all sorts of ways. Like let's say you're walking

through a house. You're talking to your agent and you're like, I'm in love. This is the greatest house I've ever seen in my life, and we will demand this much even though it's listened to this much, and the sellers like awesome. That's an upper hand in the negotiations. They put in a low ball offer and I just say, no, I'm sticking to my price because I know how much they like it. Um. And that's so as the potential seller, I'm like totally on board with that because I'm kind

of sneaky. Yeah you are, but it's a but if I put myself in the buyer's shoes, it's tough. What do you think? I don't think it's cool. And I think if I were a buyer and I found out that that happened, I would certainly feel like I was tricked, um, And I wouldn't want to do that to somebody. I mean, I understand the desire for that, but it seems unfair and so I think that should probably be off the table.

Using nestcams and whatever, like all these different nanny cams, all these other things in order to spy on people essentially walking through your house. Well, it's not Yeah, it's less spying. I don't know, maybe it's spying. Definitely keeps

dropping at the at minimum. But I feel like these these technologies are so ubiquitous now that you kind of have to assume that, right sure, especially, I mean you come into a house and they've got the smart doorbell, and you you see other sort of smart home appliances, and you gotta think, all right, you know there might

be some of that going on here. Yeah. Um. I think the biggest takeaway is for anybody who's potentially buying a house and walking through with her agent or a friend or something, that could be really careful what you're saying, because there's a chance that you know that they might not even be doing it on purpose, but they might. You know, they might be in the next room and hear you. So just be careful about what you're saying.

Wait till you're talking price and how much you actually love the property until you're off the premises, yeah, or wait till you get in your car. Don't even wait on the like the front step or anything like that. I mean, that's how we were anytime, Like when we first bought our house, Kate and I feel like we were always super tight lips, you know, like zip zip it.

You feel free to point out the minor flaws in a place or something like that, but like, you know, don't don't talk about how it's perfect for you and your family until you're out the door with your agent on a on you know, somewhere else to talk about, you know, that potential. I'm so torn though, because one one part of me wants to think, oh no, that's that's just part of the game now, it's just part of listening at home, and but the other part of me thinks that is pretty messed up. You know, I

think I'm just fascinated that's the thing. It's like, oh, well, I guess that makes a complete sense of that's a thing now. But along for the days when you had to, like he's dropping person, Joel, if you wanted to to listen what your potential buying buyers were saying about your house. Actually, so that told reminds me of a story some friends

of ours. They went across to their neighbor's house, like across the street or maybe like Caddy Corner while an agent was showing their house, so you know, they had to get out of there while while the agent was

showing their house. And so they're sitting there on the front porch though, like trying to play it super cool, and they noticed that they can't get get into the house like they could the realtor couldn't get the key thing to work, and and he was like, should we should we like text him or like columns so they can get inside of the house. And she's like, no, like they're gonna know that we can see them if you like say something about not you know, getting the house.

It's like old school leaves dropping. Yeah, gona those days. Yeah, Yeah, Now it's newfangled and there's all sorts of ways that you can can spy on people. So don't start lauding the house, you know, and singing its praises while you're walking around inside of it, because you know, the homeowner could just old school hear you or be recording you

on one of their cameras. So yeah, beware. So our topic today is going to be spring cleaning your life, and specifically, we're not talking about cleaning your house of dirt.

We're gonna be talking about getting rid of junk, decluttering your house, and kind of making a buck, Yeah, making a buck on the side while you're doing it, because this is the time of year that people are tossing things, wanting to clear up the clutter, wanting their house to be fresh, and hopefully this episode will help you kind of figure some of those things out and make the most for some of your possessions that you're not just just tossing them away, um, throwing them in a landfill,

but that you're actually able to make a little bit of money and bring some sanity back in your life by clearing things out. But first, real quick, onto the beer matt today. You pick this one up, Cascade Brewing Blueberry Ale. Tell me about it, Yeah, Joel. This is a two thousand fifteen Cascade blueberry Ale. These guys are out of Portland, Oregon, and right here on the bottle it says this Northwest style sour ale. It's a blend of wheat and blonde ales aged in oak barrels for

up to twelve months with fresh blueberries. Yeah, Joel. So, one of the reasons I think I love these these guys specifically is that they're making at least Traditionally, they've made their their sours from wheat and blonde Ale's and that is one of the things I love about sours is uh are the brighter ones. It's corking caged, which means there's a fancy cork inside that we gotta pop. So so Joel's pourning that right now. It's pouring a like a reddish purple. So it's obviously got the color

from the blueberries. I can smell that sour, man, and I can smell what the rock is cooking, you, GIBROTI so this smells exactly the way I remember. I haven't I haven't sipped it yet, but I can smell that oak. It smells right, dude. It hits you like right on the side of your cheeks and just you start salivating instantly. It's like a like a blueberry sweetheart almost. It's really really good. This is still one of my favorites, and

I completely agree with you. I would recommend Cascade to anybody, and specifically if you're looking at sours. Yeah, I would recommend Cascade to anybody who likes sours. We've had over the years, Matt, you and I have shared some really good ones from them. And I do say shared because this is in a seven and fifty milliliter bottle, So you're really talking about a great bottle to share with somebody.

Drink that on your own at your own peril. So if you happen to be able to get your hands on one of those, snatch it up with something like this, you can drink it three years from now. You can just have it on your shelf, look at it and smile every time you see it, and then decide randomly one day to start sticking in the fridge so you can crack it open. You know that the following night, if only I can see you, you know, look at your beers and smile. I think my wife gets jealous.

I was gonna say, she's like, yeah, what are you what are you doing just smiling at my beer, saying they're looking at your beers, smiling, just looking at my my malt hop Barley children. All right, onto the topic at hand, Matt. We're talking about spring cleaning your life. How to get rid of some of the stuff that you have in your house that you don't need, and how to make a quick buck from it while at

the same time decluttering and actually improving your life. And the first thing that we need to note, almost all of us we have too much stuff in our homes and it begins to take up space, not only physically but in our minds. And so I know every time that I go through a period of decluttering, a time of decluttering, it is like therapeutic for not only my pocketbook and my house in the space space there, but

for my mind as well. Yeah, it doesn't. It just feel good when, like you know that there's something that's kind of been sitting there piled up like with a bunch of other junk, and you can finally clear it out.

Like you said, I feel like that sort of mental or emotional part of it is almost even better than just clearing out the space in your house, because you can it's easy to throw stuff in the attic or kind of tossed it down on the cross base, you know, with the basement and just kind of never see it again, or or pull one of those like you know what

what like a kid. I don't know, I'm thinking like Bart Simpson probably, you know, stuffing everything in the closet and then you like literally shut the closet door so that like things don't like fall out on you you have like a closet like that, a closet that things just go to disappear basically not anymore. But you know, I think we we do. We have had that at times.

And so every time you you do this too, or you clear out one room or you clear out you know, let's s your wardrobe or something like that, man, you kind of get jones and move onto the next thing. And so recently Emily and I did kind of have like a mini purging and we get rid of just kind of a few things, and we're kind using the local Facebook yard sales site to get rid of some stuff. It was really nice, man Like, it just felt like we could walk around our own room a little bit

better and the house in general. And uh it just man, it feels good to you know, make a couple of hundred bucks hand get rid of stuffs at the same time that you will never miss you not to mention, it's just less stuff to clean, right, more stuff you kind of have out that you have to like dust.

I mean, let's lose all that. I guess the question that we have to probably answer that the people are wondering right off the bat, is are we minimalists, because that's kind of been a trend that's that we've seen, you know, across the internet, like people like to claim that they're minimalists and like to try to inspire other people to live in that way. Uh, And we are

not minimalists. And I don't necessarily think I don't think it's a bad thing to try to to try to strive for that if you feel like that's best for your life. But it's also especially with kids and stuff like that. Oh yeah, it's it's it's something that we're

not going to strive for at this one in time. Yeah, with kids, it's it's especially hard having kids at different ages because there's stuff you want to keep that you're gonna you know, you're gonna use for say, you know, the younger kid, and you're just basically waiting for them to age up. And you don't want to toss something just because you know your older child has grown out of it and you've got a cup more in my case, two more children below that are also going to use

that thing. So it makes a ton of sense to hang onto things. Uh So, yeah, getting rid of everything as soon as you're done using it isn't something that is financially smart for us, and it's just nice to have it kind of on hand just in case you do need it. That being said, I feel like you can fall on a spectrum when it comes to being a minimalist. I do think that we are slightly more minimalists than you and Emily, I would definitely agree with

that you have. I try to live a more spartan existence, try to not allow myself to have the nice things. Uh, but we do the luxuries I do like, and I've I've grown to to stop shopping for these things. By do kind of like quirky knickknacks and so you know, a little decorative thing here there that kind of adds to the spice of the room. And your house is

like white and black and gray essentially. Gear stuff is are like stark, very clean, and we like pops of color and bright stuff and crazy stuff and so our houses paintings and all over the place fake animal heads. We have very different tastes. But also on the other hand, we live in square feet with with one bathroom with the four of us, and so we do try to on purpose aim to live in a smaller space. Um we think it's good for us as a family, for our girls to share a room, for us to have

a smaller space. There's less to clean, there's less to decorate, there's less to keep up with, and ultimately we interact more. When when you have a giant house, someone's in one wing of the house and you know other persons in the other and you probably don't see each other nearly as much, and kids can lock themselves away in their rooms, but if they're kind of forced to interact with the family in this way, we just thought that was important.

And that's an intentional choice on our part to live in square feet and to share this space together. That's that's just something we feel is important for our family. Cool. I didn't realize you guys were only living in square feet, so Joel and we've we've talked about this on a previous episode two. But the back part of your house you have set up as a as a rental, You've got at least out uh when year or you know, year,

long long term rental, I should say least um. But yeah, that's pretty awesome, man, I didn't realize you guys were rocking up front. Yeah, so the house overalls about two thousand square feet. We ran out roughly this the back seven d square feet to a friend. She's awesome. In my family, we live in the front half of the house, and so yeah, it works out perfectly for a lot of reasons. I mentioned that in the Rental Property podcast.

But to truly to on purpose to try to live in a smaller space, there's like so many benefits that come from it. There's less furniture to buy, and I think to like that's part of the American dream that people bought into. It's like and there's people don't think about all the costs associated with a bigger house. Not only is there a bigger mortgage payment, not only do you have higher utility bills, but you also have more furniture that you need to buy for the space. And

so just all these things start creeping up. And I think one of the best things that you can do from the get go spring cleaning your life live in a smaller space. Living in that smaller space is going to ultimately make it a lot easier for you to take some of these steps that we're going to recommend here to you in this in this show. Uh, so that you can sprinklean your life, do the big thing.

The big thing is to live in a smaller space. Yeah, and having less possessions is one part of like minimalism that I kind of aspire towards. And hopefully by the end of this episode, you guys will have some some tips, some pointers, uh, and some sort of guidelines that you maybe you can follow that will help you and ultimately encourage you guys to to downsize, to get rid of some stuff. And honestly, dude, I think this is gonna encourage me to get up in the attic and pull

some stuff down. I think my favorite feeling in doing this is getting rid of things that I use kind of sparingly or almost never, that really don't add much value to my life. And it almost makes it easier then for me to find those things that do add value to my life that I forget that I forget, like a book that I read a lot, and I go back to his reference. You know, if I keep that on my nightstand, but I don't have four other

books there to compete with it. You know, if I if I have like this well curated selection right there of things that I go too often, whatever it is in my life if I make it easy to find those things that I use often and get rid of the things that I really don't need. It just kind of everywhere I look at my house, I'm like, I like that, I need that. I use that as opposed to like, what is all this stuff taking up space?

War on account, it just brings focus to your life exactly truly enjoy the things that you have, and man, we're gonna need it. We we gotta do it. A full episode on that too, write like kind of quality over quantity sort of sort of thing. I mean, that's our approach to beers. Right, We're not sitting here a question six Coors lights, But I mean that that that does fit with us and sort of our our sort of philosophy on on what we like to talk about

here and what we like to live. So so yeah, Joel, I think that's a great rule of kind of focus on the things that you truly find enjoyment in and the things that you know you want to pursue and just kind of kind of cut the rest, go through your life and consider some of the things that aren't adding value to your life. So on that note, let's talk about kind of the rules for how to figure

out what you should get rid of. Yes, one of those things, I think, Joel, is if it's still in a box from say when you moved into your house, Like if you have some stuff that you have not unpacked because you think, oh, we don't really need that now will you ever really need it? Let's be honest with yourself. If there's something that you have, whether it's in a closet or in an attic, and it's still in a box from a previous move, it's time to

get rid of that. Yeah, I gotta be honest. I I've probably got a few things that hit that rule that I need to go home and get rid of it. Not necessarily in a box, but I remember one of our friends gave us one of these baby carriers like backpacks for hiking. Oh yeah, and I'm always like, yeah, I can't wait to take the girls hiking and put them in this awesome backpack baby carrier. And the girls are getting big, and I've never used it, and so I just need to like pass the love on and

give that somebody that's going to use it. So we we've got that's so funny that you got one of them we were giving one of those as well, and except we've used ours a couple of times, not a ton, but we definitely have thrown glover in there a couple of times now and definitely dotty. But those are the kind of things too that unless you're an avid hiker, don't even get one because it's such a limited stage. We're gonna use something like that. Be cognizant before you

purchase something. Hey, is this limited stage juice item? If it is, and I'm actually really going to use it, try to buy it used right, But just no, Hey, unless I'm like super into this activity, it's really only you know, six months to a year that I can actually use this item. So if I'm gonna use it once or twice, is it worth the money? Yeah, I consider just borrowing it from a friend. With a lot of folks we know that kind of do the things that we like to do, check in with them. Yeah.

And I mean, honestly, I think that's such a good rule of thumb for so many things, and something that our culture doesn't really lend itself to borrowing things from people like we all have a law more and we all have a weed eater, and you know, some of those things. You know, I use those things all the time, especially as a landlord. I'm cutting a lot of lawn, so I think it's okay to have my own. But there are a lot of things in life we should be a little more thoughtful about. You know, hey, do

I need to purchase his baby carrier? Or my friend whose kid is a little bit bigger now she's probably got one. I could borrow four, you know, six months until my baby's grown out of it too. And you know, there's a lot of importance to community in this and developing community where you can borrow things like that that you'll only need for a limited time. So that works on stuff in boxes, right, things you know, things you

have up in the attic. What how do you approach clothes? Like, what do you think about, you know, say, items that you have in your closet that maybe you hardly ever wear, like your tucks. You mentioned that the other the other week. Well I wore it, didn't I I don't know? Did you was that? It was like, come on, well, I'm not looking you up and down, man. Sorry. A tux is one of those rare you didn't have. You didn't have the tie on you didn't have your bow tie, right,

you have the jack in the pants? Yep, Okay, got it. So no, that's something I'll get enough use out of. That's a really good point, though, you know, that's one of those things where it's it's a rare necessity. You don't really need a tux, And for me, it was just kind of a more of a fun thing to wear that night just because I had it, just kind of trying to get some use out of it. But my rule of thumb when it comes to clothing is that if I haven't worn it in the past year,

that's when it's time to get rid of it. I can rationalize all day about how I'm gonna wear it, or like I really do like this article of clothing, but if you've gone through all four seasons and you haven't worn it once, didn't go on your body, you don't need it, it might be time to get rid

of it. We talked about this in a recent episode too, how like in reality, there's like a uniform that we each have and not like a actual like work uniform or anything like that, but like there's clothes that we wear. And I'm sure if you're listening to this too. You're

the same way. There's a few items that you really really like and you wear those all the time, and maybe instead you should just buy one more of those and get rid of like the five that's in other articles of clothing that you have that you don't you never wear, or when you do, where you're kind of like it doesn't really fit me that well, I'll just kind of wear it because you know, it's the laundry day. Yeah.

I mean, I think over time to you, when you figure out your style and exactly what you like to wear, you stop buying things that you're not into, or things that you buy maybe just because it was on sale, and you start to buy clothes that maybe or a touch nicer, but that last for a long long time. And so now I've got shirts that like the shirt I'm wearing right now, I will probably wear this like a hundred times. Is that Pendleton or Levi's It looks

like it looks like a wool shirt. Yeah, man, so like it's it's a nice shirt that cost a little bit more than most shirts cost. But I'm going to wear this shirt a lot and it's a staple. It's to go to. So have your clothes and the clothes that you have, enjoy them more and get rid of the things, give them away or sell them that the items that you haven't used haven't worn in the last year. Another category to consider getting rid of two jewel is

our electronics. With technology and the way things are advancing, Like there's never a cool piece of old electronics that you're wanting to keep around because you think it's gonna become useful. It's like, no, it's only getting less and less use useful. That the longer you have it, and if you stuck it in the closet at some point to not use because you didn't need it, it's only gonna become less and less useful. It's never gonna like come around full circle where you're like, oh, finally kind

of pull pull up the cassette player. Now I can use that motorola razor again. I've been waiting waiting for that that old no key of brick phone things are so cool. Although I think those actually are coming back. They have like a new fangled smartphone version of the yeah it, yeah no. I completely agree. I think when I have gotten a new smartphone at times in the past, i've held onto my old one, thinking you know what

I need. I need a backup phone. But ultimately that phone is more valuable today than it is any day in the future. And so what you should do instead of putting that phone in a drawer and holding it as a backup is you should sell it if you can. And if you can't sell it, it's a complete piece of trash that you need to recycle. Yeah, that should

be a very clear indicator as to the value. If you're trying to listen something and you're like, well, I'm not gonna be able to get anything for it, cool, it sounds like it's something that you should get rid of. To ye, if no one else is willing to pay you for it, then just unload it. So if you upgrade your phone, I think, or your computer or something like that, think about a couple of things. Maybeither you can sell it on eBay or Craigslist or something like that,

or on your neighborhood yard sales site. And if you can't do that, consider donating it. Consider donating it to a place like best Buy. Best Buy has got one of the i think the biggest electronics recycling program in the nation. So take it to your best buy. If not, there's a great website called call to Recycle dot org. Call the number two recycled dot org. Check that out. And there's lots of places you can find a place

nearby you where you can donate your electronics. You can recycle those things because when you buy that new phone, your old phone is likely worth something, so sell it, get rid of it. There's also eco a t M s where you can go, and they're in lots of stores, Kroger stuff like that, and that a t M will tell you exactly how much your phone is worth, and we'll give you twenty five bucks or thirty bucks or whatever. Um,

it's better than nothing. And ultimately, when your phone dies, there's no way you're gonna go back to the old technology. Like I mean, that just sounds awful. If you rocking an iPhone eight now and you have to go back to your like iPhone four s or whatever that is, I don't know. If you're sc like I've got, yeah, you're not gonna No one wants to do that. No nobody wants to do that. So sell it or and bank that money towards you know, another phone in the future,

or recycle that thing. And al So, those are some good spots to uh as far as where you can take some of your electronics. Uh, now's a good time then to go ahead and segue into some of the other places where you can sell things that you have that you need to get rid of. Yeah, and I think, like you said, some of the stuff is junk like. Some of the stuff that you've got is probably trash like.

And so as you're as you're waiting through your drawers, your miscellaneous strawer, whatever it is, like, some of that stuff probably just belongs straight in the garbage. But let's talk about the valuable stuff, because you know, some of it, you know, whether it's the table, a chair, uh, a lawnmower that you haven't used in a long time, whatever it is, Like, that kind of stuff is actually going to sell and be valuable to other people, some of it for actual use, some of it for parts maybe even.

But one of my favorite places, and I think probably the place that people sell the most stuff these days, is Facebook yard sale sites. Yeah, you guys have been unloading a bunch of stuff on there recently, right, Yeah, I sold a record player and a microwave recently on there and Facebook yard sale is great because it is made up of your neighbors essentially. I've joined different yard sale groups reflect different communities that are, you know, right

by me. Yeah, they're like kind of neighborhood specific. Yeah, and so you ultimately, I mean, you quickly know whether this person is a part of your neighborhood or not. And it makes the transaction feel a lot more friendly and less frightening than a potential the other ones will talk about. Yeah, and then some of the other ones. Uh.

So I like the Facebook yard sale groups. And by the way, that is different than the Facebook marketplace, So be a little careful if you're looking at the Facebook marketplace and there's actually like a little icon on the Facebook gap for that, uh that. I've seen more scams on the Facebook marketplace site, and people like selling stuff that looks kind of fake or like a really nice iPhone for like a hundred bucks and all these kind

of Yeah. So the actual yard sales sites, find one in your community, join that, and that's gonna be a good place to sell some of the stuff to people that live close to you. It's gonna make the transaction easier and just a lot more above board. YEA and those are the specific Facebook yard sale groups that you

want to look at, So look for the groups. I guess the biggest downside to using Facebook yard sale is that you're really only hitting thousands of people, maybe even only hundreds of people depending on where you live, as opposed to listening something on eBay, which we can talk about next. You're reaching a limited segment of people. But it works especially well for larger items like furniture and yeahs like that that you definitely don't want to have

to worry about shipping exactly. So it's like positives and negatives. Know that, you know, bigger stuff, stuff that's harder, harder to sell, stuff that's harder to ship. You know. Facebook yard sale sites work great for stuff like that, but you're reaching a more limited audience. Yeah. But one of the advantages to that though, are that you probably already have a Facebook account. It's not like you need to go on to say eBay and create a you know,

a brand new profile. Pretty much everyone is already on Facebook. It's just whether or not they're in that group, and it just makes it really easy to hop on there and start selling the things that you want to get rid of. Yeah, the barrier to entry is nil pretty much, and creating the actual post, especially if you have the Facebook app on your smartphone, takes literally like a minute. It's really easy to take the pictures with your phone, upload them, create the listing, and be done with it

and wait for people to contact you. So I think these has of groups are a vast improvement upon Craigslist, which is, you know, kind of like maybe more the traditional route that people have taken when they, you know, wanted to sell stuff. We actually sold our car, but traditional for the last fifteen years, maybe because before that you were like listing stuff in newspapers and the actual actual classified yea, and more and more, I feel like

Craigslist is sort of getting kind of phased out. There's not there's less. I feel like there's less stuff on there that I'm looking for. I'll still go on there if if I'm looking at getting something new before I before I by purchase something new, I'll still look on ebaying, you know, and Craigslist for sure. Uh, just partly too because it's local so to be able to go there immediately potentially and get what it is that I'm looking for, to get a second hand instead of brand new. That's

something I'm always gonna do. Yeah, I think Craigslist is really good for a few things and not great at a lot of things. What Craigslist is particularly good for if you're looking to get a good deal on an automobile, a used car, a motor home. Let's say, if you are looking to buy a bicycle or something like that's a specific kind. You're able to search by keyword. Even like specialty furniture can be really good. There are a

lot of people all the keywords. Yeah, a lot of people list that and so it's easier to search by keyword. So if I'm looking for Danish modern furniture, mid century modern, m yeah, I'll find I'll find a good selection on Craigslist. And there again, Facebook is great for this to their specific sites, but there's such a wide variety on Craigslist that I think for items like that, it's great. Facebook. You might stumble across that, right, somebody might be posting

it randomly. But Craigslist, it's it's super searchable, it's super easy to find and just broad too. I mean typically you're you're searching in either an entire city or an entire region. Yeah, Well, One of the biggest pains that comes along with that, though, is you might have to drive forty five minutes or an hour to pick up the bed. I mean, I I always keep my parameters really close, and I'm not willing to travel very far unless I'm like searching for something even bigg like a car.

If I was buying a car, I would be willing to open up my parameter's got probably be willing to drive an hour to buy the right car, certainly, But I'm you know, talking about a two chair or whatever, a hundred dollar chair. I'm not going to drive an

hour to pick that up. Yeah. I used to sell a good bit of um, like my old photography gear on Craigslist, but then, man, I just got sick of it because you'd meet up with somebody and then with you know, with the gear, they kind of want to try it out, and so you're kind of sitting there while they're like playing with your camera and just kind

of sucks, kind of weird feeling. It's just weird. And then they're like a lot of times they don't know what they're doing, and so they're kind of like trying to figure out how to use it. I'm just like, dude, I'm not here to like teach you how to use the camera. To me, that was one of the downsides I guess to to selling some of that stuff on Craigslist, and and and the other The biggest, one of the biggest downsides to Craigslist on top of that is potential theft.

Potential robbery. Yeah, like someone somebody could have just like run off with Mike. Yeah exactly, I can run far, but I'm not like really fast. So the biggest tip is if you're actually going to do a transaction, if you're going to list something on Craigslist, if you're gonna buy something on Craigslist, make sure you meet that person in a well lit public area and preferably at your

local police station. Because police stations are totally cool with that now, especially because of all the crimes that they've had to chase down, all the all the purpose they've had a laugh away because of Craigslist crimes. They're all about you meeting in their parking lot and doing the transaction there, or or if you can't do that, just bring along a buddy. Yep, that helps too. So then let's talk about eBay, because instead of selling all my

kind of camera gear on Craigslist. I started putting it all up on eBay, which is great because there's you know, people all across the country and even the world. But I don't do international shipping because it starts getting kind of I don't know, it spends Ebo. Yeah, it's expensive and I just don't like messing with that. Man. I just I say no international shipping shipp it. I'll reba,

I'll reba and so I'll do domestic. But for items that are more specialty and so for for instance, some of the camera bodies I'm selling or lenses, folks that are looking for those know exactly what they're looking for. They're not just like happen to stumble upon a nice you know, nice lens or a nice camera body that, oh yeah, let me drop a thousand bucks on this. No, it's probably not gonna happen. There's a much better marketplace

and a much better environment for that to occur. On eBay, you know, when you can have all the stats up there, you can kind of have leaking link to reviews and what other folks have to say about them. Eba is my go to site for these items that are more expensive that folks are looking for and they're smaller, so I can ship it and then just be done with it.

Do you have an eBay coundrel? So I got a deal on something around Christmas time, Black Friday deal, so essentially I bought a phone and it came with uh free Bluetooth headphones. And but then another deal came up on a phone that was even better, So I got a new phone. That was my new phone. My phone that I've gotten now was a twenty bucks brand new. It's it's a really nice phone. So I saw that after the fact and I was like, crap, that was even cheaper and a little bit better. And so what

I did. The first phone came in that I bought before I found this secondary deal, and I relisted it on eBay nice, and I kept the headphones listed the cell phone, just the phone, and I made money nice. Basically, you made money and you got some free headphones, not some free headphones. So yeah, I don't use eBay a whole lot because there's not usually high end stuff that I'm selling very often. But if I was, that's the perfect marketplace for it, and interestingly enough to depending on

what kind of clothes you're selling. That can become a great marketplace for selling used clothing, like nicer clothes. Yeah, yeah, like nicer, specialty, vintage whatever. There's a huge market for clothing on eBay if you know how to list it and you know what you've got. Yeah, there's folks that do it, hire businesses on eBay and they've got like their eBay stores and they kind of specialize in clothes only. Yea.

So eventually I want to have my friend Josh on the podcast who had a vintage clothing store on eBay. That's what he did, yeah, like full time. Yeah. So his job was hit up the thrift stores and by clothing by the pound, and he just had an eye for the stuff he knew it would sell and then flip it on eBay. Is this furniture, Josh and so okay? Yeah,

And so now he flips mid century modern furniture. So he's got another business that he started basically buying one man's junk and turning it in it's somebody else's treasure. So I love that idea behind a business. So I'd love to talk to him since he's done two of these kind of businesses. I'd love to have him on the show kind of help people learn from some of the lessons he's learned and how he's been successful doing it.

So then if you don't have a bunch of like high dollar items, it sounds like what you need to do is a yard sale, Yeah, old school or garge sale, depending on where what do you call it, you call like rage shale, yard sale, yard sale? Really yeah, I feel and it isn't in a regional thing they say that, like if you call yard sailor from this part of the United States, if you call it a gradge sale, you're from here. Probably I could see that. Rummage sale,

I think is another one. Alright, I like that too, Like rummage sale, Yeah, that's nice. I like yard sale though, I think and uh, I like that idea. And by the way, if you are going to do one, posting Craigslist and let people know what's happening, that helps like bring people out. So just say, hey, upcoming yard sale, here's the address, and kind of here's a few of the things that I've got that I'll be selling that day,

and then do the same thing. Post a few signs around your neighborhood letting people know that it's happening and telling them, you know, here, here's a few pieces that will be that will have. But an old school Saturday yard sale, you know, from tend to four or nine to six or whatever, that's gonna go a long way and helping you kind of clear out some of your clutter. Nine to six, dude, what kind of long freaking yard sale? I don't know. Are you running nine to six? So

I'm out of there, man. I just have a work ethic that like none other. It would be like the longest yard sale, like history of yards, the yard sales till I dropped. Know, some people do two days, man. They spread it out over Saturdays and Sunday and know if it's still there at like one thirty, I'm like, all right, everything's on the curb. Curb alert. Yeah, that's what I would do. You just slashing the prices on everything. Yeah, Like what do you want to give me one dollar?

It's yours? Yeah, But an old school yard sale is kind of the best way to get rid of stuff that doesn't really have It's just kind of stuff you want to clear out and make a few bucks for and hopefully find some life with somebody else. Consider that right after that the next thing to do, donate it. If you can't sell to the yard sale, donate it. And so maybe you have the yard sale first, and you you know, think, maybe you know what, I can make fifty bucks hunter bucks today by selling some of

my old stuff. If it doesn't work out, or you know, you're only able to sell a few items, that means that stuff is probably worth next to nothing. And so that stuff, just donate it, get your tax receipt, write it off on your taxes, or I guess with a new tax law, you're probably still not You're probably not writing it off, but get rid of it. About that, Yeah, give it somewhere though. That's it's gonna have a good home. That is better than holding onto it. Yeah, alright, Matt.

So you're the photographer. You're great at listing things and making them look extra special. Yeah. Man, the picture, I feel like that is so important. Obviously I'm biased, but you can do so much with a good picture to make your listing look good. Yeah, and the the I I see so many listings where I'm like, I might be interested in that item, but I can't tell the picture is so bad. And when the picture is not

clear or not well lit. I just move on. Yeah, folks definitely aren't gonna be nearly as drawn to your listing if you've just got this kind of crummy, dusty looking photo. But that's awesome. I mean, that's actually a way to get a potential deal. This dining room said

that we're sitting at. We got up in uh, you know, about forty five minutes from where we were, because Kay kept watching it and it kept sitting there on Craigslist with this literally like in the photo, the flash one off and you can see just like dust kind of like in the air, and like you can barely you

can't even see the other end of the table. And she's just like, I'm pretty sure this is a sweet, sweet table, and she kept watching and they just kept dropping the price because nobody was coming to look at it. So if you're in the market, look out for those kind of listings because you might be able to get a deal. But you know, we're talking about selling, and folks are going to be more apt to come purchase something from you if your home's kind of bright and

clean looking versus like dark and dingy. Yeah, and on that note, take thirty seconds to clean up your item, you know, wipe it down, make sure it's got that kind of gleam, that new look gleam. Yeah, you don't wanna whether it's a bike you're selling or a table or a chair, wipe it down. Make sure everything looks good as new. I swear people just don't take the time to wipe something down, and that can be the difference between selling an item or not. Did you clean

your microwave that you still you said you sold a microwave? Hey, yeah, man, you gotta clean the inside and take a picture of it to show people like, hey, this isn't like some nastified like microwave with like spaghetti's bladdered up on the exactly like fish guts all over the place, something like that. Jill's Norwegians, so he microwaves his fish all the time and it's just all over the inside of his his normal microwave, but not the one he sells. And now

we're hall a bit cologne. So that's when I'm into And also with the photos, the more expensive the item, consider taking more photos right when you can't. I listed our Volkswagen. We had a Volkswagon and pissat wagon that we actually sold on Craigslist, And when we sold that thing, I took a lot of photos because if someone's gonna drop a few thousand dollars on it, they want to be able to see every every sort of blemish or

you know, anywhere where there's a scratch. I took a picture of it because that's the kind of thing that they're definitely gonna see when they show up and look at us, Amy as we'll kind of go ahead and get that out there. Obviously, we shined it up and make sure the car looked as best as it possibly could. But but like again, you're talking about the cure microwave oven. You only need to post like one or two photos of that, you know, pictures probably outside inside, done right,

someone's gonna come pick it up. Twenty bucks, thirty bucks, done deal, a couch, probably four pictures, and Matt saying, take good pictures. You don't need a fancy camera. You probably just your average smartphone at this point, most smartphones have pretty good cameras. Just hold it steady, make sure you're you're getting a shot of the entire item, and and make sure the room is well it And if you do those things, you're gonna take a picture that's

better than the pictures out there. If you think about it at all, it'll be better than pictures. Yeah, but but it's like really important if you want top dollar or even just to sell your item, take enough pictures of that item and make sure they're decent shots. So when you're taking photos to do consider the background. Right. It's so, if you've got a microwave, it should probably belong on your kitchen counter, Like that's a great place to take a picture of your microwave, or like your

dining room table or something like that. Don't put it like on the floor in the corner somewhere, or put it on your couch and take a picture of it. That's weird. It's out of context, you know, yeah, exactly. Context is important. Nothing should ever be photographed in your bathroom, like on the toilet, Like that would be weird, Like why is that sitting on the back of the toilet. That's that's bizarre. If you're taking pictures of your car, take it to like an empty parking lot maybe something

like that. Or you you know, if your house looks decent on the outside, take pictures in front of your house maybe, but just make sure that it's in context and that you're taking these like good clear pictures. Yeah. Something else to do is to price compare. Even if you're gonna post on Craigslist, say we're talking about the car, look around on some other sites that deal specifically with cars and make sure you know what your your car

can go for. Obviously you're gonna want to look like Kelly Blue Book and sites like that for for a vehicle. But say, like I we're talking earlier about camera, I'm gonna get on eBay and see what cameras like that are going for. That way, when I do decide to list it, say even locally on Craigslist or on eBay, I know, or to price it. Obviously, eBay has got different mechanisms built in where they say, oh, something like

this goes for this range and this kind of condition. Um, But you just want to do a little bit of research. Obviously you're gonna do more of that with a more expensive item, but take that into account. Yeah, be realistic about the price you're asking for, especially if you want to move it quickly. If you're serious about decluttering and you're listing a bunch of items, don't ask too much because if you if you start listening to your stuff

and overpricing it, there's just more work involved. There's lowering the price, eventually relisting it, whatever you gotta do, and that just becomes a pain. So if you're just really trying to declutter your life and get rid of a bunch of stuff, if you're trying to spring clean your life, make sure you ask a reasonable price and negotiate with people. Let them ask for you know, five ten bucks off, whatever it may be, and be willing to work with people so that you can get this stuff out of

your life, because ultimately that's what you want. I don't think I've ever talked to someone who just got rid of a bunch of stuff and they're like, I miss all of it. I just miss all those things I just sold, and I'm so bummed and my life sucks. Now. It's so therapeutic to get rid of these things, and especially if you're able to make a few dollars, it feels really good. You will not miss the things that

you sell. Your mind will be freer, you will have decluttered your life in a good way, and you're not gonna miss it all. Rangel Back to the beer Cascade Blueberry so it looks like you don't like your beer because you still have a bunch of left and mine is totally gone. Because I love it now. I'm a huge fan. I'm just not a lush like this beer one of my all time favorites. I'm gonna like, literally, this is probably one of my top five beers, um

that I've ever had. I've had it before, I've had it maybe two or three other times, but every time I have it, it just sort of maintains its place in my mind, you know, it sort of sits there at the top. It's like on your mountain, rushmore of beers easily. This is really really good. And I don't remember if I've had this before with you or not, but um, we have. I remember physically having at the beach. I don't know if it was last year, a couple of couple of years ago, but we we had this.

Don't ask me why I know it, but I know it, trust me. And again, our wives are like, how do you remember the beer you drank together two years ago and you don't remember what I told you to do last night? Yeah, I know that's a problem, but yet this beer is delicious. I'm a huge fan Cascade Brewing Blueberry Ale, you know, age for a year on blueberries

and oak. It's really really delicious and uh, if you're into a little bit of that mouth puckering sour with blueberries, it's it's really really really good, perfectly balanced that at the same time, it's got that that tartness, but it's got just enough sweetness in there, I think, and that barrel aged oakness is in there as well, and so it all kind of mellows out. I think this is just like right in the middle of like the ven Diagram of awesome sour beers. Man, it's got it all.

So thanks everyone for listening. Our home on the web is how to money dot Com. We'll have show notes up there for this episode and if you like what you hear, let us know. Yeah, thanks guys for listening. We really appreciate it. And until next time, Best Friends Out, best Friends Out.