Garage/Estate Sale Success?

[JustinD]

Never even came close to finding anything other than something someone was trying to sell at less than 5 or 10x what it was actually worth.

[keithsky]

I have never found anything good at a garage sale worth anything. I find it comical that whenever you run across something that looks of value on eBay the clown selling it always says he got it from an estate sale. Total red flag in my opinion, never any authenticity just always says it came from an estate sale like it's their way to make it sound like it's real when I would guess most of the time if not all its fake. Like a lot of Babe Ruth items always seems to be found it at an estate sale or was my grandpa's from an estate sale some excuse which they know they've got it from someplace else. What's the chance of all these high end looking items coming from an estate sale?
I would say slim to none

[Orioles1954]

Last year I bought a 1961 Hartland Rocky Colavito at a yard sale for ten bucks.

[deeg23]

I've had much better luck at my local auction house and a couple of flea markets (and even ebay) than garage/estate sales.

[skelly]

Yes, Yes, Yes to the local auction house. Many times they will sell cards mixed in with the dining room set, costume jewelry, paintings etc... I've seen it play both ways. Good stuff selling for pennies on the dollar and I've seen a binder of about 500 vg 1976 topps cards with some stars sell for over $300, which is basically more than a Nrmt set goes for. The thing with the Estate & Garage Sales is this. By all means if you have the time and they aren't too far, never hurts to check things out, but this isn't 1983 when people weren't really aware of what they had, baseball card values etc... Nowadays people are generally prone to think that their 1960 Willie Mays card with two big creases is worth at least half book. It puts you the attendee in a weird situation when you explain that it's basically a $15.00 card and you would be willing to pay maybe $7.00-$8.00 if that.

[insidethewrapper]

It's hard to believe in all the estate auctions, farm auctions etc. I have never found anything related to baseball cards. I thought some tobacco cards would show up sometime.

My best luck was running a local ad in the newspaper for pre-1980 only material. Got some 1950's Red Man cards, 1950's Topps and once a bunch of 1933 Goudey's with 3 Ruth's. Never 19th Century or T206's.

[DBesse27]

Went to a yard sale where a guy was selling pre-war Uncle Jack's Candy cards. The cards were in poor condition but still, they were only $2 to $5 apiece. Scored a Jimmy Foxx.