Important Lessons I Learned While Downsizing To Move Abroad

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hello beautiful people today I'm going
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to be getting into a topic that's very
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relevant for anyone thinking about
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moving abroad anyone I'm going to talk
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about what I've learned from managing my
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own estate sale yes as in I sold all of
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my belongings from my uh outside of my
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house outside of my home and Investments
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I'm talking about my car my plates my
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purses my shoes my boots my clothing my
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my pots and pans my decorative items my
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artwork on the wall I mean I found out I
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own so much stuff more than I ever
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dreamed more than what I realized I own
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when I'm moving from one from within the
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same country when I'm taking my
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belongings with me because when you're
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doing that you're not necessarily
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counting how many plates how many Forks
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how many spoons you know you're not
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counting any of that you're not getting
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to some boxes that are just storage so
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when you're selling your own stuff you
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get into everything and I realize I am
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I'm a single person I live alone I had
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two dogs but I realized I had enough
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things for three people and possibly
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four I don't know I had a lot of things
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but I want to tell you about six things
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I learned from selling my own belongings
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so if you're dreaming of moving abroad
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stick around because um I'm going to
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give you some great tips that'll help
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you with your planning and your
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transition into that so hi there my name
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is Marcia Hilton and I'm a move abroad
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coach I help black women who want to
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move abroad take steps towards that goal
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I'm an Air Force veteran a former
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corporate marketing strategist and a
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Serial entrepreneur uh my biggest
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company having been an a marketing
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agency I own in Houston with I don't
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know eight employees of several
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contractors all of that um and I'm a
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multicountry citizen resident I help
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black women save time keep their money
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in their pocket and maximize their
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profits from estate sales and I help
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black women monetize their existing
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skill set to become digital Nomads
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because you know having run a multi
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multiple businesses I've learned a few
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things um it's it's all about building
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though the cash Reserve because if
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you're moving to an entirely new country
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that's especially important and it's
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about making your move abroad possible
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and funding your new international life
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exciting New Life while you're here
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don't forget to subscribe to my channel
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show show you similar content this is
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the kind of stuff you want to know about
3:02
moving abroad things to help you through
3:04
the process all the good things and if
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you have questions from this video or
3:09
other questions about mov abroad or the
3:12
topics I told you I discussed and
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right so check it out go go go subscribe
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go um hit like if you really love this
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and hit notification bell all right so I
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have five lessons six lessons I added
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one at the last minute and I want to go
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through them now um I do have limited
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time so I'm sorry if I talk a little
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fast but I think there's a way for you
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to slow down the videos on YouTube now
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the first one I Learned was and it
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worked well out well for me is don't
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hire an estate sale company unless you
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absolutely NE you absolutely need to and
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if you do so make sure you do thorough
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research now hiring a company to manage
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the sales of my items it depends on what
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you have um how much your things are
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valued how much you pay for your stuff
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anyway and the quantity of things you
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have and also your own energy and time
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in my case I looked into hiring a
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company because I have autoimmune
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illnesses and sometimes I don't have the
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level of energy I have today as a matter
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of fact it took me a couple weeks to get
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to this video because I just wasn't
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having the energy I needed and today I
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was like ooh I have a little energy let
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me get this done so here I am helping
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you with that but I H tried to hire an
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estate sale company because I know I
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can't rely on myself to always have
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energy and feel well um that was my
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primary reason also because I have
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things that I really spent good money on
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my things and I wanted to make sure I
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could get the most out of it um and I'm
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actually in my house you can see it's an
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empty
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house all my things are gone but my
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house is on the market so
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I looked into companies I got a um
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referral from my agent she didn't say
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she knew the company was good but it was
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the company she knew about she sent me
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two two n two phone numbers anyway and I
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reached out to the company and I met
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with a lady and I liked her a lot she
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brought her assistant I like them a lot
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as people I like them and then I was
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pretty happy and thought I think I'll
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hire her because I wanted to go the easy
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route and just say I got a referral she
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came I liked her let's do it but when
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she went away to send me her contract I
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decided to do the due diligence do a
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little research and she's been in
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business for I think over a decade so I
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did research online her website wasn't
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impressive but you know I could let that
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pass let that slide but I went on to
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find some um her reviews and I found
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three reviews she's been in in business
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for over a decade three reviews online
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two of them were very very very short
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and they were from people that who had
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come to the estate sales to buy products
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so they weren't as relevant to me
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because I'm the person hiring her to
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sell my products and they were very
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short like two liners the third one I
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came across was from an actual client
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and oh my goodness that person it was a
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scathing review I mean she really just
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tore her up and it went on and on if I
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printed it probably would have been like
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two and a half three pages of copy she
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really tore her she went into detail
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about what happened and why she was
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upset so you could have the whole story
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or her version of the story it was hard
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to ignore that I mean that's the only
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after 10 years plus in business that's
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all I had to look at so I called her and
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I let her know that I just couldn't go
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forward with her I told her why and what
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I saw she sounds really sad and she was
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telling me Oh that lady was you know she
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was sharing her version of it the story
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but at the same time that's all I had um
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and liking her wasn't enough this was
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about my stuff this is about my money
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and I had worked really hard for my
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money and um so I decided to not go with
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her I told her I gave her some tips
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because I come from business and
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marketing and I gave her some tips
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because I was trying to be helpful I was
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like you know you may want to reach out
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to people you've worked for you should
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have a long email list from having
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emailed them reach out to them tell them
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you know a little background ask them if
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they'd be kind enough to write you a
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short review because you've been in
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business for all these years is you have
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that Client List please do that for
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yourself because I want to see you do
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better in the future I don't want that
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to come back to hurt you every time um
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but I you know couldn't move forward
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with you can't move forward with you
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seeing what I saw and that's all I have
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to go with so I got a referral to
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another or I looked online and looked at
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another company and she had I think a
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three star it was hard to find companies
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with good reviews in Google I think some
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for some reason I decided to reach out
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to her and or maybe it was Facebook I
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saw the stars and I reached out to her
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and um she I met with her and she was I
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I have a tendency to like people very
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easily so I liked her and she left and I
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asked her to send me a contract so we
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can I can look it over and make a
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decision she sent me a contract but it
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was like she just threw some words
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together on a Word document there was no
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logo there was nothing and that's I
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could have let that slide like the words
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were there but it didn't tell me enough
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and I also decided to do a little more
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in-depth research I looked on Facebook
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where I'd seen the Stars read through
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the reviews and she had 62 or so
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reviews every review was from someone
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who came to the sale to buy the products
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and all they kept saying is how cheap
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the products were how affordable all how
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they go to all her sales because they
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can always get things for um sorry I got
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a little pop up here for a very low
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price and that scared the heck out of me
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I was like no way am I going to I can't
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do that I can't do that that's not the
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way like just selling all my stuff cheap
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I understand I'm not going to get like
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you know a new new um the amount of
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money I would get for something if it
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was new but at the same time yeah that's
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not going to work for me so let me see
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what else was there so I let her know
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that as well I reached out to another
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gentleman that someone referred me to
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and he or I looked in another town that
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was a little further away and I found
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him great reviews even from clients but
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he says he does like the multi-million
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dollar contract so I was like I'm not
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that right my house is right now on the
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market for around 600,000 and it's still
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been here four months but it's priced
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right it's just the market and then um I
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wasn't looking for him to sell my house
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anyway my belongings didn't cost that
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much you know but he needed that kind of
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sale and that I wasn't that person so it
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wasn't going to work so I decided after
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all that effort and time to just go
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ahead and do it myself like I I can do
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this I just got to pace myself because I
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know my energy level I just gotta um
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I just gotta do it just one step at a
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time so from being you know doing
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project management and marketing and in
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business ownership I went back to those
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skills and I have a handyman who works
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with me when needed so I had him come
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and I schedule for him to come once a
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week to help me but I scheduled out the
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entire thing like I'm going to do this
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over in my case I'm going to do this
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over well first I went through and
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categorize my items and then I decided
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um that I would would you know just sort
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of do this over several weeks so one of
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the lessons I learned was as I was doing
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this was to price my items fairly now
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yes I was very disappointed when I went
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to look for pricing because and tried to
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do comparative P pricing because
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everything was selling for much lower
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than it started out but I had to decide
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if sorry guys I had to decide if um I
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don't if you could hear that reminder
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pop up I had to decide if I wanted to
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move abroad enough to keep this going or
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if I want to put all the stuff in
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storage and just lose money over time
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paying for storage and then coming back
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like a lot of people do and deciding I
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don't really want this stuff anyway I
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didn't want to do that so I was like
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I've made my decision I'm committed to
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my decision I am going to move forward
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let's get this done so I started getting
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on on the different platforms um and
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looking at pricing and comparing prices
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one of my first stops was always to take
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a picture of an item by the way I only
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did this with items that were high
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priced or items that were larger it just
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it just depending on the item depended
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on the item so I took pictures of the
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item I uploaded to I'm drawing a blank
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right now what it's called um Google are
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you guys familiar with Google imagery
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the
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Google let me see if I can do this for
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you really
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quickly I'm draw in a blank here Google
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Lens I think it's called I didn't Google
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Lens I think I pulled it up took a
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picture went to Google Lens it became
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really fast for me to do that after a
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while and it pulls up others that are
12:04
similar sometimes there are things that
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were rare I found out I had some things
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that were antiques that someone gave me
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two decades ago and I kept I didn't know
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but um I did that and I would find
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pricing and then I would decide is my
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stuff old is in worn out or whatever or
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is it in good condition and I would
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price it whatever range I found I would
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price mine either in the middle or
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higher because I live alone a lot of my
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things just stayed in in in Exquisite in
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top condition and it it would all look
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new so I just priced it from mid-range
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and higher within the range of what I
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saw and oftentimes the range was not as
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high as I would have liked it to be so I
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did that with my car my car was the
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first thing I did and I got pricing from
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Blue Kelly Blue Book my
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dealership and CarMax and CarMax offered
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me the most because my car is in
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excellent condition it was
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uh 4 six
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wait it was a 7-year old car and it had
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177,000 miles it was a Mercedes-Benz
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convertible it was SE 177,000 miles it
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stayed in the garage a lot I did it all
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did all the maintenance it was in
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excellent shape it CLE it looked really
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new and clean so CarMax gave me the best
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deal they offered 4,000 more than
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Mercedes-Benz did so I went with them so
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that went fast and then I've been
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relying on Uber since but I don't go out
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that much so you know and so I went onto
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my belongings which was a
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lot I decided to price the items using
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the different tips I gave you but there
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are more tips I can give you but by the
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way I have this um this download called
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organize and sell which is just about
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this about pricing your items organizing
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your items selling your items maximizing
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your profit um just doing the best to
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get to manage this yourself and make the
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most money and keep money in your pocket
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that's available on my website but I
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will also be sure to include a link in
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the video description so you can go
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through this process on your own walks
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you through I even give you templates
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that I use for organizing and
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instructions about how to use them
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because it takes a little time and for
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some people um I'm semi-retired so I
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don't really do a lot sometimes and but
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I also don't have a lot of energy so for
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me even though there's time there's no
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energy so it'll work for you even if
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you're working full-time or have a lot
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going on because I had really limited
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energy meaning really limited time in my
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case um so that and I still got it done
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all right so I learned to one not hire
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an a estate sale company unless you do
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unless you find one that's really
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impressive number two price your items
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fairly and like I said in the organiz
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and sale toolkit I can I provide much
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more information about that and and I
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priced took at a very fair um price so
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number three is promote your up number
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three of six is promote your upcoming
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sales and build an email list starting
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with day one so here's what I did what I
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learned what I did I um starting with I
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don't know if you guys have the you are
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on the nextdoor.com app but I started
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there uh they have their own rules about
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how you can go about doing that to make
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sure you read through it I started
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listing my items I provided full
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descriptions and in the organizing sale
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toolkit I actually provide you templates
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on all that so you can do it the right
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way and I went into Facebook Marketplace
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I followed their format I provide
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templates on that too to make sure
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you're covered and then I also went to
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Facebook groups that were local they all
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have their own rules but just make sure
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you read through it and I went from
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there Facebook was like crazy amounts of
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responses but it wasn't as filtered as
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the other places meaning you got people
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who were trying to get your things for a
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dollar and people are willing to pay the
15:58
price you list said it's all over the
16:00
place so I usually responded and you get
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you got to respond to a lot of people so
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I didn't use them as much until I wasn't
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selling something and then I pushed off
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Facebook but I kept it listed there I
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listed the items there because those
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people some of them will show up at your
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estate sale you want to call it the
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garage sale yard sale estate sale gives
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more of the impression of um they're not
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expecting to pay a buck for something
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that's $1,000 okay so you can say garage
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sale because people are going to be
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coming there expecting one1 and $2 items
16:30
all right
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so I decided to use those platforms and
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their others um I'm not going to go into
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the whole sorting through your items but
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I do provide that in the organize and
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sell toolkit so you can check that out
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all right then so third thing was
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promote your upcoming sales and build an
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email list oh build an email list the
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first sale I had no when I was on
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nextdoor.com I would put in my
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description if you would like to keep
16:55
updated I'll be doing this over the next
16:57
several weekends and here are the kinds
16:59
things you can expect to come in the
17:01
future weekends like by
17:03
categories and I would give tips of the
17:05
kind of things I had like really the
17:07
really appealing and attractive items
17:09
the popular items and then I would say
17:11
if you want to be on that mailing list
17:12
so you know when things are being sold
17:14
um make sure you send me a DM with your
17:16
email address and people that was the
17:18
easiest way to start my email list and I
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start creating that list so I could send
17:23
the emails a group um I would secure
17:26
people's email addresses it would BCC or
17:28
I think at one point I started using a
17:30
tool for that an email marketing tool
17:32
for that but that's how I started my
17:34
list and then at the actual events from
17:37
event number one I had a sheet and I had
17:40
like email and name and then I would
17:42
tell people please print and they would
17:44
come up and I would tell them as they're
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walking around if you want to know about
17:47
the things that are coming up in the
17:48
future make sure you add your name and
17:50
email address here and every week couple
17:53
of days before the sale you'll get dibs
17:56
you'll know first you'll get
17:58
notifications first about what's coming
18:00
up and then you see the pictures you'll
18:02
see videos when I've set up for that
18:04
weekend you'll see all that in advance
18:06
and what happened as a result of that
18:07
was people were outside my garage door
18:10
waiting like especially when there were
18:12
popular items I they were just they
18:15
parked out there some came really early
18:17
and parked and waited to come in and
18:19
they would come in and after a while
18:20
they learned to come in really quickly
18:22
and move towards what they wanted
18:23
because other people are going to want
18:24
it and then I allowed them to take
18:26
things and put in corners like shopping
18:29
cart Corners I guess and and just go
18:31
with these are mine and at some point I
18:33
had to start saying yes those are hers
18:35
those are hers and they would just sort
18:37
of start at one point they started seem
18:39
like they were about to fight over my
18:40
items but it built anticipation so I
18:44
didn't have any problem selling most
18:46
items so promote your upcoming sales
18:48
build an email list number four I've got
18:51
six minutes left number four organize
18:53
your sales by categories and take lots
18:55
of photos and videos I did that now a
18:57
handyman once I organized my schedule
19:00
and the weekends it categorized um I did
19:03
like Furniture which was my last weekend
19:06
I did you know kitchen wear I did um
19:10
clothing women's clothing and the sizes
19:12
and all that and then shoes sizes and
19:14
all that I did all that by weekend so I
19:17
did like clothing and and women's closet
19:19
items in one weekend I did kitchen wear
19:21
in another weekend I did personal items
19:23
like you know I had a lot of lotions and
19:24
things whatever those items brand new
19:27
items um just anything like that so
19:30
organize your items into category and
19:33
then when we set up in the garage my
19:35
handyman would come help me because I
19:36
didn't have the energy a lot of times we
19:38
spend an hour two hours moving things
19:41
organizing things putting them on the
19:42
shelves it looked like a little store
19:44
when you walked in I would go around
19:46
when he left and took pictures of the
19:48
items that were more popular or items I
19:50
wanted to sell more and then I would um
19:54
get warm and my glasses start to see
19:57
that fogging up I'm just so hot just
20:00
kidding all right so I would just go
20:03
around do videos after just walk around
20:06
and sort of do a quick description like
20:07
oh over here we have some wonderful lady
20:09
shoes and all that and then the other
20:11
thing I would do is just take pictures
20:12
of individual not every single thing but
20:14
just groupings of things or individual
20:16
items that I thought would be popular
20:18
like I don't know I had a gamer I had I
20:23
can't remember all the things I had too
20:24
many things but basically I just did
20:26
that I uploaded that to Google Drive
20:29
which I gave access to with a link to
20:31
anyone who was on my email list and
20:34
there are a pictures folder there was a
20:35
video pictures and videos folder there
20:37
was a list folder that told them each
20:39
individual item the higher the bigger
20:42
items the big ticket items um not every
20:45
little thing and they could see and get
20:48
excited about oh my God she has you know
20:51
a IR robot one of the newer ones I want
20:53
that she has a I don't know how big my
20:56
TV
20:57
was oh 75 in TV I want that right so I
21:01
did that to build
21:03
anticipation almost had fight fights
21:05
happen in my garage over those things so
21:08
um organize so make sure you your sales
21:10
by categories and then make sure you
21:11
take lots of pictures and videos so that
21:13
number one was don't hire an estate sale
21:15
company unless absolutely necessary and
21:17
make sure you do your research number
21:19
two is price your items fairly do the
21:21
research around that um but you won't
21:23
always get the price you hope for be
21:25
willing to to move forward with that
21:27
number three was promot your upcoming
21:29
sales and build an email list starting
21:30
from day one and number four was to
21:33
organize your sales by categories take
21:35
photos videos ETC number five is get a
21:37
friend to assist you as I told you my
21:40
handyman was helping me I you know
21:43
haven't made any real friends in this
21:45
town I usually miss my one of my nieces
21:47
says everybody's your friend um but I
21:50
moved to this town being really sick
21:52
with autoimmune symptoms and it took a
21:53
while to figure it out so and then
21:54
there's covid so I made a couple of
21:57
neighbor friends um that's about it but
22:00
my handyman I could rely on him to show
22:02
up and do it and he knew what he was
22:04
getting and not getting because he works
22:05
for me so there we go get someone to
22:08
help you if you can though um you decide
22:10
how you'll compensate them could be that
22:13
they get to pick the nicest purse they
22:14
like just a really nice expensive purse
22:17
or something you decide whatever works
22:19
for you and your friend get someone to
22:20
help you that was number five number six
22:22
is save furniture for last like my house
22:25
is on the market but I was going to be
22:27
living in this house while while selling
22:29
all my things so I pulled away clothing
22:31
and things that I know I'll need and
22:33
keep even with my relocation we um and
22:38
then I need my bed I need my furniture
22:40
so I kept that for last and also those
22:43
big items you're going to get either
22:44
people who have absolutely no interest
22:46
or you're G to get people who want to
22:48
buy in my case people are like oh I'll
22:50
buy everything like they were excited
22:52
like how much but depending on the price
22:54
they some people couldn't afford it um I
22:56
mean I bought some pricey pieces of
22:58
Furniture so I ended up having some
23:02
people buy some smaller items and then I
23:04
had two one individual by quite a few
23:07
items like a room full of items
23:09
basically if you counted the items and
23:11
then one final family that bought
23:13
everything else everything like they
23:16
just kept adding it up on their sheet of
23:18
paper because I had the pricing stickers
23:20
and they're like I want the full bedroom
23:21
set my wife wants the living room and
23:24
you know they were just we want your
23:26
desk in your office that's a nice desk
23:28
but they had already come through in the
23:30
previous sales and I would give a couple
23:31
people who were interested tours of the
23:33
house so they could see I wanted them to
23:35
get excited and they were about what was
23:37
coming in the future on the because they
23:39
could see the calendar they saw what was
23:40
scheduled and they were ready to buy
23:43
those pieces of furniture and they did
23:45
so that was how I managed it now my
23:48
house I don't have a lot of control over
23:50
that just gota wait the markets slow
23:52
down summertime I went to Mexico for
23:55
about seven weeks came back and I'm
23:57
sitting here so right now don't laugh at
23:59
me but I have a blowup double height
24:01
proud of that blowup mattress in my
24:03
bedroom and I stayed in Airbnb a few
24:06
weeks back um and I'm like I'm not
24:08
paying mortgage plus pay for an Airbnb
24:10
so I'm here um and I have things I need
24:14
everything I need plus the clothing I'm
24:15
keeping and all that so I'm good but
24:18
it's not as comfortable as having your
24:20
own stuff but those are the six things I
24:22
learned well six that I'm sharing with
24:25
you today I learned a lot more from
24:27
having a managing my own estate sale yes
24:31
estate sale not garage sale not yard
24:34
sale what are you selling like dollar
24:35
items no so that's what I learned hope
24:38
you got something new out of it don't
24:39
forget to subscribe don't forget to turn
24:42
on notifications for when I go live I'd
24:44
be happy to answer your questions how
24:45
however I can and um don't forget
24:49
to subscribe oh hit a thumbs up if you
24:52
really got something out of this video
24:54
really like the video and also letting
24:56
YouTube know this is the kind of stuff
24:57
you want to see more of slow down the
25:00
video if I was talking too fast I am out
25:02
of time I have exactly one minute left
25:05
you take
25:06
care have a great day bye-bye
25:15
[Music]