Garage Sale

A garage sale, also known as a yard sale, rummage sale, tag sale, lawn sale, attic sale, moving sale, garbage sale, or junk sale, is an informal, irregularly scheduled event for the sale of used goods by private individuals, in which "block sales" are allowed so that sellers are not required to obtain business licenses or collect sales tax. Typically the goods in a garage sale are unwanted items from the household with the home owners conducting the sale. The goods are sometimes new, like-new, or just usable. Some of these items are offered for sale because the owner does not want or need the item to minimize their possessions or to raise funds. Popular motivations for a garage sale are "spring cleaning", moving, or earn extra money. The seller displays their wares to the passers-by or those responding to signs, flyers, Craigslist postings, Facebook updates, Twitter posts or newspaper ads. Sometimes local television stations will broadcast a sale on the local public channel. The sales venue is typically a garage, driveway, carport, front yard, porch, or occasionally, the interior of a house. Some vendors, known as 'squatters', will set up in a highly trafficked area, and not on their own property.

Staples of garage sales include old clothing, books, toys, household knickknacks, lawn and garden tools, sports equipment, and board games. Larger items like furniture and occasionally home appliances are also sold Garage sales occur most frequently in suburban areas on good-weather weekends, and usually have designated hours for the sale. Buyers who arrive before the hours of the sale to review the items are known as "early birds" and are often professional restorers or resellers. Such sales also attract people who are searching for bargains or for rare and unusual items. Bargaining, also known as haggling, on prices is routine, and items may or may not have price labels affixed. Some people buy goods from these sales to restore them for resale.

In the US, the act of going to garage sales has spawned the use of a new verb construction in the vernacular known as "garage saling." One who frequents garage sales is said to be going "garage saling." This collocation has become the common spelling for what has emerged from the oral use of the phrase "garage sale-ing." The pun "garage fail" has also entered use to portray a garage sail that has so few items that it is not worth stopping.

Some cities, such as Beverly Hills, California, Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, Sweden, New York and Bessemer City, North Carolina require that the homeowners apply and pay for a yard sale permit, and even with that homeowners in Beverly Hills can hold yard sales only in the back of their homes. Typically, these permits cost only about $10.