On decluttering

Over the past year I have been trying to declutter our house however I feel I have only reached the tip of the iceberg and making a start is always good.  I have donated lots of things to charity that we no longer use including books, toys, kids clothes etc. however there are lots of items that I feel I don't want to give away but also can't be bothered to put on Ebay.  Eleven years ago I was living in Melbourne and one of the Mum's in our playgroup was hooked in Ebay of which I hadn't heard of it before.  She showed us the website and what you do and I sold a couple of things and bought a book of toddler feeding.  Then about a year later when I was back living in Brisbane I had lots of things to sell as my style was very country, old world charm, antique furniture etc. and we were getting ready to ditch the house and build a modern house on the property.  I sold about $1,500 worth of olds and ends and put it towards my first DSLR camera changing from my film SLR camera.

Over the years I've put things on Ebay and it's been a bit hit and miss and after a while I decided not to post anything because that requires working out postage, packing and taking trips to and from the post office.  Also things are so much cheaper to buy these days than they were 5-10 years ago that by the time you factor in postage it's not a bargain anymore.  So here in lies the problem that I don't want to use Gumtree and I don't want to use Ebay so my sister put me on to "Buy, Swap and Sell" Facebook pages.  I'm not a FB fan, I love reading blogs but I'm not into Facebook so I didn't want to join Facebook.  This also meant that I could never join a FB Group when people said - oh I'm on FB etc.  It just doesn't interest me at all and I love blogs and I have a private Instagram account for a few of my real friends and that's about it as far as social media goes.  So in order to sell stuff I had to set up a FB page of which I don't post anything on but set it up in order to declutter my house and pay some bills.

The thing I love about the FB buy and sell pages, just think like the old days of "Trading Post" except it takes about one minute to post your add after you've taken your photos and the best part about it is you are selling to people in your local area so once they buy something they are over to collect it the same day or the next day.  It has been the best thing ever to sell stuff that is good quality that I have perhaps changed my mind on, don't use or would rather have the money to go towards bills.  I have sold over $800 worth of items and this went straight towards paying bills like electricity and rates etc.  Clearing the house and paying bills has been worthwhile taking photos, writing out measurements and descriptions and getting stuff out to sell.  I gave up on Ebay and Gumtree  me and I know there are lots of scams on Gumtree even though people do have lots of success with this site however a closed group of your local Buy, Swap and Sell page has been a godsend.  I've sold handbags, kitchen jars, pictures, a mirror, fruit basket etc. decorating items, you name it I've sold it.

I highly recommend you get on to a local FB page and start decluttering as for me a local group is so much easier than anything else I have done in the past and it makes so much sense to sell locally.