Garage Sales and Storage Auction Finds

This is a personal urban treasures article from one of our visitors, Paul, who would like to share his experiences:

My wife is a garage sale junkie. She has been as long as she can remember. At first, I was reluctant to spend my weekend mornings getting up at 6am to search for treasures among trash. Then one morning I found it, a Frank Mueller "Conquistador" series watch in near excellent condition. This watch would normally retail at over $10,000 and I found it scattered in a jewelry bin among fake pearls and clip on earrings. The sellers obviously didn't know what they had as they had it priced at $50.

My wife smiled and squeezed my hand, "it gets better" she whispered in my ear. She walked over to the sellers and asked if they'd take $30 for the watch. They agreed. She was my new found hero; I felt so energized, like a kid in a toy store!

From then on out I was hooked. So when my wife recommended that we start going to self storage auctions, I was the one that couldn't wait to hop in the car and get going.

My coworkers all laugh when I relate all my urban treasure hunting stories come Monday morning. Whoever said treasure hunting is for either pirates or bored kids at the beach is wrong. This is a hobby that my wife and I have been able to grow as a couple (and a good treasure finding team I might add) and we have so much fun spending our weekends together.

Last weekend we went to a garage sale and bought a pile of books for $3. When we got home and dumped out the box we found one book that made us both laugh, "Gold of the Gods: A 30 Year Search for the Philosopher Stone." My wife looked at me with her bright blue eyes, and commented, "Can you imagine finding the philosopher's stone? Wouldn't that be something?" We both laughed pretty good, but after finding a $10,000 watch for $30, I am a firm believer that valuable odds and ends surface all the time so it's anyone's guess!