There’s gold in them thar hills!

Okay, so maybe it’s not gold --and there’s probably no hills either… But it’s money-- and it’s not just the spare change in the sofa either. It’s in your garage, your closet, your storage space or wherever you might you keep your unused stuff. Rather than let it sit there and take up space or lose value over time, sell it or donate it! Either way it’s extra money in your pocket. Have a garage sale, sell it on ebay – if you don’t want to be bothered or don’t know how, take it to an ebay dropoff or consignment store… or sell it on craigslist.org or amazon.com. Good rule of thumb is that if it’s taking up valuable space and you haven’t worn it or used it in the last six months or so then you should sell it!

If you’re really too lazy to do any of those things to get some money out of your unused items, then do this: Go out to itsdeductible.com, figure out what the item(s) is/are worth as charitable contributions, document the value of all of the items and donate them all to Goodwill or the Salvation Army. (And be sure to get a tax receipt and file it away for next year’s tax season!) You’d be surprised how much a couple of bags of old clothes and other items can add up to as tax deductible contributions! So go on… Reclaim the space in your home and clean out the closet, garage, spare room, storage unit, etc and get some extra money in the process… it might not be a fortune, but its essentially free money that you already had just laying around. What are you waiting for? Cash in!

However, if money is not your object, but you still hate seeing the items go to waste, consider putting it up for grabs for free on your local FREECYCLE site. Visit www.freecycle.org to locate a freecycle site near your community that you can participate in. It’s FREE to join and typically your items will disappear quickly. Freecycle is also a good place to look for free items that you might otherwise have to purchase. Folks are constantly giving away perfectly good items on a daily basis so that they may be enjoyed by someone else. Items are given a second life in order to keep them out of landfills. Who says nobody gives out anything good for free anymore? They obviously haven’t checked out freecycle!