Rothschild, the famous financier, is reported to have said never to buy until there is “blood running in the streets”.
Whether there’s blood or not, Americans are flocking to flea markets and Craigslist to sell prized possessions just to raise money to pay the bills.
This means that people with cash can be snapping up items for resale later at bargain prices. The question is “how much later?” I suppose all times are good for “chattel trading” if people know how to do it, but now people with cash can use Craigslist to find incredible deals… if they know where to sell them! Others are being ebay assistants and helping others sell there stuff online as this article notes.
Struggling with mounting debt and rising prices, faced with the toughest economic times since the early 1990s, Americans are selling prized possessions online and at flea markets at alarming rates.
To meet higher gas, food and prescription drug bills, they are selling off grandmother’s dishes and their own belongings. Some of the household purging has been extremely painful—families forced to part with heirlooms.
“This is not about downsizing. It’s about needing gas money,” said Nancy Baughman, founder of eBizAuctions, an online auction service she runs out of her garage in Raleigh, N.C. One former affluent customer is now unemployed and had to unload Hermes leather jackets and Versace jeans and silk shirts.
At Craigslist, which has become a kind of online flea market for the world, the number of for-sale listings has soared 70 percent since last July. In March, the number of listings more than doubled to almost 15 million from the year-ago period.
Craigslist CEO Jeff Buckmaster acknowledged the increasing popularity of selling all sort of items on the Web, but said the rate of growth is “moving above the usual trend line.” He said he was amazed at the desperate tone in some ads.
You can read the whole article here
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