KonMari 2016 - The Life Changing Magic of Tidying Up

GreyQueen

camelot1001 wrote: »

Sounds like a good day GQ, I like your selling style - if you are going with the intention of releasing things then a realistic price will help enormously.

I am toying with the idea of releasing a lot of jewellery that was my DMs (and some even my GMs). I am not a jewellery person, just wear the same rings and earrings, very rarely wear a necklace and have a daytime watch and an evening watch. I think I will have a look through it all and maybe see about sending some to auction - does anyone have any experience of selling at auction?

Thank you.

I can't speak for your area but I know in my region ( a biggish chunk of SE England), the auctions are becoming beyond ridiculous, in charging both a seller's and a buyer's premum which means they're taking about 40 % of the hammer price fo rdoing beggar-all..

Here, the Trade and interested amateurs have given up on auctions as a place to sell or to buy, they're so tired of getting ripped off. These are market town type auction houses, to be specific, not the big London houses.

If you want to realise the value from jewellery, you might want to try calling a few of the places which buy gold and silver, including chain jewellers, and asking their price-per-gramme for the different carats. If you're not sure what you've got, and it's English hallmarks, you can find them online and in refernce books - you'll prolly need a magnifying glass to read them. Older ones are stamped, modern ones are lazered.

The precious metal price moves with the international markets but you should be getting about 0.28 p per gramme for steriling silver, about £10 gramme 9 ct, about £14 gramme 14 ct and about £18 gramme 18 ct and 22 ct and platinum circa £20 a gramme. Gold is on the up so you might want to hold onto any for the foreseeable.

Stones vary, lovely blue sapphires are popular, black sapphires are junk, diamonds under 0.75 ct are pretty much worthless as cubic zirconia has killed the diamond market. I know jewellers who've tried to sell them into the trade in London and can't even get a bid, and are trying to sell them to each other at £1-£5 each and still not getting a nibble. Most small gems are worth pence, I've seen catalogues like Cooksongold which go out to the jewellery makers and you get packs of them with change from a tenner for most stones.

If you've got anything very tasty, try taking it to Hatton Garden and getting a few offers. If any place works on the basis that they take it 'out the back' for weighing and just come back with a quote - WALK AWAY. Always have it weighed in front of you on electronic scales after getting their price per gramme. Selling precious metals should be as transparent as buying petrol - the unit price is the price on the day, take it or leave it.

Most jewellery doesn't have especial value as objects, unless it was a very premium piece when it was new, and the value is in the metal. HTH.

[Deleted User]

OO I love those rolsers GQ, I have one in a black and white cow print

I just had an e mail and three visitors, who seldom visit, are comng tomorrow. I have not even a hint of panic as everywhere is spruce. I`ll just give the loo and washbasin a quick wipe and I am done I even kondo`ed a pack of costco brownie mix to the freezer the other day, so I have brownies to offer them. I feel very serene about their visit and even plan another cycle ride in the morning as they arrive at 4.30

Bench had its second coat and the whole lot took only one can I have three unopened cans in my shed now, they will last years. Obviously carp at estimating volumes and spreadability of protective oil, oh well, it`ll only go up in price so an investment I kondo`ed the cheap brush, could not be a**ed to clean it

silvasava, you are on a roll as well as GQ and others :T nice. I`ll just watch

greent

Spent the afternoon sorting the garage loft (OH was up there, I was down below) Heaps and heaps of cardboard boxes from various things removed, flattened and taken to recycling centre. 3 largish ones kept for some specific things which will be listed on fleebay in coming weeks. 4 duvets (no idea why they were in garage loft) used as mice bedding - taken to tip, along with some random foam packaging, a 'Hippo' bag which had been munched by mice and various other small bits of detritus. Loft swept of mice p00 and then lower floor swept for the fallen bits! Two boxes containing masses of tax records/ self employment records/ rental income records for tax years 2002-09 were gone through - lots recycled, some burned (nature of the info contained therein) and lots of rusty bulldog clips binned. A good pile of punched plastic wallets were removed from the paperwork were removed and set aside for reuse (I am actually getting low enough to have considered buying more, as I only had a couple unused) Three were torn and binned. Some elastic bands were retrieved for reuse, but most had perished.

A whole filing box of cards from over the years was recycled, as the mice has shredded lots of them for nest materials. A box of wedding bits was binned - bridesmaids headdresses, paperwork from the photographer and reception (we married in 1997, so why we still had it...???), sugarcraft flowers from the cake (yuck), my veil, sticky sugared almond favours, our ring boxes, the mounted dried flowers of my bouquet.... all destroyed by the mice. My headdress was in a plastic box and undamaged, so has been out for CS pile.

We also discovered a toilet seat (kept for Justin) - that went in the bin And a small child's bike with stabilisers was put at the bottom of a drive with a sign saying 'free' - that went (was originally DS1's - he's 17 tomorrow )

Garage loft now contains 1 suitcase, a Xmas tree stand and a fake Xmas tree, 2 boxes of sentimental items, 2 boxes of business filing (Really useful boxes - no mice damage), spare bedroom inners for the tent and the camping chairs. I think that's it. And a mouse trap and a tray of bait.

Tomorrow sees us tackle more of the garage space, weather dependent - everything needs to come out and be assessed and thoroughly cleaned before going back in. Currently raining here, so we shall see......

PollyWollyDoodle

Oh dear, sorry to hear about the mouse destruction (they must have been very cosy in there!) but it proves a point, doesn't it - we keep stuff and then end up having to throw it away.

You are wise to have some bait down - I've had a garden chair destroyed by mice, it was one of those ones that fold up and go in a bag. I took it to an open-air event and as the bag was intact it was quite a shock to take it out and discover it had been reduced to a sort of lacework effect! :rotfl: I later discovered they'd eaten holes in the garden umbrella and my tent ... Never underestimate the power of tiny rodents.

iamsalt

I echo the damage that mice do, it's been surprising how much damage they do, my cat is a master catcher, but she brings them to me to play with (still alive) so we get the joy of catching them before popping them back outside.

Greent please can you send some rain my way, my waterbutts are almost empty and I can't remember when I had a decent amount of rain.

OH surprised me by agreeing to get rid of the wardrobe, we looked at the decoration a friend had done in their house, and talked about having less furniture in our spare room...and I said the melamine could go, and he said yes...so that will be leaving tomorrow. We are trying to figure out why we have only had one viewing in 3 weeks on our house, so are looking at the decoration, and are discussing Whether we need to revisit the price - we chose the second lowest of 4 estimates as we would like to move reasonably quickly.

Kondoing onwards tomorrow, I will be delighted to visit the tip tomorrow X

greent

Ahh - iamsalt - the rain lasted less than 15 minutes and that's the first we've had for a couple of weeks or more.

The only good thing about the mice is that they are *just* in the garage, which is well away from the house. Sadly they are easily attracted there - our guinea pigs hutch is there (they are out in a run on the lawn during daylight hours) so there is always a ready source of bedding and food for them. It's only been the last 2 years though. Because the guinea pigs are in there it also means we can't use any sonic deterrents.

I think the only thing I was truly peeved about losing due to the mice was my veil - it was simple and beautiful and when I last looked at it (2 years ago this month) in perfect condition (as was all the rest of the stuff, but I wasn't bothered about that) Some of the drawings done by our teens when they were small were a little heartwrenching to throw too - but they're just things at the end of the day.

The garage loft is looking much better - hopefully we can achieve the same with the actual garage (although that will take longer! )

Chilly tonight. I've had a shower (to ensure I'm clean after the mousey-items and then burning paperwork in the chiminea) and am chilly - sat here in my pjs, dressing gown - and with2 wheat bags!
x

Floss

Iamsalt perhaps you could talk to your EA? They may be able to make suggestions as to tips for improving saleability.

camelot1001

Thanks for the info GQ, certainly a lot to think about!

If anyone wants any rain, feel free to have some from here, don't think we've had a totally dry day for weeks.

GreyQueen

My allotment could do with some rain, bone dry up there, haven't had appreciable amount of rain for a long time and none for weeks. Think we had a shower late yestereve but today is shaping up to be sunny.

kittie, my r0lser is the black and white giraffe print, very striking.

I'm just easing into the day before starting bootsale prepping, will be early start tomorrow, grab & go. We'll get the car out and van it today, got stuff to retrieve from the loft, from the shed(s) and various nooks and crannies.

Other than that, may go for a stroll in the woods later on, if I feel like it.

tibawo

I inherited a water butt on my new allotment and in the clear up needed to move it. Inside there were about ten water drinking bottles and empty compost bags.


Behind on the KD i intended to do these holidays but we have not been sat in front of the tv. Painting, visits to ikea, settling in gp.