Donating or Selling

I think some people like to have garage sales. They like to sit outside, talk to their neighbors and people who come by. They sell their old stuff for next to nothing, get to see some cherished items go to a "good home" and often give stuff away for free to little kids who get excited about some funky old toy or game.

Personally, I'd rather give my junk to the thrift store and take the tax write off. But that's because I'm too lazy to do the work required to get my stuff organized and ready to sell. I'd rather spend my time going to other people's garage sales and finding more stuff to clutter up my house.

I had a totally different answer posted, then thought more about this. Maybe people who are wealthy get that way by being very careful with their money? I don't know how you would become (or stay) wealthy if you were always giving money away.

And, with respect to the garage sale, when they do donate, maybe they prefer to donate money to a cause they feel very strongly about, instead of donating stuff to a charity that they might not feel as strongly about.

And, FWIW, I love going to garage sales in expensive neighborhoods, because I can get some high-quality stuff that I'd never be able to afford if I had to pay full price.

Capitalism and generosity are not mutually exclusive. An in depth study of American history reveals how one supports the other. I am teaching my children about both.

I didn't read the article because I don't click on links. However, I think the blanket statement that the wealthy don't give is not completely true. Look at what Bill and Melinda Gates have done as well as other very wealthy people. How is someone determined to be "underclass"?

I know some wealthy people with ZERO ethics and class.

We are fortunate to have good life and we have worked our butts off for what we have with no help from family, government, etc. We do a lot of planning and a lot of delayed gratification vs some people who have to have something NOW. We are believers in no debt. We live way below our means. Everything we do have, has been earned ethically.

The person in that $900,000 houes may be facing foreclosure due to the amount of debt incurred by living above their means and trying to be something they are not.

I refuse to have a garage sale. The people who came to mine ( I am not saying this about ALL garage sale shoppers) wanted something for nothing. I don't think 1 item was priced over $5 and those included some never worn jeans that were $50. I wasn't having the sale to "make money", I thought it was a good way for some others to get some quality things for a very low price and it would be appreciated, NOT. Also, I felt like people were casing out my house and I didn't like that. They were judging based on cars in garage, items at my garage sale, etc.

We are regular contributors to the womens shelter and the community outreach program. From that garage sale point on, I declared I would never have another sale and I donate everything, from computers, appliances, etc to the womens shelter where I know the clothes are appreciated, to Habitat for Humanity ReStore where I know things can be used and appreciated.

I am a regular supporter of schools in the area and volunteering to help others. I am far from filthy rich but we are secure financially and we do care about helping others.

J.:

What do I think? I think you are quick to judge. There are times when those people in that million dollar home? They are living paycheck to paycheck because they bought more than they could afford...or they lost their job because of poor leadership of our country....or mismanagement of funds...or a death....so don't be sooo quick to judge by what you see on the outside...just because they have the McMansion - does NOT mean they have it great...

What do **I** do? I have garage sales, sell on ebay and craigslist....and I donate...and I put stuff on freecycle too. Do I have any particular order I do it in? Nope. I have 3 bags of clothing ready for the Lupus Foundation on Tuesday. I had planned on having a garage sale this weekend - then learned we might have thunderstorms - so put it off.... what do I do with the stuff that didn't sell? I take it to Goodwill.

My boys have lemonade stands in the summer and hot chocolate stands in the winter (we have a church down the street from us). The money is split...they pay me back my expenses for the stand (milk, chocolate, cups, etc.), then charity and themselves.

I've not read your article. However, i will state that I know wealthy people and people struggling to get by....all of them do what they can to help others...either by volunteering or by donating items and/or money. Don't be so quick to judge. Don't be so quick to ASSUME. You don't know what's happening behind closed doors.

Well, here is the thing ... you do not know their plans. You do not know their financial status. All you know is that they live in an expensive home, appear to have expensive things and are having a garage sale. Most of the wealthy people I know would find a garage sale tacky and would not host one unless it was a last resort option.

Many of the wealthy people I know do place things on consignment and donate frequently.

I would also probably be more inclined to attend a garage sale of a more expensive home as I would assume their things are in better condition than of someone in my middle of the road area.

ETA: My mother bought herself a 2002 Lexus something or other, people assume she has money. Do you know HOW she got that car? By shopping at the dollar store, saving her pennies and getting together a decent down payment so she could affoard the monthly payments. Now she owns it, and she then did the same so she could affoard to purchase her home.

Not to start an aurgument but the studies I have seen show that wealthy democrats (Joe Biden, etc) are not particularly generous and are actually kind of cheap. Conversely, wealthy and even middle class republicans are very generous😊

Maybe by selling and not donating they can afford a 900k home.

I sell what I can and donate the rest. As a SAHM, the money I make from selling our things is part of my financial contribution to the household, and goes towards financing the "extras". We also donate to charity, whether it be our time or money. I must point out that many of the people I know who live in very expensive homes are what you would call "house poor". They have bought a home that they can barely afford and have trouble making ends meet.

ETA: In Canada we do not get a tax receipt for donating used stuff to charity.

I think you might be assuming that those ppl with the 900k could in fact afford that house and aren't living beyond their means (hence the reason they may be having the sale) Many people who aren't wealthy but want to feel and look like they are spend beyond their means..
Also, what makes you think they aren't going to donate the money.... judging someone's outside with our inside is never a good idea...

I never teach my son that money is bad or he has less than.. What's more important to me is that I instill in him the belief that he can live a prosperous life and to never begrudge someone elses money.. that to me just leads to resentments... My mother would always crab that money was the root of all evil.. that while she bilked the welfare system and was on it for nearly 30 plus years.... gee for such evil, she sure didn't mind taking someone elses money...

poor or rich.... either a person is generous or not...

I do both as well. Actually, it's easier to donate (& tax deductible if you get a receipt, too!) so I do that more often.

I've been very fortunate to know a number of wealthy people and have found them very generous -- though rather suspicious of many charitable organizations. Instead, the people I know tend to do very local, very quiet donations. For instance, a man I knew was notorious for loudly shooting down organizations that came to him for support but very VERY generously provided for a number of local families that experienced hard times because of illness or accident. He also hired and paid generously deserving kids from lower income families who were trying to get an education and others who hit a patch of hard times. And I recently found out that my brother, for the past 10 years, has been paying all living expenses for our dad and his wife as well as his wife's mother. The only reason it's coming out now is because of some long-term health issues my dad is having.

I think we all find a balance that works for us -- but I totally agree with you that it's our job as parents to promote kindness, compassion and generosity in our children.

In general I agree with you, however you never know what the actual situation of the family in that 900k house is. Maybe they are house poor. Maybe they have unexpected expenses. Maybe they are trying to teach their kids that if they want new stuff they have to first sell the old stuff. Maybe they're behind on their mortgage. Lots of people who bought big fancy houses with jumbo loans have been foreclosed on or gone through short sales.

But yes, I agree that if you don't NEED the money from selling the items you should donate them. I end up Freecycling so much stuff, but I also receive from Freecycle as well. Last year I Freecycled our bassinett, but now I'm looking for a bassinett from Freecycle. Sure we have the $ to go out and buy a new one, but if someone else has a perfectly good used one that we can use, we will, and then we'll Freecycle it on when we're done.

It seems that the many of the very wealthy give only as a calculation of income tax deductions. Even wealthy politicians tend to donate very meager amounts. There's no reason why my family should be donating a higher percentage of our income to charity than VP Biden's does, but his income tax returns show that to be the case.

ETA: My aunt and uncle are VERY wealthy--the kind of wealthy that makes organizations approach them and ask for donations in the $100k+ range. They have been extremely generous to my family. They helped my parents pay for all 5 of us kids to go to private school from K-12, gave us ALL jobs at one time or another, paid for all my college books, flew my sister and I home multiple times to attend family funerals or other family events, rescued my K-12 school from financial ruin with a $1m donation and set up an endowment for them, giving no interest loans to my cousin so he could buy a new home after his cheating and credit-destroying wife left him, etc. The wealthy I know are VERY generous, and they have taught their children those values as well.

Seriously? I don't ever presume to know other's circumstances or wonder if or why they do x, y, or z, I have enough on my plate. Whatever they do I'm sure it works for them.

Like a good friend of my Mom's who sold her belongings when her husband left her and their son, after squandering her millions while she'd fought cancer. Our family benefitted greatly by her generosity, she took mere pennies of what things were worth. Her goal was to downsize before she moved to more humble dwellings from her family owned mansion, she couldn't afford the taxes, being unable to work and broke.

I have known enough "wealthy" people to know they have for the most part been generous to a fault with their time and treasures, more so than most people I know with less.

I give and sell, whatever works. Children learn by example and develop a cheerful heart in what they have, as long as we teach them we're doing our part.

I think it's their stuff and they can get rid of it in any fashion they choose. I think looks may be deceiving. Many people would drive by my house and think that we are well off as well. We have 4 kids and are very frugal so that we can live in the house we have. We do nearly all our own remodeling work and when we sold our old house it was worth a lot more than when we purchased it 12 years earlier. We found a fixer upper repo house, interest rates were low, and our house sold for more than what we were even asking for. Because of all this we were able to buy in a nicer neighborhood. We do all our own electrical work, framing, drywalling, flooring, and plumbing. We buy second hand furnitures and recover them or refinish them. Our clothes are mostly second hand. We rarely go out to eat. All our vehicles are older and we fix them up. Many times I have had people ask how we are able to live in such a nice house and I tell them we do all the work ourselves and save. I don't have rummage sales. I give it all away.

I wouldn't judge the book by it's cover. What if that rich person had just lost his job and is getting rid of their stuff to pay off bills? That happened to my family. We sold everything and moved into a town house at one point. The only thing we kept was one bedroom set because it was a family treasure, and the clothes on our backs. When we got to where we were going we bought our furniture at a rummage sale in a wealthy neighborhood. Thank God for those rummage sales. It saved us a bit of pride to be able to purchase it ourselves and not have it just given to us.

I've done both. Smaller things that I would get a couple of dollars for in a yard sale go directly to Goodwill. They do a good work, and I appreciate them. And they teach their workers to say Thank You, too...

Bigger things that I feel that I can make some money off of (like a snow blower, LOL!) I have sold for a good price using Craigslist. The nice thing is that you don't have 20 people in your front yard combing through your stuff like in a yard sale. I also sold things that I didn't have a truck to take to Goodwill, like an old sofa and loveseat. (College students bought those, and that really made me happy!)

Really nice clothes that I didn't want to go to Goodwill can be sold on Ebay, but I don't do that myself. Instead, I let a family member do the work for it (she's good at it) and she gets part of the profit. Helps her, helps me.

You can teach both capitalism and charity. But you don't have to wear yourself out doing either one of them. It's a lot of work to go through stuff and pare down. Nothing wrong with making your life easier AND being generous. AND, don't forget, just because you get some money for something doesn't mean that you aren't actually being generous. The fact that you are making it available to someone at a lower price is generous. And Goodwill does charge a lower price, even if I don't get the money...

Don't forget about giving to a charity so you get a receipt for the estimated value and write it off your taxes.
We do a lot through It's Deductible and it saves us several hundred at tax time every year without all the hassle of holding yard sales or selling it online.
You can give in a way that saves you money and that's just being frugal.
Giving away something just to get rid of it certainly saves you space and clutter but not getting anything out of it is just like throwing money away.

I've never had a garage sale and I often donate things to thrift stores, but it's really due to laziness more than generosity, LOL! Seriously, I think that it is important to be generous and try to help others, but that having a garage sale or selling something through Craigslist or whatever is not necessarily an indication of stinginess. I like the lemonade stand idea, my kids have done that as well! Another good way to teach your children to give service is to ask for donations to your favorite charity rather than gifts for a birthday party. When my girls did that they still got gifts from mom and dad and grandparents, but all of their friends brought canned food for the food bank. It turned out really well!

The other day my low income, hard working, blue collar brother-in-law called me while he was going through the car wash. He said, "hold on, while I tip this guy a $5." I was thinking, "many, that's generous." I usually only give $1. $2 at the most. DH and I make more than twice what my BIL and his wife make. I then thought, "I'm one of those wealthy cheap-skates."

It just helped me put things in perspective, and remind me of what I CAN give, compared to others. I do donate most everything - either to the 2nd hand store, or to co-workers or neighbors (i.e. my boys' clothes). I have a threshold of $50 or less. If it's worth less than that, I'm not going to bother to sell it online. My income fluctuates (commission), so I admit there are times I think - "gee, I would love to have a yard sale and make some extra cash". Who knows, maybe those guys hit "hard" times. Ha!

I like your ideas!

A number of studies have shown that the middle class & less wealthy give proportionally more of their income to charities.
If something is of great value, we'll sell it (car, etc.)
I used to sell infant & toddler clothing in eBay (hardly worn, great stuff!)
Now, since at 10, my kiddo really "wears" his clothing, I tend to choose bless another family ( i know several with kids the right age) with a son getting near that size. Still good stuff, just not "crisp & new."
Now if I have a large load of all great shape, name beans stuff, I will take it to Once Upon A Child & get a check.
But there are times that merchandise would be more valuable to another family than that $50 check would be to me.
I also pass a St Vincent de Paul on my way to work, so that's a frequent stop for drop offs.
Sometimes I put a pic on FB to get rid of stuff like dishes, towels, etc. if no takers? Thrift store or City mission truck is called.
Anyhoo--I don't take too much notice if how others choose to handle their finances unless they ask for ideas.
Corporations? That's another story entirely!

I totally get what you're saying! I am by no means rich money-wise, but I donate just about everything I can when we're cleaning out or the kids have outgrown clothing and toys. And my kids have picked up on giving and doing for others!

Like just yesterday we went to a church rummage sale - it was all by donation - my daughter picked out a couple things, probably about a dollar's worth if they had priced the items, but she handed the lady a five dollar bill and the lady asked if she wanted change - my daughter said no. The lady was very appreciative!! And I was very proud, especially since my daughter was using her own money!!

As for the rich - I know for a fact that my in-laws are very well off and they are among the tightest with their money I've ever seen! My MIL is always complaining she never has money for this or that; they NEVER donate anything to any charities (money or material items); it just makes me sick! They'd rather throw stuff away than donate it. And yes, I know all this because we've discussed it!!!

And my children also volunteer their time at our local food pantry!!

I think it has a lot to do with how you're raised!! I had great parents that taught me how to care for others; unfortunately, my husband's parents don't care about others - it's obvious (after 20 years that we've been together) all I've seen them care about is themselves!! How sad!!

Great question!!

most people i know do a combo. if you've got enough stuff to make the hassle of a yard sale worthwhile, why not? people like bargains, and i don't think it's greedy to try and make a little $ from your good things that you've finished using.
but i think people who have yard sales still do donate and give to charity.
i do agree that the lower middle-class is probably the most generous demographic there is. that observation is based totally on my subjective and unscientific observations.
:) khairete
S.

It is an interesting article. And, yes, a big part of being generous is knowing what NEED is and seeing its effects.

I have always been blessed in my life by knowing people who had a lot of money (relatively) and people who have had very little money.

My poor father had jobs by knowing rich and generous people. My dentist when I was little would do work for free for me. But they knew us. They saw need and filled it. I too, saw VPBiden's giving record and was shocked by his less than generous nature. It turns my stomach when I see him playing to the poor and knowing his real nature.

You do well to teach your kids to be generous. What's interesting is that you fall into a certain economic category, too. And while your generosity is kind of, once removed, it still helps many people and allows others to help more directly. Those yard sales, they are a treasure trove to me! I love to be at rich people's garage sales, it's like Macy's to me!

The truly poor are in the trenches. They give the $10 they have been saving for their neighbor to have a doctors appt. or invite them to eat supper every night with them. If they get a wind fall crop of squash or watermelon, they leave them on the doorstep of widows.

If I know one friend with a kid with lots of clothes and another outgrowing everything then I am the conduit that hauls those clothes from one to the other, without that stop of Goodwill, inbetween. At my small poor church, we exchange kids clothes all the time. God blesses that. He keeps our church financially fit in some desperate times through generous people.
In return, we have been able to be very generous with our sister churches around the world.

I applaud your generous spirit.

Nancy, that its me that you described. I will have a yard sale at the drop of a hat. In my current community, we have car boot sales monthly and every month I am out here selling SOMETHING just to be able to chat! Otherwise, neighbors are too busy to socialize, so I use this time to chat with them.

I think that the wealthy having a yard sale IS INDEED giving to the poor! I am so against welfare in the sense of free giving, So, if the wealthy give poor me the chance to buy some of their luxury stuff at a fraction of the cost--I will buy the their high thread count sheets, used dishes, old picture frames, costume jewelry, etc. That is charity, too!

Like anyone, they can donate or sell or both. What if they're suddenly ruined and have to flee the big house due to bankruptcy? What if they're barely within their means and need some college money for kids?...what if they just want to cash in on the stuff of value because they like money?

Some wealthy people aren't very generous or charitable, and some are very generous and charitable. That goes for any economic bracket, but I do often see less empathy and generosity in people who have never been without for sure. It's just hard to say on a case by case basis.

I will say you can err too much on the generous side too. I almost feel my parents were like this. They always took us to volunteer in needy environments, taught us to give, gave gave gave, and we didn't have much ourselves. They both worked full time and we had to take things to recycle for spare change and budget utilities and wore all hand-me downs etc. They taught us that it's what's on the inside that counts and not to be greedy or snobby etc. I almost grew up thinking being rich was "wrong" though they didn't really say that...They were just about "the rich man into heaven is like a camel through a needle"-ish.

This is all great and I have retained these views. BUT. They never taught is about investing, saving, taxes, practical money management...I always dated BROKE guys because they were "artists" which I later learned the hard way they weren't kind souls JUST because they were broke and I had to work hard to support THEM.....I married a guy with NO money savvy and paid dearly in a tax debacle and still carefully manage all his meager funds post separation so the kids and I can live until I get back to work which is a huge time suck.

I could have used a little more balance is all I'm saying. There is nothing wrong with being well off. You CAN still be a good person with the right moral foundation.

It is quite possible the proceeds from the sale will benefit a particular charity. Many need $$ vs time or materials and perhaps their favorite charity requested that?

I've given up trying to figure out people's giving (time, resources, money) Each families situation is unique. The only thing we can control and understand is our own.

I have been in the mortgage business over 20 years. I have seen Doctors with million dollar homes and lavish belongings that are very house poor and debt up to their eyeballs.

When wealthy people have very nice homes, they usually have an interior designer decorate the entire home and leave it like that for many many years, so there's not as much of an opportunity to donate or have a garage sale.

I also believe that the *wealthy* gives more financially rather than personal goods. Did you hear about the waitress in Indiana, over the weekend, that got a $450 tip? Now that's what I like to hear about. I could care less about a garage sale.

But don't forget that the wealthy are supporting the majority of this country.

Teach your daughter to save, spend and donate ALL at the same time. Teaching her about reaping the benefits of hard work at the same time of being generous with donating, is more of a valuable lesson than just donating everything.

And yes, like a lot of your posts, I do think this post is judgmental.

BTW glad to see people brought up how cheap Joe Biden is, what a hypocrite he is too.