Estate Sale Finds in 2010!

[radiotvnut]

We don't have many estate sales in my area; but, the ones I've been to in the past usually had something of interest. Church rummage sales are a mixed bag. The older churches with an older congregation often have stuff of interest. The garage sales in the newer neighborhoods that advertise "baby clothes" usually mean that the people running them have never even seen a knob tuned TV, let alone owned one. The biggest problem around here are the dealers (aka, vulchers) who always show up at sales two hours early or even the day before and buy up all the good stuff so they can put it on ebay or take it to the flea market with a price tag that's 14 times higher than it should be. I can't tell you how many sales I've been to (when they opened) where something of interest was advertised and I was told, "yeah, we had an old radio; but, we sold it yesterday." The whole time I'm thinking, "What the hell do you mean you sold it yesterday, the sale wasn't supposed to start until this morning". A friend of mine, who used to live in TX, said it was illegal to sell anything at a garage or estate sale before the posted start time. I can actually see both sides of the coin on this issue. As a seller, you have to sell an item whenever the opportunity presents itself. As a buyer, it's real irritating when you show up at a sale that is advertised to start at 7 AM and find out that the very thing you wanted was sold the day before.

[Chad Hauris]

Recently I have been able to find a pretty good amount of tube type radios and radio phonographs at estate sales along with lots of electric motors, fan blades and fans.
I haven't seen very many tube-type TV's at all over the last 5 years or so. Mostly the ones I do see are the small black and white sets.
Old radios seem to have a lot much more sentimental value to people that old TV's and seem to be held on to a lot more...I have seen this in both buying them to own, and in what people bring in to get repaired at our repair shop.

I actually found a CTC-25 or CTC-17 this year at the thrift shop (haven't opened it up yet) but this is very rare.

Several of the estate sale companies here send out emails with links to photo galleries and this has been very helpful at spotting things I'd like to get.
I sure wish more sales would operate in the evening, at least one day so people working regular hour jobs could go easier. On the rare occasion I have gone to an estate sale on a weekday if I have taken some time off work I am amazed how many people are there at say 2:00 in the afternoon or 10:00 AM on a Thursday or Friday.

When I was a kid I often would find good stuff at garage sales but unless the ad mentions old radios or a jukebox or something like that I don't patronize garage sales. It takes 1/2 hour just to drive to town and it's too much wasted effort if the sale doesn't have any thing good.