Sell It or Donate It?

Is your house overflowing with stuff while the bill collectors are pounding on your door? It's time for you to decide - Sell It or Donate It?

It wouldn't hurt to purge a few things from your life but how do you decide what to do with everything? Do you close your eyes while you load up bags full of perfectly brand new stuff and give it away for the sake of clearing out the house and gaining some instant sanity? Or do you commit to spending a few weeks or months selling it and using the proceeds to pay off those bills and get the bill collectors out of your hair for awhile?

We'll take a look at a few mounds of stuff that I have around my house and I'll show you how I make that crucial decision.

This bucket has 3 dolls on the very top so that's where we'll start. Two of the dolls are Cabbage Patch Kids, One of them is an original from the early 80's. It has blonde hair that's a mess. The stitching is coming apart on one of the shoulders and there's quite a few stains on the doll. It doesn't have any clothes. I think I would give this one away. I think it's too risky to sell it. I'm afraid someone would complain about the flaws too much.

The next doll is also a Cabbage Patch Kid but it's only a few years old. It's actually really cute with it's adorable pink outfit. The hair is a mess too and it's missing all the parts that go with it like an ice cream cone and a bottle. One of the shoes is also missing. I think this one is missing too many parts to try selling it.

The last one is a talking doll from the early 90's. It's amazing that this doll is still in the house. Every time you move it, it talks. If you throw this doll up in the air, like many parents do to their baby, this doll says, "Mommy, do it again!" Unfortunately, kids figure out real fast that it says the same thing when you do things like throw it against the wall. I think I'm going to give this disturbing doll away too.

Would you have kept any of the dolls or tried to sell them? Am I doing the right thing by giving them away instead of trying to sell them?

By looking at the low prices of brand new Cabbage Kids on Amazon, I think I made the right decision to not attempt to sell these. I think I would have been wasting my time.

Oshkosh B'Gosh and Jumping Bean

This bucket had a few clothes in it. I was going to give them to my friend for her daughter and I still might do that but I think I'm going to try selling them first. If they don't sell, I'll still plan on giving them to her. Three of them are made by Oshkosh, a pretty popular brand and one is made by Jumping Bean.

I decided to try selling them because of their brand names and because they are really cute. They look almost brand new and would make a nice addition to a little girl's wardrobe for a low cost.

I had 23 Step Into Reading Books in this bucket. I put them as one big lot and decided to try selling them.

After people go to the bookstore and realize that books can be quite pricey individually, they will often check online for a deal. Since I had so many of these books, I thought it would be worthwhile to put these on Ebay. None of them had ripped pages and some even looked brand new.

Since these books were in very good condition and there were so many, I thought it would be good to sell them. These books are great for beginner readers and encourages kids to pick up a book instead of watch TV.

Let's take a look at how they're selling on Amazon so we can see if I made the right decision.

Elementary school kids love Henry and Mudge! I will definitely try selling these! I have 8 of them and they are all in very good condition.

As a matter of fact, they did sell and they sold very well. Books like Henry and Mudge are great to sell if you have a bunch of them that you can put together and sell as a lot.

There was a wooden basket in the bucket. This one was hard for me. It's very cute and a nice little basket but I have way too many baskets and I just don't think that I could make any money on Ebay with it. I don't think it would be worth it to anyone to pay for the basket and the shipping. With the handle that goes up pretty high, shipping costs will be higher. I think I'm just going to give this one away.

It's a very nice basket. Nothing wrong with it. The flowers on the side are very pretty and baskets are essential to good organization. I chose to donate it though because I don't think it would be worth it to try selling it online with the price of shipping.

I've never looked for baskets online. For some reason, I always seem to have them around but I've never actually bought one for myself. They seem to come with gifts and that's usually how I end up with so many.

I know that people's houses get a lot of clutter for various reasons but I'm curious to see what the most common reason is.

Maybe instead of having stuff all over the house, you can organize it a little better! A few of these organizers might help.

I have buckets and buckets of stuff all over my house. They are sitting here not doing anyone any good. I would love to sell what I can to make some money and donate the rest so that someone else can enjoy the items instead of them cluttering up my house.

I'm not in it to make a fortune, just to pay a few bills. I figure even $2.00 is more than I had before so why not?

If you always sell things and then use the money that you make to buy the new things that you want, then you won't have to worry about credit card debt. You won't have ridiculous interest charges and you'll be helping to keep your house clutter free.

One of the things that we need is an Xbox Kinect Adaptor so I'm going to use my PayPal money to get one.

There's lots of videos on YouTube to help you learn how to sell there. Take a look at a few of them and get your own sales going!

Do you have a rule of thumb that you go by? If you haven't used it in a year, get rid of it? Do you prefer selling or donating?