Post Your Wins

[disneysteve]

This is actually a big pain for logistical reasons but it's still a significant win financially speaking.

Part of my inheritance from my cousin was just over 3,200 shares of Exelon stock. I knew about that all along.

What I just discovered today when the mail came is that Exelon recently spun off a division and all shareholders were given stock in the new company, Constellation. Yes the value of the Exelon stuck dropped a bit when the separation occurred, but it didn't fall by anywhere near as much as what the new stock is worth.

At today's closing price, the new stock shares I now own are worth $48,700.

[disneysteve]

We got our gas/electric bill yesterday. We're on the budget billing plan and our payment had been $269/mo. This bill said that based on usage, they've lowered us to $250/mo.

[disneysteve]

I'm hoping this is a win. Time will tell and I'll be sure to report back.

I went to an estate sale this morning and bought 6 recreation sculptures of buildings featured in Gone With the Wind. I paid $14 total. A quick ebay search shows them selling well for $25-$40 each. I'll be quite satisfied if I end up with $150 or more out of them, 10+ times what I paid. I've already photographed them all and written the descriptions. I'll post them shortly.

[james.hendrickson]

I'm hoping this is a win. Time will tell and I'll be sure to report back.

I went to an estate sale this morning and bought 6 recreation sculptures of buildings featured in Gone With the Wind. I paid $14 total. A quick ebay search shows them selling well for $25-$40 each. I'll be quite satisfied if I end up with $150 or more out of them, 10+ times what I paid. I've already photographed them all and written the descriptions. I'll post them shortly.

Excellent work Disneysteve.

[disneysteve]

Excellent work Disneysteve.

Thanks. I have plenty of stuff in the house that needs to be sold, and I'm working on that (I currently have 67 items on ebay plus another 10-20 on Marketplace) but I've also realized that if I truly want to make ebay a meaningful part of our retirement income, I can't just depend on what we've got. I'm going to need to be buying merchandise to resell. At this stage, I don't want to buy a ton of stuff until I sell more of what we've got, but I don't want to pass up opportunities either. I saw the estate sale listed on Facebook this morning and it was in the development right across the street from ours so I shot over there after breakfast.

[disneysteve]

We use the Slice app for ordering from two local pizza/Italian restaurants. With their rewards program, every time you order is $10 or more, you get a "pizza point". When you have 8 points, you can get a free large pizza. We redeemed our free pizza the other day. Toppings not included so we paid $2 for mushrooms. I pick up so no delivery charge. We at half the pizza for dinner that night. I had 2 slices for lunch yesterday and we have 2 slices left for another meal - all for $2.

[disneysteve]

I went to an estate sale this morning and bought 6 recreation sculptures of buildings featured in Gone With the Wind. I paid $14 total.

I just sold one of them for $25. After fees I’ll get about $21. I paid $14 for all 6 so I’m already ahead and still have the other 5 left to sell. That’s a win.

[disneysteve]

While researching an item I was going to list on ebay a week or so ago, I accidentally discovered that another item which I had available to sell is worth a lot more than I realized. I cleaned it up and listed that as well. It ended tonight for $108.50.

[disneysteve]

I just redeemed my Discover cashback of $103.01.

I also set up my account to automatically redeem the cashback each month. There's no point in letting it build up.

[Thrif-t]

I just redeemed my Discover cashback of $103.01.

I also set up my account to automatically redeem the cashback each month. There's no point in letting it build up.

I'm surprised you don't use it for your amazon purchases, that's what I always end up using my cashback on.

[disneysteve]

I'm surprised you don't use it for your amazon purchases, that's what I always end up using my cashback on.

I just noticed that as an option on a recent Amazon purchase. But that would mean forgoing earning more credit card rewards by charging the purchases so it doesn't make sense. And 3 months out of the year, we get 5% back using the Discover card to pay.

I just apply the cashback to our bill.

[disneysteve]

I just sold one of them for $25. After fees I’ll get about $21. I paid $14 for all 6 so I’m already ahead and still have the other 5 left to sell. That’s a win.

Sold another one of the six today for $15. I spent $14 and have already gotten back over $32 in under a week. Not a bad investment. I wish I could do that on a much larger scale.

[QuarterMillionMan]

Estate sales are sort of a testament to how much a descendant devalues and sells items the deceased once cherished and placed such a high value on.

[QuarterMillionMan]

In other words we might think we’re leaving something good for our descendants when we die but to them it is just more junks to get rid of.

[ua_guy]

I keep an old car around as a hobby. It's got some age-related problems which I've been meaning to fix, and can be expensive. An electronics rebuilder wanted $250 to fix the instrument cluster and a car stereo refurbisher wanted another $250 to fix an unknown problem with the stereo system (wouldn't play through front left speaker). So I found a wrecking yard that had more than one of my cars (rare! -most yards don't do older than 10-15 years). $47 later I walked out with a complete instrument cluster that I was able to get good parts off of, which fixed mine. That included $10 for a speaker amp that I swapped with the one in my front door, and it fixed the problem. I spent $13 on lunch to celebrate. It was a beautiful day and most of my time in the yard was wandering around looking at all their cool old wrecked cars!!