Emptying the attic to pay the bills

At AuctionPal.com, which helps novices sell things online, for-sale listings rose 66% from February to March, much faster than the 25% to 30% average monthly pace since the company was formed in September, CEO Maureen Ellenberger said. She said she was surprised to see that most of her clients desperately needed to sell items to raise cash.

For LiveDeal.com, a classifieds and business-directory site, for-sale listings for January through March rose 10% from the previous year.

"We can definitely detect economic stress on the part of the consumer," said John Raven, the site's chief operating officer.

On Craigslist, Buckmaster said, three of the four fastest-growing for-sale categories are tied to gasoline: recreational vehicles such as campers and trailers, cars, trucks and boats.

Raven noted more listings for furniture, particularly in areas around Miami and Las Vegas and other regions hit hard by the housing crisis.

Baughman, of eBizAuctions, said that over the past four months she's been working mostly with desperate sellers, rather than casual ones. Most are middle-class customers who can't pay their bills and now want to be paid upfront for the items instead of waiting until they are sold, she said.

The trend may be hurting secondhand stores. Donations to the Salvation Army were down 20% in the January-to-March period. George Hood, the charity's national community-relations and development secretary, said that was probably partly because people were selling belongings instead of donating them.

And with the surge in selling, secondhand buyers now command better deals, driving down prices. Secondhand merchandise online is going for 25% to 35% below what it commanded a year ago, estimated Brian Riley, a senior analyst for TowerGroup, a research firm.

"It won't hit the saturation point until the (economy) hits the bottom, and right now, we don't know when that is," he said.

In Alabama, Bateman-Lee said she had received only $30 for her TV and $45 for her DVD player at a flea market. She didn't have too much left to sell, but she was going back to "sort through more things."

Her $30 water bill was coming due.

This article was reported and written by Anne D'Innocenzio for The Associated Press.

Published May 7, 2008

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