Sunday, May 24, 2015

Reflections of a Lawn Sale

Although I have been working steadily to downsize the house, it has been a few years since I’ve held a lawn sale.  During this stint of downsizing I have largely relied upon either donations or Craig’s List and both have been good resources to knocking down clutter, but each has its limitations.  For example, Craig’s List is great for ticket items over $5 or $10, but isn’t so good if you have a lot of “small” priced items.  Donations are great, there is the intrinsic value of contributing to a good cause; however, financially you will need to itemize to benefit which means record keeping and also keep in mind that a deduction only reduces the amount that you are taxed on.  (For example, if you donate $100 worth of stuff and your tax rate is 20%, the value of the tax deduction is $20, not $100).  With this being said, I am going to hit some of the high notes from my recent lawn sale experience.

Sunday, May 3, 2015

The many faces of giving up

Giving up - we all know the words and we all feel the negativity associated with the notion of "giving up".  We embrace perseverance - those we point to and say "he's a fighter...".  But what about those of us who aren't fighters?  And does "giving up" deserve the dread and negativity that we attribute to the phenomena?