Thursday, February 24, 2011

Las Vegas: an Auction Royale for Storage Wars

Part of the fun of television is when something that is a real part of everyday living becomes TV entertainment. For thousands of people across the U.S.A., they can see this weekly on the hit A&E series, Storage Wars. One recent episode, Auction Royale, took the bidders on a marathon of unit auctions in Las Vegas.

Already tired from several consecutive days of bidding, the bidders had to endure Dave Hester, who was his usual pain in the neck. He's a businessman who doesn't care who he annoys. That's clear from his methodology of bidding as seen through Storage Wars' first season.

The sad part of this reality show is that it means someone has fallen on hard times. The best part of renting a unit is that a person can easily go to sparefoot.com and find a nearby facility for their goods. Unfortunately, if economics lands them in a situation where they can't pay their fee, the facility can put it up for auction. That's where we end up finding the fascinating stories of what is kept in the lockers on this TV series.

Auction Royale gave us Darrell finding some expensive vases and glasses. Hester landed a furniture set, while Senior citizen Barry found an interesting S&H Green Stamp sign, worth nothing, but he made a new friend. Finally, ust when married couple Brandi and Jarrod thought they had a so so buy, Brandi discovered over $500 in casino chips. They celebrated with a night on the town!

Thursday, February 17, 2011

Fascination at Storage Wars Continues on

Storage Wars may be the fresh hit line for the A&E community, and it's the present can easily reveal concealed items. That's the entertaining as well as unknown of this collection. The program follows several regular buyers, men and women who participate in auctions for storage lockers that have not been paid for in at least three months and therefore have their contents put up for auction.

A big part of the fascination is seeing who these storage treasure hunters are. Some are thrift shop owners that look at it as strictly business, although some are usually daily enthusiasts watching it as being a hobby. For some, it's the future of their family, and they take it very seriously.

Anytime a locker is up for bit, it's a bit of a guessing game because the bidders do not get a chance to examine the contents. All they get is a look from the entrance of the locker. What they see may be all they get, or maybe there's more inside than they realize.

A single occurrence took place throughout Cerritos. On the surface, that had a lot of camping out items obvious. One more had electronic equipment that was easily seen. Not so visible was a safe, but would the contents be valuable or might it be empty? That's the gamble that is involved with this business/hobby.

There were some winning storage lockers. One was full of brand new electronics, like a stereo system. Another was full of a coin collection that brought a huge return on the price paid. As the auction winner said, this was 'the wow' factor.

We see in this episode that there is method to the bidding, as well as a lot of competition. Sometimes people will bid just to drive the price up for the person who really wants the locker. The lesson learned? There are few friends in storage wars.

In the fourth episode of the show, the action took place in Huntington Beach, California where it was expected that the lockers would be a home to high end goods, so the bidding was fast and furious. Some went remarkably low, like $275, while others went for almost $4,000.

Was it worth it? For one, it was as he discovered in a questionable purchase a sports collection with mint cards and balls. His gamble paid off big time. Even better, the man who paid $275? He found a mini-baby grand worth $12,000.

Thursday, February 10, 2011

A Tale of Two Women and self storage facilities

There is a woman who grew up in a home where the father was a construction worker. More than that, he did what is now known as flipping. He would buy a rundown house, move his family in, and spend a year or so fixing it up in his spare time. Then he'd buy another fixer upper, sell the current home, and move his family into the newest rundown residence. This is how he made money.

A by-product of this frequent moving lifestyle is that this woman could literally pack up a house in a matter of hours. She learned early to prioritize her possessions. The items that made it through each move were only those that really mattered. The rest went in the trash or to good will.

Contrast her with another woman who grew up in a home where the mother had lived through the depression and desired for her children to never want for anything, even if the family really couldn't afford to buy anything.

They lived in the same house for decades, collecting things that no one ever threw out. The mother was a product of a poor childhood never wanting to feel deprived again. That's what she passed on to her daughter, who became a pack rat.

While the first woman would never need to go to to find a self storage facilities, the second woman needed it desperately to store box loads of possessions. It was a lifesaver, giving her space to walk her halls once again.