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I salvaged $6k of luxury items discarded by Duke students

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Re: I salvaged $6k of luxury items discarded by Duke students

#131
post #54

I remember that my school rented out mini-fridges to students. It was about $150 to rent a dingy, used fridge for the year. The cost to buy a similar fridge was about $100. So of course, students would buy fridges, then discard them at the end of the year. Piles and piles of mini-fridges.

My school did that too, but the rental was substntially cheaper than the cost of buying one. There was a deposit too, to encourage returning them, which may have encumbered more money than a new one cost but if you returned it clean it was cheaper than buying and you didn't have to deal with it over the summer.

Mini-fridges are so cheap now it probably doesn't make much economic sense to rent one.

Re: I salvaged $6k of luxury items discarded by Duke students

#132

I wonder what we need to do to make buying and selling used items convenient. My experience has been that the bid/ask spread is too large, and liquidity too low to be practical. And if you're giving something away, no one will take it. No explanation; just observations. I want to not throw things out and buy new, but haven't found a workflow that works. (I'm in an apt building near the one listed in the article; more…

freecycle.org

Re: I salvaged $6k of luxury items discarded by Duke students

#133
post #44
post #39

It's not just students. Where I live (admittedly wealthy) people throw away everything they can't be bothered to do the slightest bit of maintenance on. I have found, and made functional: - a snow blower - various weed eaters - vacuum cleaners - a generator (higher capacity than the one I already had) - a log splitter - pressure washers (nozzles usually clogged with dirt) - a chainsaw - multiple typewriters (the Sele…

Because it is cheaper to buy a new one than pay someone to fix most of those. A fairly significant minority of wealthy people got that way because they have no free time to do those things themselves.

Generally, when I go into the sporting goods store, I look around at everything mechanical that may need maintenance, and I get the sense that whatever I chose, after the season is over, the company will discontinue the model, and spare parts will be unobtainable, and I wouldn't find a shop with the tools or knowledge anyhow.

Shoe repair is hit-or-miss. I contacted one who said it would be a 2 month turnaround time.

I purchased an item from a church supply and noticed that it included a molded plastic insert that I'd be removing to clean once in a while. So I contacted the vendor and asked whether I could purchase some spare inserts. "well, our supply chains are challenged right now, and this is made in Italy..."

I advise my friends, if they're purchasing any electronics, like a notebook, you may as well bundle some accessories and spare parts right away, like an extra battery or power supply or the component that's most likely to go bad, because in 5 years when you need it, they'll be sold out.

In fact, in all of those markets I've listed above, I've purchased something, unbox it at home, only to find out that it is lacking accessories, isn't a complete set, or part of it is unfit for purpose, and in fact the manufacturer just gets things onto store shelves while incomplete, so they can sell you more things out of their catalog [iPhones without chargers; shipping beta software...]

I just finished carefully cleaning the sponge filter on my vacuum cleaner. One day I'll visit their website to see if there are any spare accessories still available for it. Good luck!

Re: I salvaged $6k of luxury items discarded by Duke students

#134
post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because it is cheaper to buy a new one than pay someone to fix most of those. A fairly significant minority of wealthy people got that way because they have no free time to do those things themselves.

> A fairly significant minority of wealthy people Apologies if this is just a typo but I am really confused by this wording - isn't "significant minority" an oxymoron? If you had to express this as a percentage how many wealthy people are you saying got this way?

A quarter or third of a group would be a significant minority, I think? it just means non negligible really

Re: I salvaged $6k of luxury items discarded by Duke students

#135
post #128

I wonder what we need to do to make buying and selling used items convenient. My experience has been that the bid/ask spread is too large, and liquidity too low to be practical. And if you're giving something away, no one will take it. No explanation; just observations. I want to not throw things out and buy new, but haven't found a workflow that works. (I'm in an apt building near the one listed in the article; more…

Every time I've tried either selling something or giving something away, I came away finding that the hassle was totally not worth the time. Which obviously is easy to happen with giving something away. But even when selling, if for instance I sell something for $50 but put in an hour or two of my time, I'm still in the hole.

Whenever we give things away, we do one of two things:

  1. We donate to an appropriate organization that tends to specialize in donations for the specific items we're donating. I.e. work clothing for university students.
  2. We list an item for free, but pickup only. Confirm a day/time, and then said item is set outside for the individual to pick the item up. If they don't show, or something happens no big deal.

Re: I salvaged $6k of luxury items discarded by Duke students

#136
post #88

In LA you just leave anything you don't want that still has value on the curb and it's gone within a few hours. It's a very efficient system.

Pretty much everywhere. I have a bigger junk haul in process at the moment. But, living well off a busy exurban road well outside of Boston, if I drive or drag something big to the end of the driveway and give it a free sign, it'll be gone within a few hours.

Even better, put a price on it, then it will be "stolen" for sure.

Re: I salvaged $6k of luxury items discarded by Duke students

#137

I live near UPenn. Some locals call the end of the academic year "Penn Christmas". I definitely see some resentment, but having made an international move in my life I have sympathy for it. You need to buy things to live, shipping that stuff when you move away is often very expensive and time consuming, so you condense your life down to a few suitcases and do the best you can.

In a city I lived in bedbugs were common enough that the health department spends all weekend on major move-out dates tagging furniture with bedbug PSAs.

It seems like move-out day would be the great volume of stuff with the lowest likelihood of bed bugs.

Re: I salvaged $6k of luxury items discarded by Duke students

#138

I wonder what we need to do to make buying and selling used items convenient. My experience has been that the bid/ask spread is too large, and liquidity too low to be practical. And if you're giving something away, no one will take it. No explanation; just observations. I want to not throw things out and buy new, but haven't found a workflow that works. (I'm in an apt building near the one listed in the article; more…

Look into "buy nothing" groups. We have given away about a dozen things we once cared about with like an 80%+ certainty it's not going to a landfill.

Even if someone is breaking the rules and just refinishing furniture to resell, to be honest that benefits me because they are motivated to come get things fast, and my goal of not making trash is not only satisfied, but there is surplus enjoyment from being part of creating new value in an item.

Re: I salvaged $6k of luxury items discarded by Duke students

#139

I wonder what we need to do to make buying and selling used items convenient. My experience has been that the bid/ask spread is too large, and liquidity too low to be practical. And if you're giving something away, no one will take it. No explanation; just observations. I want to not throw things out and buy new, but haven't found a workflow that works. (I'm in an apt building near the one listed in the article; more…

[deleted]

Re: I salvaged $6k of luxury items discarded by Duke students

#140

I wonder what we need to do to make buying and selling used items convenient. My experience has been that the bid/ask spread is too large, and liquidity too low to be practical. And if you're giving something away, no one will take it. No explanation; just observations. I want to not throw things out and buy new, but haven't found a workflow that works. (I'm in an apt building near the one listed in the article; more…

We don't have to do anything, Craigslist already exists and works great. I've bought stuff from departmerting college students, the transaction is as simple as showing up and saying 'hi, are you X? Great, here's $50, thanks for The Thing'.

Some people just cannot be bothered, and if they're wealthy they simply may not care about concepts like wasting money - doubly so if they grew up with money and have never had to ration it for basic items. This isn't a market in search of a tech solution, any more than people who put out working items on the street with a sign saying 'free' because they don't want to go through the hassle of conducting a transaction for pocket money.

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